Connecting the dots: Sanjaya/Will Ferrell/CAA/FunnyorDie, How Sanjaya: Human Art Project came about Options

[hollygo72]

I'm at work flipping through the Hollywood Reporter and came across and article that caught my interest. NO it DOES NOT directly reference Sanjaya in any way. But reading it a lot of things popped out at me:

Sanchez's Web dare: FunnyOrDie
Nellie Andreeva and Andrew Wallenstein
April 17, 2007


Will Ferrell and Adam McKay's Gary Sanchez Prods. is making a big splash on the Internet, partnering with leading venture capital firm Sequoia Capital to launch comedy video site FunnyOrDie.com.

Since quietly going up as a beta release Thursday, the site is off to a sizzling start. A two-minute video featuring Ferrell and McKay, writer-director of Ferrell vehicles including "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby," has racked up more than 1.5 million page views.

Titled "The Landlord," the clip features Ferrell as an apartment tenant forced to reckon with an angry landlord — who happens to be played by McKay's toddler daughter. "Landlord," which is featured on the FunnyOrDie home page, has generated more than 2 million streams alone.

In addition, "Landlord" has popped up on YouTube, where it has drawn thousands more views. However, an effort was afoot to have YouTube remove the clip.

FunnyOrDie also features user-generated comedy videos, allowing anyone to upload their clips. But unlike YouTube and other popular user-generated sites, the viewers' ratings for the videos determine their fate — thus the name of the site — with only the highly rated staying on. Those with negative reviews are banished to the "Crypt" section of the site.

Sources said FunnyOr Die.com has been in the works for months, following an overture by Sequoia to CAA that led to the partnering with Ferrell, McKay and Gary Sanchez executive Chris Henchy. (Both Sanjaya and Will Ferrell are represented by CAA)

Sequoia knows a thing or two about successful user-generated Web sites, having provided early rounds of funding to YouTube. The company also delivered venture capital for YouTube's parent, Google, as well as Yahoo! PayPal and Meebo. Sequoia also was one of the first investors in Cisco Systems, Oracle and Apple.

Ferrell and McKay employed their alter ego, Gary Sanchez (and created an alter ego for Sanjaya! By the name of Bill Vendall), to talk about their first foray into original Web content.

Sanchez, an enigmatic character described as a Paraguayan ex-NFL player who sounded on the phone awfully like McKay with a Spanish accent, said that video starring Hollywood heavyweights will appear regularly in the "featured" section of FunnyOrDie, but "the meat and cabbage of the site will be the real peoples."

He added that the site's principals will regularly scour the site to look for new talent who will then be whisked away and "put on a private jet to Paraguay." (maybe that explains that missing week we couldn't find Sanjaya! )

Comedy has long been considered a driver of the video boom on the Internet, and there have been a number of attempts of launching Web sites dedicated to comedy videos, though few have broken through to the mainstream.

Since launching last summer, Gary Sanchez has been developing features through its deal with Paramount Vantage (Hmmm....Sanjaya was spotted with an "entourage" taking meetings at Paramount back in April!). The company also recently landed a pilot at HBO.

The deal for FunnyOrDie was brokered by CAA, (again, both Will Ferrell and Sanjaya are repped by CAA) manager Jimmy Miller and attorney Deborah Klein.

So since the "Sanjaya: Human Art Project" went over like GANGBUSTERS!! I wondered if there was anything Sanjaya and Will Ferrel could pair up on and I found this:

KING DORK

Feature Film
In Development

Summary
Project Genres Adaptation, Mystery, Teen
Project Keywords mystery, teen
Synopsis Charts the exploits of a 14-year-old boy who gets involved in a series of mysteries after he reads JD Salinger's "The Catcher In The Rye."

I know it says "14" but they could be flexible! Besides lots of actors have always played younger than they really are.

Just throwing this out there. This is how my mind works.


Synopsis of "King Dork". MAN! This has Sanjaya written all over it!!

