Gaga for 'Glee'
Gleeks delight in online mimicry of the show's musical numbers
David Hiltbrand, MCT Campus
Issue date: 11/20/09 Section: Sports
"Glee," Fox's sharp and subversive musical comedy series, is averaging a respectable 8.6 million viewers a week.
And apparently all of them are going online to champion and celebrate the show, which is turning out to be more viral than H1N1.
"Glee" may rank 42d in the Nielsen ratings, but it's a phenomenon on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
"We monitored Twitter feeds," says Chris Albrecht, coeditor of NewTeeVee.com, a Web site devoted to online video, "and 'Glee' is absolutely crushing the competition. Of all TV shows, it's the one people Twitter about the most."
Fans of the series-imagine "High School Musical" with a wicked sense of humor-call themselves Gleeks. They have a unique way of expressing their devotion: taping do-it-yourself copycat videos of the show's rousing musical numbers, then posting them on YouTube or on their individual home pages.
The spontaneous explosion of tribute videos was the first indication to the makers of "Glee," which airs at 9 p.m. EST Wednesdays on Fox, that their show was hitting a sweet spot with viewers.
"Right after we aired the pilot in May, people started posting their own versions of our songs online," says Dante Di Loreto, "Glee's" executive producer. "It was so exciting to see because we knew then that we had touched a chord.
"Believe me, I've seen a lot of different versions of our songs," says Di Loreto of the online reproductions. "No matter how crazy they get, it's still flattering."
Things certainly do get loony in these play-at-home versions of "Glee." There are videos featuring puppets, Disney cartoon characters, even a live leaf bug grooving to the show's cover of "Gold Digger."
Remember the sparkly rendition of Burt Bacharach's "I Say a Little Prayer" delivered by three lissome cheerleaders on one episode?
Imagine it painstakingly reenacted by three bearded gay men in baby Ts.
"People say, 'You should do it in drag,'" says Jason Whipple, who lip-syncs the lead. "I say, 'We ARE doing it in drag! It's boy drag.'"
And apparently all of them are going online to champion and celebrate the show, which is turning out to be more viral than H1N1.
"Glee" may rank 42d in the Nielsen ratings, but it's a phenomenon on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
"We monitored Twitter feeds," says Chris Albrecht, coeditor of NewTeeVee.com, a Web site devoted to online video, "and 'Glee' is absolutely crushing the competition. Of all TV shows, it's the one people Twitter about the most."
Fans of the series-imagine "High School Musical" with a wicked sense of humor-call themselves Gleeks. They have a unique way of expressing their devotion: taping do-it-yourself copycat videos of the show's rousing musical numbers, then posting them on YouTube or on their individual home pages.
The spontaneous explosion of tribute videos was the first indication to the makers of "Glee," which airs at 9 p.m. EST Wednesdays on Fox, that their show was hitting a sweet spot with viewers.
"Right after we aired the pilot in May, people started posting their own versions of our songs online," says Dante Di Loreto, "Glee's" executive producer. "It was so exciting to see because we knew then that we had touched a chord.
"Believe me, I've seen a lot of different versions of our songs," says Di Loreto of the online reproductions. "No matter how crazy they get, it's still flattering."
Things certainly do get loony in these play-at-home versions of "Glee." There are videos featuring puppets, Disney cartoon characters, even a live leaf bug grooving to the show's cover of "Gold Digger."
Remember the sparkly rendition of Burt Bacharach's "I Say a Little Prayer" delivered by three lissome cheerleaders on one episode?
Imagine it painstakingly reenacted by three bearded gay men in baby Ts.
"People say, 'You should do it in drag,'" says Jason Whipple, who lip-syncs the lead. "I say, 'We ARE doing it in drag! It's boy drag.'"
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