Tubefilter News

There’s a Woody Allen reference in the first 30 seconds of the latest and greatest installment of the indy web series duder.

Ricky, cooking breakfast in his newly renovated Brooklyn apartment, asks Glen, playing video games in Ricky’s newly renovated Brooklyn apartment, if he wants to see a screening of Stardust Memories in McCarren Park. Glen, despite being a huge Woody Allen fan, is apathetic. His reasoning? “It’s just going to be so crowded, you know, because everybody in New York City has a deep, personal relationship with Woody Allen movies.”

It’s funny because it’s sort of true, but more because duder writer, creator, and actor Matt Kirsch (who plays Glen) is obviously projecting. His relationship with one of America’s greatest film directors goes beyond deep and personal and enters the realm of influential and intimate.

Kirsch channels Allen (along with other devotees to Allen’s particular brand of Jewish, neurotic humor that’s at once about everything and nothing, including Jerrry Seinfeld and Larry David) throughout the whole of duder. It’s the same self-indulgent, mildly offensive, somewhat self-loathing, smart, Semitic character embodied in a new persona, placed in a new environment on the other side of the East River. It’s an “agonizing, overzealous analysis of life’s least important mysteries.” And it’s good.

The premiere episode of Season Three is the best installment of duder yet. It picks up right where Season Two left off. Glen and Ricky (played by Alden Ford from The Webventures of Justin & Alden) are hanging out, talking about whatevs.

Kirsch, who works as a Digital Producer at The Onion, produces duder at his own pace. He told me over e-mail he expects Season Three to last anywhere from 6 to 10 monthly episodes. Kirsch also produces the series out of his own pocket. He’s certainly open to to the idea of sponsors, but said it’s not the end goal, “We’ve always just focused on making the best show possible.”

In addition to creative drive, duder is back for a third season because of two more reasons: 1) the WGA East and 2) new film equipment. Kirsch explained:

I’d say a large reason we brought the show back was encouragement from the Writer’s Guild East, their creation of a new digital WGA award, and the positive responses I’ve received from other content creators I’ve met through the guild. Also, Alden happened to be sitting on some amazing new equipment (including a Canon 5d) so we couldn’t resist playing with it.

We always wanted to bring the show back and I’ve had a bunch of scripts written for a while, but time constraints always made it difficult. The WGA gave us a kick in the pants to actually get moving.

Makes sense. The writing has always been duder’s strong point and if the show could use an upgrade in any area it’s camera quality. The latest installment of the series looks fantastic, especially when you compare to episodes from last season. A cleaner, crisper picture can highlight Kirsch and Ford’s dialogue and dynamic for judging bodies and broader audiences. Be sure to check it out at dudershow.com.

dLt Casting & Productions, the Hollywood-based “cattle call” agency behind Scream Queens, Beauty and the Geek, The Fashion Show, The Biggest Loser, and other reality shows across NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, MTV, VH1, Bravo, and E!, just posted an open call for a new reality web series from Martha Stewart Weddings and hair care products maker Pantene called I Do, My Do.

Johnny Knoxville and his boys have pretty much dominated every other medium—it began as a TV show after all—they get their hands on, so why not saddle up for the web? Their latest collection of raunchy pranks and stunts, Jackass 3D, scored $155 million dollars in global box office in just over a month making it the highest grossing non-scripted film to date.

Now as a follow up, Paramount is releasing an online-only Jackass 3.5 in March 2011 with all new stunts and pranks that will be released online weekly and then packaged together as a feature length film. That makes this what we like to call a “companion” web series, with its original concept launched in another medium. But a web series it will be nonetheless.

Nick Green is a government operative, part of an elite, covert force of 64 highly trained U.S. military personnel. He’s a deadly assassin with an appreciation for blondes and a dislike for their overprotective boyfriends. And he’s a junior in high school. Green must carefully balance innate, 17-year-old hormones and teenage drama while executing his hits.

So goes the premise for Aim High, a web series from executive producer Peter Murrietta, producer McG, creators Heath Corson and Richie Keen, and financiers Warner Premiere and Dolphin Entertainment. The program – which is one of three upcoming online originals from Warner Bros. short-form digital content arm – just announced its cast list will feature a number of actors popular with the teenybopper crowd.

Jackson Rathbone (Jackson Hale in the Twilight Saga) will take on the role of Green. Aimee Teegarden (Julie Taylor on Friday Night Lights) will play the object of Green’s affections, the charming Amanda Miles. Other members of the Aim High Cast include:

Aim High also stars Rebecca Mader (Lost) as Nick’s sultry science teacher Ms. Walker, Johnny Pemberton (Megadrive) as the well-connected best friend Marcus, Clancy Brown (Highlander) as Russian mercenary Boris the Bear, Jonathan McDaniel (That’s So Raven) as Amanda’s jealous boyfriend and swim team captain Derek Long, and Greg Germann (Ally McBeal) as the protective Vice Principal Ockenhocker.

No distributors or advertisers are currently attached to the project, but SVP and General Manager of Warner Premiere, Eva Davis told me earlier this month to expect to hear more announcements of that nature in the near future.

The most recent series from Atom.com’s reloaded original programming slate announced last summer tells the story of 37-year-old commodities trade broker, who in the recent economic downturn, loses his job to a computer. Now unemployed, he must say goodbye to the trading pit, booze, and testosterone, and hello to life as The Stay-At-Home Dad.