King Dork
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

King Dork is a young adult novel by Frank Portman (otherwise known as Dr. Frank) that was published in 2006 (ISBN 0-385-73291-0). The storyline follows a disillusioned teenager named Tom Henderson as he attempts to survive the daily sadism of high school, understand the opposite sex, start a band, and find some answers about his father's mysterious death.

The film rights to the book were acquired by the Will Ferrell/Adam McKay Paramount/Vantage production company Gary Sanchez Productions in November 2006. According to IMDb, the King Dork movie is set to be released in 2008. The IMDb link to information on the King Dork movie is only open to IMDbPro members as of January 4, 2007.

[proudnewyorker82]

Interesting......

[TeaNZane]

Wow that seems more of a coincidence. I didn't know CAA represent Will Ferrell and I think it was a smart move to have Sanjaya do the video. Everytime someone watches that video funnyordie.com gets more recognized. That movie does sound like it would be perfect for Sanjaya but they need to change Tom's name.

[hollygo72]

This shall be my new obsession for the month of June until the tour starts up.

Actually they don't have to change the name. Sanjaya is half white anyways (Italian). In the movie they could make his father white/american with the last name Henderson and his mother Indian. Or just say he's a multi-racial kid. That would add more depth to his character anyways.

So, I just bought the book! I'm reading the inside of the jacket. You guys - Sanjaya HAS to play this character!!

Here it is:

Tom Henderson (aka King Dork, Chi-mo, Hender-f*a*g*, and Sheepie) is a typical American high school loser. Zero athletic skils, a nonexistent social life, and an inexhaustible supply of rock-and-roll dreams. Up until the tenth grade, he spent his days with his alphabetical-order friend, Sam Hellerman, attempting self-preservation by avoiding the general normal/psychotic high school student body and administration.

Until he discovers the book - The Catcher in the Rye - that will change the world as he knows it. When Tom finds his deceased father's copy of the Salinger classic, then discovers a secret code, a funderal card, and a twenty-four-hour Martinizing receipt, he finds himself in the middle of several interlocking conspiracies and at least half a dozen mysteries involving dead people, naked people, fake people, ESP, blood, guitars, monks, witchcraft, the Bible, girls, the Crusades, a devil head, and rock and roll. And it looks like it's all just the tip of a very odd iceberg of clues that may very well help tom unravel the puzzle of his father's death and - strangely - reveal the secret to attracting semihot girls.

Though being in a band could possibly be the secret to the girl thing - but good luck finding a drummer who can count to four.

This post has been edited by hollygo72: Jun 1st 2007, 4:00 PM

[TeaNZane]

This shall be my new obsession for the month of June until the tour starts up.

Actually they don't have to change the name. Sanjaya is half white anyways (Italian). In the movie they could make his father white/american with the last name Henderson and his mother Indian. Or just say he's a multi-racial kid. That would add more depth to his character anyways.

So, I just bought the book! I'm reading the inside of the jacket. You guys - Sanjaya HAS to play this character!!

Here it is:

Tom Henderson (aka King Dork, Chi-mo, Hender-f*a*g*, and Sheepie) is a typical American high school loser. Zero athletic skils, a nonexistent social life, and an inexhaustible supply of rock-and-roll dreams. Up until the tenth grade, he spent his days with his alphabetical-order friend, Sam Hellerman, attempting self-preservation by avoiding the general normal/psychotic high school student body and administration.

Until he discovers the book - The Catcher in the Rye - that will change the world as he knows it. When Tom finds his deceased father's copy of the Salinger classic, then discovers a secret code, a funderal card, and a twenty-four-hour Martinizing receipt, he finds himself in the middle of several interlocking conspiracies and at least half a dozen mysteries involving dead people, naked people, fake people, ESP, blood, guitars, monks, witchcraft, the Bible, girls, the Crusades, a devil head, and rock and roll. And it looks like it's all just the tip of a very odd iceberg of clues that may very well help tom unravel the puzzle of his father's death and - strangely - reveal the secret to attracting semihot girls.

