Our Top Spot this week is a tongue-in-cheek viral piece of nearly four minutes, which introduces us to Kiril Vasakinov, billed as formerly being Russia’s most successful TV series creator/producer.
He invites us inside his home–a modest abode considering he was once so successful–and explains (in Russian, accompanied by English subtitles) that the TBS sitcom My Boys is a total rip-off of a comedy series he created in 1994 entitled A Woman And Her Wolves.
As exhibit A, he screens a scene from My Boys in which the star gal has her three male buddies draw pretzels, the one with the shortest pretzel having to accompany her on a boring evening event.
Next we see a clip from A Woman And Her Wolves which is pretty much the same, except with Russian actors.
Vasakinov observes, “As bad as Stalin was, he never stole anyone’s idea for a TV show.”
The angry producer then invites us to go outside and walk the former Soviet Union’s streets. He relates that this isn’t the first time that American TV has stolen from him. We then see a scene from his series Solovyova, in which a Kramer-like character stumbles around a front door, clearly the inspiration for what became Seinfeld in the U.S.
Later we see a clip from Vasakinov’s Everybody Loves Radzimierz, which was copied by American television, translating into Everybody Loves Raymond.
For the Russian producer, My Boys is the last straw, representing a pillaging of the last creative property he had to call his own.
A website address–kirilsoutrage.ru–appears at the end of this viral, serving to further promote TBS’ My Boys.
Jim Jenkins of bicoastal/international O Positive directed the viral piece for Saatchi & Saatchi, New York.
The Saatchi team included creative director Gerry Graf, associate creative director/copywriter Chris Beresford-Hill, associate creative director/art director Nick Spahr, copywriter Michael Illick, art director Dan Lucey, and senior producer Peter Ostella.
Editor/sound designer was Chris Franklin of Big Sky Edit, New York.
TikTok’s Fate Arrives At Supreme Court; Arguments Center On Free Speech and National Security
In one of the most important cases of the social media age, free speech and national security collide at the Supreme Court on Friday in arguments over the fate of TikTok, a wildly popular digital platform that roughly half the people in the United States use for entertainment and information.
TikTok says it plans to shut down the social media site in the U.S. by Jan. 19 unless the Supreme Court strikes down or otherwise delays the effective date of a law aimed at forcing TikTok's sale by its Chinese parent company.
Working on a tight deadline, the justices also have before them a plea from President-elect Donald Trump, who has dropped his earlier support for a ban, to give him and his new administration time to reach a "political resolution" and avoid deciding the case. It's unclear if the court will take the Republican president-elect's views — a highly unusual attempt to influence a case — into account.
TikTok and China-based ByteDance, as well as content creators and users, argue the law is a dramatic violation of the Constitution's free speech guarantee.
"Rarely if ever has the court confronted a free-speech case that matters to so many people," lawyers for the users and content creators wrote. Content creators are anxiously awaiting a decision that could upend their livelihoods and are eyeing other platforms.
The case represents another example of the court being asked to rule about a medium with which the justices have acknowledged they have little familiarity or expertise, though they often weigh in on meaty issues involving restrictions on speech.
The Biden administration, defending the law that President Joe Biden signed in April after it was approved by wide bipartisan majorities in Congress, contends that... Read More