Features
Twitter TV?
In case you’ve just been revived after spending the last few months cryogenically frozen, Twitter is the service that enables you to send your thoughts – in 140 characters or less – to anyone opting to receive them.
Who Twitters? It’s probably easier to say who doesn’t Twitter. Like Kanye West, who recently dissed the service for allegedly letting someone else sign up under the star’s name. It’s safe to say West doesn’t Twitter.
With the exception of West, just about everyone who is someone is twittering, from politicians to TV stars to rock stars. Heck, even if a celeb isn’t using Twitter, chances are he (or she) won’t own up to it. These days it’s hip to Twitter.
However, like many socially based Web services, Twitter has yet to make a dime, although the company’s recent announcement might change things.
The plan is for Twitter to team up with Reveille Productions and Brillstein Entertainment Partners for an unscripted (reality) TV series. The program will feature contestants tracking celebrities through the latter’s 140-character “tweets.”
The show’s producers are touting the program as the first to bring Twitter to the small screen, with Reveille’s head of unscripted development – Noah Oppenheim – saying, “It captures what’s best about Twitter, and it’s a compelling TV show in its own right.”
If any two companies can make a profitable TV show out of Twitter, it’s probably Reveille and Brillstein Entertainment. Reveille has succeeded in both scripted and unscripted shows, and counts “The Office,” “Ugly Betty,” “The Biggest Loser” and “American Gladiators” among its successful TV properties.
Brillstein Entertainment is also a TV powerhouse, whose sucessful TV projects include “Real Time With Bill Maher, “The Sopranos,” “According to Jim” and “News Radio.” If Twitter TV fails, it won’t because the two companies involved lack any television showbiz savvy.
Who knows? If Twitter takes off as a TV show, maybe even Kanye West will watch.