Though being in a band could possibly be the secret to the girl thing - but good luck finding a drummer who can count to four.

Holly you're a real sleuth for finding out all of this information. If the character's name is Tom I gues it's alright. I just really hate that name. Okay I'm going to go pick up the book right now. I'll see if it's at Target if not I have to go to Barnes & Nobles downtown. I'm so excited!

[Boston Brigade]

i want to read this book too! when i think of sanjy in movies, i always picture him in a teen angsty role (Perks of Being a Wallflower always pops into my mind). This is a fun diversion for the summer, even if it turns out to be untrue. Thanks muchly Holly!!

[TeaNZane]

okay they have it at b&N

i want to read this book too! when i think of sanjy in movies, i always picture him in a teen angsty role (Perks of Being a Wallflower always pops into my mind). This is a fun diversion for the summer, even if it turns out to be untrue. Thanks muchly Holly!!

you read wallflower the manga?

[kjd2003]

This shall be my new obsession for the month of June until the tour starts up.

Actually they don't have to change the name. Sanjaya is half white anyways (Italian). In the movie they could make his father white/american with the last name Henderson and his mother Indian. Or just say he's a multi-racial kid. That would add more depth to his character anyways.

So, I just bought the book! I'm reading the inside of the jacket. You guys - Sanjaya HAS to play this character!!

Here it is:

Tom Henderson (aka King Dork, Chi-mo, Hender-f*a*g*, and Sheepie) is a typical American high school loser. Zero athletic skils, a nonexistent social life, and an inexhaustible supply of rock-and-roll dreams. Up until the tenth grade, he spent his days with his alphabetical-order friend, Sam Hellerman, attempting self-preservation by avoiding the general normal/psychotic high school student body and administration.

Until he discovers the book - The Catcher in the Rye - that will change the world as he knows it. When Tom finds his deceased father's copy of the Salinger classic, then discovers a secret code, a funderal card, and a twenty-four-hour Martinizing receipt, he finds himself in the middle of several interlocking conspiracies and at least half a dozen mysteries involving dead people, naked people, fake people, ESP, blood, guitars, monks, witchcraft, the Bible, girls, the Crusades, a devil head, and rock and roll. And it looks like it's all just the tip of a very odd iceberg of clues that may very well help tom unravel the puzzle of his father's death and - strangely - reveal the secret to attracting semihot girls.

Though being in a band could possibly be the secret to the girl thing - but good luck finding a drummer who can count to four.

He HAS to do this movie. This has him written all over it!!

[hollygo72]

If anyone else gets this book and starts reading it, let me know! I just started and I'm REALLY enjoying it. So far it's a bit like "Napoleon Dynamite" and the similarities to Sanjaya are EEERIE!!

Here is an excerpt that cracked me up:

First on the program in Mr. Schtuppe's class, when the introduction had finally ended, was a book called "30 Days to a More Powerful Vocabulary. "In 30 days, you will learn how to make words your slaves."

This book is a big list of fancy-pants words, and our job as self-improvement vocabularists was to prove we knew what they meant by saying them aloud and using them in sentences.

Mr. Schtuppe's unique twist on this was that he managed to mispronounce around half of them.

"The first word is 'bete noire,'" he said. But he pronounced it "bait noir-ay," with the emphasis on the "ay".

"Bait noir-ay," we said in unison.

"Excellent. Now, class, listen carefully: magnaminious..."
(We would have to wait till the end of the alphabet before we witnessed Mr. Schtuppe's finest hour. That would be "wanton," which he pronounced like "won ton." The delicious Chinese dumpling often served in soup at the Pacific Rim's finest eating establishments. That's why Sam Hellerman and I will sometimes refer to a sexy girl as a Won Ton Woman.)

Of course, if I had known how important mispronunciation skills would prove to be in my sex life and in the events that followed, I probably would have paid more attention. But I spent most of the class in my own zone, thinking about the lyrics of Roxy Music's "She Sells" and writing out a track list for Baby Batter's third album, "Odd and Even Number."

