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New channel promises more laughs
AP Television Writer
NEW YORK
Evan Shapiro thinks you deserve to laugh more. Wherever you are. With hot- and cold-streaming comedy from any screen in reach.
He thinks Seeso, his new streaming comedy channel, will do the trick.
“We want to give you more and better laughter,” he says, adding that when you log on to Seeso, a dose of comedy content is served to you with barely a moment’s delay, “because we also want you laughing FASTER.”
Shapiro is a former president of IFC and Sundance channels and was an executive producer of such laugh generators as “The Onion News Network,” “The Whitest Kids U’Know” and “Portlandia.”
A year ago he became executive vice president of NBCUniversal Digital Enterprises, and, jumping onto the OTT (over-the-top) video bandwagon, “We’re launching this brand-new product, direct to the consumer, with 2,500 hours of content, 20 original series and a brand-new platform built from scratch. And we are doing it organically, from within, as opposed to making an acquisition.”
Seeso may be a homegrown part of the Comcast empire, but its indie vibe is reflected in its offices on Manhattan’s lower Broadway, many blocks removed from Rockefeller Center’s Comcast headquarters, in an airy loftlike space where affirmations are scribbled on the walls.
The ad-free Seeso, which officially launches Thursday, will be available by subscription for $3.99 per month.
Its programming includes old favorites “30 Rock,” “Fawlty Towers,” “Parks and Recreation,” “Saved by the Bell,” “The IT Crowd,” both the British and U.S. versions of “The Office,” and every season of “The Kids in the Hall.”
Next-day episodes of “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” and “Late Night with Seth Meyers” will be available, as well as all 40-plus years of “Saturday Night Live,” “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” and Python films “The Meaning of Life,” “Holy Grail” and “Life of Brian.”
Initially, original fare will include “The UCB Show,” from Upright Citizens Brigade founders like Amy Poehler; a dating/sketch-comedy series, “Dave & Ethan: Lovemakers”; “Sammy J & Randy in Ricketts Lane,” a musical comedy about mismatched housemates (one an attorney, the other a puppet); and the animated “Cyanide & Happiness Show,” based on the Web comic.