''SPAMasterpiece Theater'' (or ''S.P.A.M. Theater'') is an American

web series A web series (also known as a web show) is a series of scripted or non-scripted online videos, generally in episodic form, released on the Internet, which first emerged in the late 1990s and became more prominent in the early 2000s. A single i ...

starring humorist

John Hodgman John Kellogg Hodgman (born June 3, 1971) is an American author, actor, and humorist. In addition to his published written works, such as '' The Areas of My Expertise'', ''More Information Than You Require'', and '' That Is All'', he is known for ...

where he does dramatic readings of unsolicited

email spam Email spam, also referred to as junk email, spam mail, or simply spam, is unsolicited messages sent in bulk by email (spamming). The name comes from a Monty Python sketch in which the name of the canned pork product Spam is ubiquitous, unavoida ...

received by ''

Boing Boing ''Boing Boing'' is a website, first established as a zine in 1988, later becoming a group blog. Common topics and themes include technology, futurism, science fiction, gadgets, intellectual property, Disney, and left-wing politics. It twice won ...

'' editors in a parody of ''

Masterpiece Theatre ''Masterpiece'' (formerly known as ''Masterpiece Theatre'') is a drama anthology television series produced by WGBH-TV, WGBH Boston. It premiered on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) on January 10, 1971. The series has presented numerous acclaim ...

''. The series featured images and videos from

Creative Commons Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...

-licensed media.

Background

S.P.A.M. Theater

In 2008, ''S.P.A.M. Theater'' debuted. Each episode features a dramatization of

. Originally, the series featured images and videos from

-licensed media from the

image hosting {{internet hosting, right An image hosting service allows individuals to upload images to an Internet website. The image host will then store the image onto its server, and show the individual different types of code to allow others to view that i ...

and

video hosting An online video platform (OVP), provided by a video hosting service, enables users to upload, convert, store and play back video content on the Internet, often via a structured, large-scale system that may generate revenue. Users will generally u ...

website

Flickr Flickr ( ; ) is an American image hosting and video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was a popular way for amateur and professional ...

and the nonprofit

digital library A digital library, also called an online library, an internet library, a digital repository, or a digital collection is an online database of digital objects that can include text, still images, audio, video, digital documents, or other digital me ...

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

. The second episode "FOR MY DAUGHTER'S SAKE/DE@L OF A LIFETIME" featured the voices of Russ Gooberman and Dana Devonshire. In the third episode "Love Song of Kseniya," ''

''s

Xeni Jardin Xeni Jardin (; born Jennifer Hamm, August 5, 1970) is an American weblogger, digital media commentator, and tech culture journalist. She is known as a former co-editor of the collaborative weblog ''Boing Boing'', a former contributor to '' ''Wire ...

reads her own email spam. In the fourth episode "The Proposition," Erik Sheppard of Voice Talent Productions contributes a voice.

SPAMasterpiece Theater

2008 John Behrens and Sean Bonner at Xenis BBtv Office

On October 1, 2008, Jardin announced the official debut of the web series ''SPAMasterpiece Theater''—almost a month before the American release of

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

almanac An almanac (also spelled ''almanack'' and ''almanach'') is an annual publication listing a set of current information about one or multiple subjects. It includes information like weather forecasts, farmers' planting dates, tide tables, and other ...

More Information Than You Require ''More Information Than You Require'' is a 2008 satirical almanac by John Hodgman. It is the follow-up to Hodgman's 2005 book '' The Areas of My Expertise''. It was released October 21, 2008. The full title reads: ''More Information Than You ...

''. Hodgman described it as "true tale of romance, adventure, infamy, and low-cost prescription drugs, all culled from the reams of actual, unsolicited emails, received here by us and people like you -- what we call SPAM." The hosted series included dramatic readings by Hodgman in a parody of ''

''. In 2010, '' Boing Boing Video''s Jardin was picked as "Curator of the Month". She commended the series with "These were so much fun to put together."

Episodes

S.P.A.M. Theater

SPAMasterpiece Theater

Music

The first four ''SPAMasterpiece Theater'' episodes opened with a

chiptune Chiptune, also known as chip music or 8-bit music, is a style of synthesized electronic music made using the programmable sound generator (PSG) sound chips or synthesizers in vintage arcade machines, computers and video game consoles. The t ...

remix of

Jean-Joseph Mouret Jean-Joseph Mouret (11 April 1682 in Avignon – 22 December 1738 in Charenton-le-Pont) was a French composer whose dramatic works made him one of the leading exponents of Baroque music in his country. Even though most of his works are rarely per ...

's " Rondeau: Fanfare" ( 1735) by Hamhocks Buttermilk Johnson.

Reception

''Vulture''s Matthew Perpetua praised the series with "Hodgman's deadpan delivery is typically excellent, but we're particularly fond of the deliberately pretentious juxtaposition of stock footage in the dramatizations.

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

might want to look at this." In a retrospective celebrating the anniversary of ''Boing Boing TV'', ''

BBC Online BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...

''s web producer Ellen West described ''SPAMasterpiece Theater'' as "It's like

Adam Curtis Adam Curtis (born 26 May 1955) is an English documentary filmmaker. Curtis began his career as a conventional documentary producer for the BBC throughout the 1980s and into the early 1990s. The release of ''Pandora's Box (British TV series), ...

doing a nonsense Power of Nightmares."

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:SPAMasterpiece Theater 2008 American television series debuts 2008 web series debuts American comedy web series

Background

S.P.A.M. Theater

SPAMasterpiece Theater

Episodes

S.P.A.M. Theater

SPAMasterpiece Theater

Music

Reception

See also

References

External links