Note to self: one of these days, my next band is definitely going to be Beat Noir-ay. First album: "Talk Won Ton to Me, You Crazy Asian Superstar." Lots of wok solos.

This post has been edited by hollygo72: Jun 1st 2007, 9:41 PM

[Shell]

I'm getting this book!

[TeaNZane]

I just started the book this evening.It comes off as being weird and quirky. I think Sanjaya would be good for this role because he's kind of a nerd (or was) and he was like an outcast. My favorite quote is "highschool is the penalty for trangressions yet to be specified" which is so true. The whole chapter about how AP classes function is so true --they're easier than regular classes. The only concern I have is that Tom is suppose to be younger than the average person his age. Even though Sanjaya looks young he is very tall. As far as casting maybe they would have to get really tall people to play the in crowd.

[hollygo72]

Yeah the tall thing is the only thing that doesn't fit. But things can change in movie adaptations. Like in the Harry Potter books - Hermione was suppose to be plain, buck-toothed with big frizzy hair. But they cast a pretty girl with wavy hair and left her teeth normal. Or how in the book Fred and George were suppose to be short and stocky. But they cast twins that were tall and wiry.

I'm personally getting disturbing high school flashbacks myself reading this book:

"I used to get beat up and hassled a fair amount in elementary and junior high school, but not so much tehse days. In part, that's because the normal people of the world, as they mature and become more sophisticated, naturally begin to discover that psychological torture is in the end more satisfying, and easier to get away with, than the application of brute force."

A lot of that bullying stuff happened to me too.

This post has been edited by hollygo72: Jun 1st 2007, 10:04 PM

[TeaNZane]

Yeah the tall thing is the only thing that doesn't fit. But things can change in movie adaptations. Like in the Harry Potter books - Hermione was suppose to be plain, buck-toothed with big frizzy hair. But they cast a pretty girl with wavy hair and left her teeth normal. Or how in the book Fred and George were suppose to be short and stocky. But they cast twins that were tall and wiry.

I'm personally getting disturbing high school flashbacks myself reading this book:

"I used to get beat up and hassled a fair amount in elementary and junior high school, but not so much tehse days. In part, that's because the normal people of the world, as they mature and become more sophisticated, naturally begin to discover that psychological torture is in the end more satisfying, and easier to get away with, than the application of brute force."

A lot of that bullying stuff happened to me too.

Yeah the descriptions don't have to match perfectly. Even an important characteristic such as the color of Harry Potter's eyes was changed to fit the actor's abilities ( can't wear contacts ). Isn't is scary how accurate this book is about high school turmoil ahem life. I think I'm going to read Catcher in the Rye because I read it such a long time ago. Did you notice that Tom has these weird mannerisms such as twitching his ears, it reminds me of Sanjaya's lip trick. Sorry that you were bullied, I was as well but only in my early years.

This post has been edited by TeaNZane: Jun 1st 2007, 10:12 PM

[hollygo72]

Thanks for your concern. I consoled myself with the thought that I would one day be at a top notch college while they were on their 3rd child wondering who the father was. Which pretty much all came true.

Man, the description of PE class was hilarious and disturbingly accurate. The prison analogy was dead on.

This post has been edited by hollygo72: Jun 1st 2007, 10:36 PM

[IslandMomma]

On Amazon they also have some music that was written along with the book. Would be so cool, if Sanjaya got the part AND got to sing.

http://www.amazon.com/King-Dork-Frank-Port...5053&sr=1-1

[hollygo72]

On Amazon they also have some music that was written along with the book. Would be so cool, if Sanjaya got the part AND got to sing.

http://www.amazon.com/King-Dork-Frank-Port...5053&sr=1-1

Thanks for the link! Man! This part would be TOO PERFECT!! Sanjaya could play the part AND do the soundtrack!!

I'm digging "I Wanna Ramone You".

Frank Portman (aka Dr. Frank) is not just an author, he's also a musician. We were lucky enough to get a few tracks and a few words from the man behind King Dork, his band The Mr. T. Experience, and the relationship between his book and his music.

