Last May, Jesse Wellens and Jeana Smith, the couple behind one of YouTube’s biggest prank channels, PrankVsPrank, announced their separation, as well as a cessation of their popular daily vlogs in order to pursue larger-scale projects.
And today, Wellens, 34 — who signed with Beverly Hills talent agency WME late last year — has dropped something of a whopper: a music video for legendary rapper Snoop Dogg’s latest single, BadBadNotGood. The politically-charged clip, which also stars acclaimed actor Michael Rapaport, marks the first project from Wellens’ just-formed production company, Rose Ave., which it says has other music videos, TV shows, and feature films in the works.
According to Billboard, the concept for the video arose when Wellens and Snoop Dogg — who share the same manager — were smoking together at a video game event both attended last fall. The song and video are a commentary on police brutality, hatched in the wake of the death of Philando Castile, whose murder at the hands of a police officer in Minnesota last July was captured on Facebook Live. Music video director James DeFina co-helmed the clip with Wellens.
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The majority of the characters in the video — including one named Ronald Krump, who bears a striking resemblance to our President — are dressed as clowns, “because it’s clownery,” Wellens told Billboard of today’s political climate. “It’s ridiculous what’s happening. As America, it just doesn’t seem like we’re very respected right now.” At the end of the video, in an explosively evocative moment, Snoop fires a gun directly at Krump’s head, whereupon a flag with the word ‘Bang’ pops out of the barrel.
The song will appear on Snoop Dogg’s forthcoming album, Never Left, which is slated to drop in May. BadBadNotGood isn’t the first time that the rapper has collaborated with a high-profile YouTube star: in January 2016, he appeared in the song and video for Ricky Dillon’s single, Problematic.
Wellens, for his part, last collaborated with Casey Neistat on a viral holiday film for Samsung, in which Neistat hovers through the Finnish mountains while being toted by a custom drone.
