Punk'd
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Punk'd | |
|---|---|
 Punk'd Opening (2003-2005) |
|
| Genre | Reality/Candid Camera |
| Creator(s) | Ashton Kutcher |
| Starring | Ashton Kutcher |
| Country of origin | United States / Canada |
| No. of episodes | 56[2] |
| Production | |
| Running time | 30 min. |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | MTV |
| Original run | April 15, 2003 – 2007 |
Punk'd is an American hidden camera practical joke television series on MTV, produced and hosted by Ashton Kutcher, which first aired in 2003. It bears a strong resemblance to both the classic hidden camera show Candid Camera, and to TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes, which also featured pranks on celebrities. "Punk'd" refers to having such a prank played on oneself, and the word also refers to the show's style of prank itself.
The final season will premiere on MTV on April 7, 2007 featuring punks on Hilary Swank, Zac Efron, Hayden Panettiere, Ashley Tisdale, Kelly Rowland, Kelis, Nelly Furtado, Magic Johnson, John Cena, Evangeline Lilly and Jewel amongst others and the series will culminate in early June with the Punk'd Awards. [1]
Contents |
[edit] Formats
[edit] Candid Camera format
The show begins with a description by Kutcher of which celebrity will be punk'd, why he feels the celebrity deserves to be punk'd, and what the setting of the joke will be, including the premise and the accomplices. As the show is usually set in Los Angeles, the pranks often take place in common locations such as parking lots, restaurants, hotel rooms, residences, Universal Studios Hollywood, a school or a bowling alley. Occasionally, Kutcher will engineer the prank at a celebrity event at which the target is a prominent guest, such as barring Halle Berry entry to the premiere of her film, Gothika because the number of the people in the establishment exceeded the fire code, or when he pranked Denver Nuggets' Guard Allen Iverson by convincing him that he could not enter his own 30th birthday party because the President's daughters and Secret Service men were inside. Kutcher will also sometimes use real-life current events as elements in his pranks, as when he pranked tennis player Andy Roddick, who was scheduled to appear on The Tonight Show, by convincing him that his automobile was trapped by the 2004-2005 Los Angeles mudslides. Kutcher sometimes sets his pranks on the sets of movies, TV shows or music videos where his targets are working, as when he pranked Kanye West by convincing him that he could not shoot any footage for his music video for the song Jesus Walks on Sundays without a permit, or when he pranked The Game by convincing him that he could not leave his studio because his crew had repaved its entrance, or pranked Daddy Yankee where he was slapped with a $463,000 fine by the FCC for swearing on live radio. Kutcher has also done holiday-themed pranks, as when he pranked Beyoncé Knowles into thinking she knocked over a 50 foot Christmas Tree, or when he pranked Fall Out Boy's Peter Wentz into thinking he derailed a train at a Christmas festival. After the joke progresses to a point, usually with the celebrity having become angry or frustrated at the outrageousness of the situation, Kutcher or one of the actors will announce to the surprised victim that they just had a practical joke played on them (usually with the line, "You just got Punk'd!"). Each half-hour episode usually features three pranks.
[edit] Road trips
In Season 3, Kutcher and his crew went to the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C., at an event tied to the release of the film The Prince and Me, and pranked actress Julia Stiles.
In a season 5 road trip to Tony Hawk's hometown Carlsbad, California, Hawk was pranked by son Riley, who destroyed a park restroom with an M-80, supposedly injuring a bystander played by an actress.
In Season 6, Kutcher sent crew members to Moorestown, New Jersey, the town of residence of football player Terrell Owens, in order to prank him there. The crew staged an auto accident in which Owens, believing it to be real, attempted to assist elderly people from an overturned bus. [2].
[edit] Ryan Pinkston format
A frequent segment during the first season had the then fifteen-year-old Ryan Pinkston pretending to interview celebrities at red carpet events for a kids' show, only to mock them instead [3].
[edit] Celebrities interviewed by Pinkston
The following is a list of stars interviewed by Pinkston, along with awkward questions he posed to them.
- Kid Rock - "What underpants are you wearing?"
- Pamela Anderson - "Wanna make out later?"
- Ray Liotta - "I really liked you in The Sopranos."
- Christina Aguilera - "Could we hook up later maybe?"
- Denise Richards - "How does it feel to play someone smart?" "How do you feel about Halle Berry being the hottest Bond Girl ever?" (Richards herself had been a Bond Girl)
- Tori Amos - "Did you like working on Beverly Hills 90210?" To which Amos replied, "Oh honey, I make records. You want Tori Spelling. But that's ok. I'll get you one (records)."
- Christina Applegate - "I really like Genie In a Bottle." "Aren't you Christina Aguilera?" To which Applegate replied, "Bless your heart, and thanks for saying that I look 20 years old!"
- Eddie Griffin - "Eddie, why are you such a pimp?"
- Pierce Brosnan - "I think Sean Connery was the best Bond ever."
