By Natalie Placek
The popular Web series “We Need Girlfriends,” (WNG) created by three University alumni, is being developed as a new comedy for CBS with “Sex and the City” creator Darren Star helping to lead the way. Steven Tsapelas, class of ’03, and Angel Acevedo and Brian Aymot, ’04, all film studies and production majors, created the series when they were dumped by their girlfriends after graduation.
“We Need Girlfriends,” which boasts as many as 700,000 views per YouTube episode, was developed by the grads’ own production company, RagTag Productions. RagTag posted WNG episodes on the first of every month, and occasionally would release “specials” such as a Christmas-themed episode and a blooper reel.
Aymot described the circumstances which led to WNG being picked up by CBS as “an interesting chain of events.” An episode of WNG was a finalist for an online Emmy award, and producer Clark Peterson, who helped produce the Charlize Theron hit “Monster,” was watching a friend’s online Emmy submission when she showed him WNG.
Peterson was impressed and showed the Web series to another producer he was working with, Dennis Erdman. Erdman loved it and brought it to Star, who said he wanted to make it into a television show.
The grads flew to Los Angeles in August to meet with Star, and closed a deal with Sony to produce the show and sell it to a network.
Sony set up meetings with Fox, CBS, ABC, NBC, TBS and Comedy Central, but according to Tsapelas, “CBS was the one that was most interested and really seemed to understand the show.”
The alumni hope to premiere WNG on CBS in fall 2008, but the writer’s strike in New York City has forced writing the pilot to temporarily halt.
If CBS decides to shoot the pilot, the original actors from the Web series will have to audition with CBS for the TV role, but Tsapelas, Acevedo and Aymot will still be credited as supervising producers, and will most likely keep contributing to the script, along with a team of Hollywood writers.
Susan Murphy, the assistant dean of the School of Communication, said the WNG creators “have terrific passion for what they do,” and added, in regard to how they work together, they have “interesting and perfectly complimentary personalities.”
The three agreed that teamwork has been absolutely essential in their success and that the University has prepared them for life in the industry. “Filmmaking is a team sport, and you have to get the best out of everyone to succeed,” Aymot said. “My experience at Hofstra taught me that above all else.”
Murphy said the alumni, who were also members of the Hofstra Filmmakers Club, practically lived in Dempster Hall, the home of the School of Communication. “They were just so active at Hofstra and just so talented,” she said.
Tsapelas attributed WNG’s success to their hard work. “You get what you put into it,” Tsapelas said. “It takes a lot of hard work and effort and sleepless nights.”
RagTag Productions isn’t about riding the success of “We Need Girlfriends.” The three are still creating new ideas, while sticking to the genre that works for them. “We’ve had some meetings about some Internet shows: a college comedy and a slacker comedy,” Acevedo said. “We like comedy.”