Can we call this its own genre now or what? Web series from inside the so-called ‘LA Bubble’ have dipped their bucket in the well of aspiring Hollywood stories that it really deserves its own name. We get barraged by a least one of these a week—two, possibly three, young twentysomethings have moved out to LA clawing their way through the dregs of the Hollywood ladder, all while underpaid and oversexed.

A new entrant joined the fold this month in Freckle and Bean, opening with three episodes that so far hug true to this quasi-meta subgenre of the real Young Hollywood. James (Elena Crevello) and Emma (Heather McCallum), both girls in their early-twenties, are fresh-off-the-interstate transplants from the midwest trying to beat the odds and make it in Hollywood.

The clichés of this new genre are all here—craigslist roommates, sketchy dates with d-list celebrities, indentured servitude of A-listers assistant jobs. But something clicks in this series where others don’t. The charm of the two leading ladies, both good friends in real life, mix relatable ambition with a classy candor that finds me rooting for them throughout their missteps. Balance that with a well fleshed-out supporting cast of characters, like Skye (Betsy Cox) the incapable A-lister who shines as a comic Lohan of the story, and comedy wannabe Ken (Kris Sharma) who brings a burst of energy into the mix. Yoga couch-surfer Chase (Bobby Gold) is always good for a few well-timed laughs.

Do you wish you slept better? The Better Sleep Council can help.

Since 1979, this non-profit, consumer education arm of the International Sleep Products Association (a non-profit supported by America’s mattress industry) has devoted itself to educating the public about how to improve upon what everyone spends one third of their lives doing. The BSC produces Better Sleep Guides and disseminates research linking sufficient sleep to improved physical performance, work productivity, and more, all in the pursuit of teaching you and me how to have pleasant dreams (and helping quality mattress makers sell their products).

Do you wish you knew more about The Better Sleep Council? Suite 7 can help with that.

The branded entertainment web series from CJP Digital Media (the same marketing and production house that created The Temp Life and The Webventures of Justin and Alden and helped Easy to Assemble become one of the most-watched branded web shows ever) is an anthology, featuring seven, scripted, stand-alone installments all intended to entertain and “heighten consumers’ awareness of the link between the mattress and overall sleep health.”

Wilson Cleveland, SVP of CJP Digital Media, told me Suite 7 is his homage to Four Rooms, and tells a handful of distinct stories set in the same hotel room, each one directed by and starring a unique set of Hollywood and web celebrities.

The cast and crew is comprised of a laundry list of such names as Craig Bierko (Damages), Shannen Doherty (Charmed), Illeana Douglas (Entourage), Mark Gantt (The Bannen Way), Tony Janning & Sandeep Parikh (The Legend of Neil), Michael Kang (Easy to Assemble), Susan Miller (The L Word, Anyone But Me), Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes), Brian Austin Green (Beverly Hills 90210), Henry Dittman (Greek), George Newbern (Nip/Tuck), Eddie McClintock (Warehouse 13), Brandon Molale (Reno 911!), Jaime Murray (Dexter), Tara Perry (The Legend of Neil), Alexi Wasser (Boy Crazy), and Cleveland himself.

When I asked Cleveland how he was able to wrangle such a killer lineup, this was his answer:

It’s always a team effort. I’ve been incredibly lucky this year to have worked on multiple shows with so many talented friends like Milo, Tony, Sandeep, and Felicia Day. For Suite 7, I gave a lot of control to the writers and directors, including casting.

I’ve known Shannen for a while. We worked together on Webventures and she reached out to Brian Austin Green, (which, for a recovering 90210 addict like myself, was Christmas in October). Mark Gantt knows Eddie and Jaime so he got them to do the show.

But I really owe a lot to Illeana Douglas. Suite 7 is the fifth series we’ve worked on together in the last year. She’s introduced me to so many amazing people like Craig Bierko who not only wrote an episode of Suite 7 and got George Newbern to co-star, but he’s also playing my brother this season on The Temp Life.

Each episode showcases characters checking into Suite 7, “where they unpack their emotional baggage and eventually discover the bed in the center of the room somehow holds the key to resolving their conflict of dealing with overall sleep health.”

The series will be distributed online by Lifetime at MyLifeTime.com and is set to debut December 17.

The latest in a long string of YouTube videos leading their creators to lucrative development deals with major motion picture studios comes from old school YouTube favorite, Waverly Films.

The collective of seven Brooklyn filmmakers are best known in the web series world for their Atom.com series Stickman Exodus – the story of a group of brave stick figures trying to traverse dangerous scribbles and end up on the promised page of a middle schooler’s lab notebook – and winning the second (and last) YouTube Sketchies Comedy Contest – a short-lived, annual event aimed at finding, celebrating, and rewarding YouTube’s most talented comedy creators.

But in the near future, the greater public may know Waverly Films as the talented individuals behind that Eli Roth gore flick with the clown.

Waverly Films uploaded a teaser to a fake movie called Clown a little over a month ago. In 78 seconds, the trailer depicts pithy scenes from a film inspired by the mask part of The Mask, the Cowboy Dan no-show storyline in Parenthood, and the whole of It. Local area dad fills in for a clown who doesn’t make it to his son’s birthday, can’t take off the makeup or costume once the party’s over, and slowly transforms into some Barnum and Bailey version of Brundlefly.

The creators of Clown took a page out of Alex Brownstein’s playbook and included a card in the trailer that reads, “From Master of Horror Eli Roth.” The trailer made it’s way back to Roth. Four weeks later Deadline reported Roth is on board to produce the film. Waverly Films’ own Jon Watts will direct and Watts and Waverly colleague, Christopher D. Ford will pen the script.