'Seth & Avi' Debuts, Despite iKlipz Folding

Indie film and video site iKlipz quietly went under this summer, though one of its original web series commissions has managed to find some daylight on Funny or Die this week.  The company folded while the show was in production on future episodes, so as of now Seth & Avi Show is just three episodes.

The bro-comedy is created by writing duo Seth Menachem and Avi Rothman, with each episode the pair playing themselves “Avi is continuously pulling his best friend Seth into sticky situations,” said Menachem when describing the setup. Incidentally, the series itself is a little preview of the pair’s in development series Partners which they recently sold to Starz.

Rothman is a familiar face around here as the star of Atom.com’s underrated gem Modern Day Jesus, which popped out last winter. Word is that they are pitching that series to Comedy Central for a possible half-hour TV pickup. Rothman’s co-creator from Modern Day Jesus, Oren Kaplan, directed the Seth & Avi Show along with Greg Thanos.

Menachem also launched a low-fi blog and interview series, Life Advice from Old People, that picked up some national press attention and even spawned an offshoot blog, Life Advice from Clergy. Somehow not surprisingly there are talks of a book deal in the works.

The now-defunct iKlipz had signed short order deals with a handful of web series creators like The Fine Brothers, who had a multi-sketch contract with them last December. The site apparently struggled to make money even with its pedigree of Hollywood names on its advisory board like Ed Burns and Jon Landau.