Get ready for some more laughs from America’s Funniest Home Videos (AFV). The longest-running entertainment show in ABC’s history has entered an agreement with Maker Studios through which Maker will produce content on AFV’s YouTube channel.
Maker and Vin Di Bona Productions will be releasing several short-form, original content to help develop AFV’s brand. The main attraction will likely be the 17-episode series ShayFV, with weekly 3-5 minute episodes hosted by Shay “Shay Carl” Butler. The series will debut on Maker.tv on October 19, while also appearing on Shay’s YouTube channel. Additionally, user-generated content from ShayFV audience challenges will be weekly features on AFV’s YouTube channel.
In a release reported on by Variety, Carl said the show has been “a huge influence on my decision to start vlogging and pursue my content career. If it wasn’t for AFV, I may have never posted that first video of me dancing in a unitard.”
Maker and Vin Di Bona Prod. also want to create other digital and in-show content that features more YouTubers like Sam Macaroni, Brooke “Dodger” Lawson, and Barely Political. The two companies have tapped Jason Horton, Ceciley Jenkins, and Ed Bassmaster for AFV Do Overs, where they’ll reenact some of the show’s most memorable moments. These will air for a week on TV before going to AFV’s YouTube channel. Horton’s also set to appear in the improv series America’s Funniest Line, which will debut on October 5 on AFV’s YouTube, coinciding with the show’s 25th season premiere on ABC.
Maker is already partnered with Vin Di Bona Prod. to manage its AFV-related YouTube content and video rights. While AFV has been putting videos on YouTube for a while now, the non-pet-or-kid-related content has taken a while to attract attention. Di Bona, creator and producer of AFV, believes adding younger, familiar faces in the digital realm will remedy that.
“I never could have imagined, when I first pitched this idea in 1989, that using viewer-generated content to entertain families would become the phenomenon it is today,” Di Bona said in a statement. “Our relationship with Shay Carl and YouTube’s talented roster of comedians is the perfect extension of the AFV brand as we continue our quest to engage a new generation of AFV fans and develop memorable destinations for every platform for audiences who love to laugh.”
With over 9 billion monthly views and more than 550 million subscribers, Maker is uniquely suited to help Di Bona’s AFV-related content appear in front of the new eyes he’s searching for.
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