It's Expensive for 60Frames to 'Get Ripped'

Gym rats need to be made fun of. Nobody’s done it yet.

Everyone’s been too busy parodying bodybuilders and douchebags – who, one could argue, are all concentric circles in the same Venn Diagram – to take an extended look through a satirical lens at the superfit that walk among us, at the bridge-and-tunnel trainers that work at city clubs and sell personal sessions like used car salesmen, at the top-heavy dudes that invent awkward stretches so they can put your girl into sexually suggestive positions by the treadmills for $60/hour.

The personal trainer is an archetypal character in need of some comedic attention, and Gloria Claderon Kellet gives it fair treatment in Get Ripped.

Created by Kellet, shot by Firefly, distributed by new media studio 60Frames, and starring Rand Holdren, it’s a POV tour of your local LA Fitness with a guide hopped up on copious amounts of Ephedrine. And it costs $20,000 an episode.

From John Horn at the LA Times:

“There’s no sponsorship deal in place yet for ‘Get Ripped’…but 60Frames hopes a fitness product would eventually sponsor the series to cover its production costs, which total about $20,000 per episode.”

Kellet’s resume impresses – she’s an award-winning playwright, a writer for CBS’ How I Met Your Mother, a member of the LA-based sketch comedy group And Donkey Makes Five, and takes one helluva headshot. Her first project in online entertainment is off to a decent start.

Despite some lingering monologue (you can tell Kellet adapted the series from one of her

plays), Holdren plays the role of “stereotypical personal trainer who’s overcompensating for an overweight past” well, with exclamations exaggerated just enough to be almost believable. If you can last through the entire 4:18 premiere, you’ll be intrigued enough to wonder where your weekly workouts with Derek Gillespie will take you.

But $20,000 an episode?!? Twenty-thousand dollars an episode!?! Seriously???!!! Where’s this money going? If you’re line producing the show please get in touch with me (joshua AT tilzy DOT tv). Inquiring minds (me!) want to know what you’re spending your money on.

I’m all for big budget web shows, but a big budget Get Pumped does not need. For a lot less cash and an equal opportunity at landing a sponsor, you could buy a tricked out Red, a month with a staff writer for Cracked, and give them both to this dude.

Or follow Carrot Top around for a day with a small camera crew. He’s kinda famous, mildly amusing, and into fitness!

UPDATE: Liz talked with Get Ripped director Fed Schroeder who says he has no idea where John Horn got the $20K quote from and that the budget is actually around $3,000 per episode.  I still think putting the cash towards that YouTube kid or Carrot Top would’ve been a better investment.