"King Dork"
This is the "title track" for my new book. No matter how many times I say that (and I've now said it at least twice by my count) it still sounds strange...Anyhow, I wrote this song for my band, the Mr. T Experience, back in the mid-nineties (you can hear the electrified rock and roll version on the MTX album The Mr. T Experience... and the Women Who Love Them). While I was gingerly, sheepishly exploring the idea of trying to write a book, and not really knowing where to begin, Krista Marino (who was to become my editor at Delacorte) suggested that I try to turn a song into a novel as a way of getting started. I can't remember why I settled on "King Dork" as the song to "novelize," but I started thinking about the narrator/character of this song and after quite a bit of staring at a blank Word document and banging my head against the bar I eventually started typing. I didn't tell anyone at the time, but for months the file entitled "King Dork_(novel)_ms" had only the words "there's no way I can write a whole book, absolutely no way, who am I kidding?" on it. The fact that this did turn into a sort of novel in the end continues to mystify me. So this is an acoustic recording of the song that started it all, in effect. "I'm King Dork and I want you to be my Queen..."


Listen to "King Dork"

"Thinking of Suicide"
The narrator of King Dork, Tom Henderson, has a band and is trying to figure out how to play his guitar and how to write songs. He writes several songs through the course of the book, and I thought it might be fun actually to come up with the songs rather than just alluding to them in the text. The songs were written by me "as Tom Henderson," know what I mean? "Thinking of Suicide" is one of the first complete songs Tom writes. The title comes from an informational pamphlet for troubled teens handed out by the school. He likes the drawing of the girl on the cover. "This would make a pretty good song," he thinks: "all I had to do was give the girl a name and feel sorry for myself while pretending to be her. And figure out some lyrics and chords and stuff." This song, which incidentally ends up echoing through and complicating his family life, his social life, and his psychological life, is the result.



Listen to "Thinking of Suicide"

"I Wanna Ramone You"
This one is a little hard to "set up," but I'll give it a shot. There are three strands all tangled up in this song. Strand A: Tom is doing research on the life and times of his mysteriously deceased father, and part of that involves poring over ancient texts like the Bible and The Catcher in the Rye. It's a long story, but in the course of this research he inadvertently learns that the French verb ramoner (which literally means "to scrub out a chimney") can be used as a sexual metaphor. As a rock and roller, he of course immediately thinks of the Ramones, and, voilà, a new English euphemism for sex is born - I ramone, you ramone, he, she or it ramones... (This is useful to him, as it gives him a much cooler metaphor for sex than any of the other ones available; and it proved useful to the author, i.e., me, as well, for pretty much the same reason.) Strand B: Tom is taking Advanced French, which he describes as "a form of the French language in which only the present tense is used. Primarily employed for telling time and for describing the activities of this one guy named Jean and this other guy named Claude." So in writing his song about the timeless power of love, he decides to include some sophisticated, romantic French phrases in the lyrics. Strand C: He has this pretty big crush on a girl from a neighboring town, so he writes a song about her. (As one does in those situations.) "I Wanna Ramone You" is the result, one of his first full-on love songs.



Listen to "I Wanna Ramone You"

This post has been edited by hollygo72: Jun 1st 2007, 10:55 PM

[TeaNZane]

Thanks for your concern. I consoled myself with the thought that I would one day be at a top notch college while they were on their 3rd child wondering who the father was. Which pretty much all came true.

Man, the description of PE class was hilarious and disturbingly accurate. The prison analogy was dead on.

oh mayne the naked part

On Amazon they also have some music that was written along with the book. Would be so cool, if Sanjaya got the part AND got to sing.

http://www.amazon.com/King-Dork-Frank-Port...5053&sr=1-1

They have a soundtrack ?

[TeaNZane]

After listening to the soundtrack I kind of feel like going to the beach

[TeaNZane]

Did you guys read about the party yet ? I love Chi-Mo.

[sprout]

what party?