Social media has been trying to put it’s foot in the television door. It started with a William Shatner sitcom titled “$#*! My Dad Says,” but it got cancelled after 18 episodes. Then it was thought that a TV show or movie based on a social network was completely foolish.
Enter “The Social Network”, the semi-true story of the creation of Facebook, was nominated for 8 Academy Awards and went on to win 3 of them. Those awards were Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, and Best Film Editing. It also won the Best Motion Picture – Drama Golden Globe at the Golden Globes and Best Film, Best Actor in a Leading Role from the British Academy Film Awards. So now it was know that an entertainment property based on a social media property could be viable in the mainstream.
Now we get a report from Vanity Fair that a sitcom based on the online coupon program known as Groupon has been picked up by CBS. The sitcom, which is fairly inappropriately titled “Friend Me,” will star Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin) and Nicholas Braun as
“twentysomething best friends, Evan and Rob, [who] move from their hometown of Bloomington, Indiana, to Los Angeles to begin their exciting new lives working at Groupon. Evan is having trouble breaking his old slothful habits and rather than go out after work to explore L.A. and meet new people, prefers to play online poker with his buddies back home. Rob has different plans and is determined to drag Evan, kicking and screaming, along with him.”
If you are confused about why a show, based on an online coupon, has a name that brings up visions of Facebook, you are not alone. The confusingly name show has no release date as of this time, but if CBS has indeed picked it up, look for it to either debut in the fall, or as a midseason replacement.