The 60 Frames series Get Ripped got a fair amount of attention this week when the LA Times reported that the professional-scale production cost $20,000 an episode to make. These days, you can make a feature film for $20,000 — how can a web series shot on one location with one actor cost $20,000 an episode? The answer, in this case, is that it doesn’t.
According to Get Ripped director Fred Schroeder, who we spoke with via email:
Get Ripped was budgeted at around $3,000 an episode. I’m not sure who told LA Times reporter John Horn that our budget was $20,000 an episode but that number is way off. Our set looked perhaps more professional than other web series he visited but that is more a testament to the skills of our producer Lara Wickes (who called in a lot of favors) than our budget. Our crew was around 14 people [not 28, as Horn reported].
Horn says he got his information straight from 60Frames and even double checked that it was $20,000 per episode. 60Frames is saying they never gave him that number and asked for a retraction but he’s refused to do so. All I know is that we had $3,000 dollars.
This is not a big budget show. We didn’t blow anything up or take huge salaries. It’s a cast of one person in one location that we shot in under ten hours. Hopefully it’s funny and will make people laugh a couple times.
But did it make us laugh? Check out Jill Weinberger’s review on NewTeeVee Station to find out.
And because it wouldn’t be a Station piece without an awesome video, this upload from Random Good Stuff illustrates a novel idea: repurposing your old touchtone phones into an ad-hoc piano. No guarantees you’ll be able to play Mozart’s Sonata in A Major right away, though.
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