'lonelygirl15', 'KateModern' Heading to Japan

EQAL, the social entertainment company behind hit web series like lonelygirl15 and KateModern

, announced they have partnered with Nagoya-based TV and radio advertising company Shinto Tsushin to bring dubbed versions of lonelygirl15 and KateModern to Japan and to produce an original LG15 series set in Japan.

Even if you haven’t watched lonelygirl15 or any of its spin-off shows, you’ve probably heard about them – the show made waves by starting out as a (supposedly authentic) video-blog, complete with in-character correspondence with YouTube viewers and references to other real-life vloggers; only once the events became more and more surreal was the show outed as a scripted production, and by then the audience was already riveted. The shows have combined views of more than 150 Million.

The show – and its side stories KateModern (starring the Streamy-nominated Tara Rushton), LG15: The Resistance, and Polish-speaking n1ckola – are all centered around a group of young women with rare physical properties that make them the target of a mysterious organization. It was the LG15 shows that established EQAL’s reputation for mixing TV production with social networking websites – the whole series feels kind of like an alternate reality game.

The plans are to have EQAL work with Shinto Tsushin and a local production company to make a new series that merges the backstory of the LG15 world with characters designed for a Japanese audience. This is similar to the arrangement EQAL currently has with Polish producers Agora and A2 Multimedia to produce n1ckola, another LG15 series based in Poland that started airing in January 2009.