- Dominic Monaghan and Billy Boyd
- Lacey Chabert
- Pauly Shore - "What's going on with your career, man?" Then, attempting to embarrass him, "Pauly Shore everybody, Pauly Shore is in the house!"
- Johnathon Schaech - "Good bit on The West Wing." After Schaech replied that he wasn't on The West Wing: "Dude, you ain't Rob Lowe?"
- Lifehouse - "You're not O-Town?"
[edit] Failed punks
- In the season 1 finale, producer Jason Goldberg tried to prank Kutcher, with Britney Spears being an accomplice. Kutcher caught on, made Spears a turncoat and punk'd Goldberg. Also, Spears tried to punk Busta Rhymes in New York City but Kutcher told her to not punk Rhymes.
- In December 2003, Kutcher attempted to "punk" WWE wrestler Bill Goldberg by having a truck run over an exact replica of his prized motorcycle, but the stunt went wrong when the truck clearly missed the bike. When the bike spontaneously exploding without any visible reason, Goldberg quickly realized what was going on, and asked, "Who do I get to kill first?" as Kutcher (accomplice Jesse James walking with him) revealed himself, knowing the joke had failed. This was the only failed punk to actually make it on air. It aired on the Season 2 finale.
- According to Kutcher himself, he failed to punk Neve Campbell twice until he finally succeeded on his third try in season 6.
- In June 2005, Kutcher failed to "punk" Lil Jon. He was boarding a plane headed for Las Vegas, but Kutcher used actors to play customs agents to tell him that he was actually headed for Ecuador. Lil Jon quickly identified members of the "customs agents" from previous episodes of the program, and asked for Kutcher to reveal himself. Lil Jon is currently one of four celebrities to thwart an attempted "punking" by Kutcher. Later in an interview Lil Jon quipped, "You can't Punk the King of Crunk."
- He also has failed to "punk" Nick Cannon, as he said that he, being a TV show producer himself, 'recognized the poor acting and hidden cameras', quoted in People magazine.
[edit] Controversy and conflict
- In late 2003, it had been announced by MTV that Kutcher had decided not to continue production on Punk'd. Some commentators speculated that the announcement was a ploy designed to lower the guard of increasingly wary celebrities in an attempt at another season of pranks. This theory was given more credence when the third season began airing on April 25, 2004.
- Alias star Michael Vartan reportedly refused to sign the release after being pranked by Kutcher, preventing the prank from airing. However, Vartan denies ever being pranked. [4][5]
- American Pie star Shannon Elizabeth filed for divorce from her husband Joe Reitman, a year after her appearance on the show. She was reportedly furious over his involvement in the prank, which involved leading Elizabeth to believe that they had been filmed on a sex tape. [6]
- Pamela Anderson also denies ever being pranked. [7]
- New York Yankees third-baseman Alex Rodriguez refused to sign the release after his prank and asked Kutcher to destroy the tape. "It was a good idea. It was just bad timing," Rodríguez said later. [8]
- During his interview of Kutcher for Interview, actor Brad Pitt advised Kutcher not to prank his Ocean's Eleven co-star George Clooney, a notorious prankster himself. Pitt told Kutcher, "Don't do it. Don't ever go near it. Clooney will kill you and everything you love. I know it's tempting, but don't do it." [9]
- Talk show host Ellen DeGeneres has stated that she does not wish to be Punk'd, and is so paranoid that she often assumes she is being Punk'd whenever any suspicious or out of the ordinary mishap occurs, as when, for example, a valet gives her the wrong car when leaving a restaurant, which Kutcher's crew members did to Simon Cowell during the Season 5 Premiere. [10]
[edit] Influences
In addition to the obvious influences of past hidden camera prank shows such as Candid Camera and TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes, Method Man, Redman and Matt Besser of the Upright Citizens Brigade had a hidden camera celebrity prank show on MTV called Stung in 2002, a full year before the introduction of Punk'd. Whether this was a direct influence on Punk'd is unclear. In an issue of the hip hop magazine S.M.A.C.K. DVD Vol. 9, an interviewer asks Redman about the similarities between Stung and Punk'd, and the rapper replies "Fuck you, Ashton Kutcher," to the delight of the audience, who begin to chant the phrase.
[edit] Parodies and derivatives
[edit] MTV shows derived from Punk'd
- Singers Michelle Branch, JC Chasez and Season 1 Punk'd victim Nick Lachey created another prank show called Faking the Video during the 11-month Punk'd exile. [11]
- Ryan Dunn created another prankshow called Homewrecker which the show mixes with Punk'd and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
- Victims Tony Hawk, Vivica A. Fox, and Tichina Arnold later volunteered on another prank show Hi-Jinks on MTV's sister network Nick-at-Nite.
[edit] Parodies and other derivatives
- Dave Chappelle parodied Punk'd and The Jamie Kennedy Experiment in a skit that he called Zapped.
- In 2003, Timberlake spoofed Kutcher and Punk'd when he hosted Saturday Night Live.
- During the 2003-04 National Hockey League season, the Los Angeles Kings broadcast on Fox Sports West produced a handful of segments called Puck'd featuring practical jokes on various Kings players. The segments were created for pre-game and between-period entertainment. Luc Robitaille, who was retired from the NHL after the 2005-06 season, played the role of Kutcher. Puck'd made a return in the 2005-06 season.
- Stephen Colbert parodied the show in his well-known segment on The Daily Show, This Week In God, introducing a new fake program called Baptiz'd.
- In the television comedy Will and Grace, Jack McFarland, an executive of a gay television network, invents Pink'd, the gay equivalent of Punk'd, in episode It's A Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad World. The first person to be "pink'd" is title character Will Truman.
- In an episode of the sketch comedy show MADtv, Will Sasso, impersonating Kenny Rogers, did his own version of Punk'd. The jokes involved Kenny botching his pranks and, forgetting what to do next, would simply kick the celebrity in the groin. Targets included Clay Aiken (played by Ron Pederson).
- In the Family Guy episode "I Take Thee Quagmire", Peter remembers that one time he pranked Kutcher by throwing an axe at him and saying, "You've just been Tomahawk'd! That's my show, Tomahawk'd."
- The film High School Musical refers to Punk'd in one scene with Lucas Grabeel and his on-screen sister Ashley Tisdale.
- In May, 2006, O.J. Simpson released a candid camera show for pay-per-view and DVD called Juiced. One of the pranks showed Simpson trying to sell a white Ford Bronco like the one he made famous in the slow speed chase in 1994.[12]
- In an episode of The Adventures of Chico and Guapo, the two title characters decide to come up with a prank show called "You've been Guapo-sized", in order to become stars in the next Punk'd.
- Carlos Mencia played Ashton Kutcher in a sketch on his show, Mind of Mencia in which he would bust online sexual predators in a skit called "Dateline Punk'd."
- The Ronnie Johns Half Hour parodied Punk'd on a sketch, instead naming it Pope'd
- In the episode of Hannah Montana "Grandma Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Favorites", the Queen of England remarks after Hannah's rather speedy rendition of "The Other Side of Me", "Have we just been punk'd?"
- In "Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories" when the main character Adell attacks Axel, before the battle Axel asks the question, "Hey, am I on 'Screw'd'?" in obvious reference to "Punk'd".
- In the film Epic Movie, after Edward, played by Kal Penn, is kicked by the White Bitch, played by Jennifer Coolidge, David Lehre, along with a camera crew, enters the scene dressed like Ashton Kutcher and annoyingly tells Edward again and again that he has been "Punk'd" (over-exaggerating how Ashton reacts to the celebrities he has punk'd), until eventually Edward knocks him out in annoyance.
- In the September 2006 and February 2007 editions of LAMB!, a premier magazine for the young artist community in Michigan, the art news column featured an editorial on the "Ashton Kutcher of the art world", in which the world-famous Leonardo da Vinci's American Horse, a 24 foot high bronze horse at internationally renowned Frederik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park, fell victim to a sculpture punk called Paletta Grande.
- In the show Reba the titular character pranks her son on Hallowen, later saying, "You got Reba'd!"
[edit] Celebrities who have been Punk'd
- List of celebrities who have been Punk'd by episode
- List of celebrities who have been Punk'd by name
[edit] Pranks not aired
| Name of Prankee | Intended Season: | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Al Shearer | 1 | The prank was never seen on MTV but was released on The Complete First Season: DVD |
| Alex Rodriguez | 3 | First celebrity to deny Punk'd broadcasting rights, although he was amused by the show's concept. (See above) |
| Black Eyed Peas | 3 | Claimed in an interview that they were pranked. They noticed the 'cops' apparently featured in the prank weren't real and got into a fight because they suspected the fake police not of being Punk'd staff, but criminals. [13][14] |
| JoJo | 4 | Denied Punk'd broadcasting rights. Common belief is that JoJo did not sign the release form to air her episode because she didn't want her young fans to see her swearing but she has said that that isn't true because she didn't swear. [15] |
| Juliette Lewis | 4 | MTV forgot to air her on Season 4. |
| Michael Vartan | 4 | Denied Punk'd broadcasting rights. (See above) |
| Pitbull | 6 | Pulled out from the air because of Dallas Cowboys Wide Receiver Terrell Owens suspension on November 19, 2005 while with the Philadelphia Eagles. [16] |
| Pamela Anderson | ? | Denied Punk'd broadcasting rights (See above) |
[edit] International versions
- An Icelandic version of the show, Tekinn, hosted by Auðunn Blöndal, premiered on channel Sirkus in fall 2006.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- Punk'd website on mtv.com
- Punk'd at the Internet Movie Database
- Punk'd at TV.com
