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Putting canceled-show The Beautiful Life starring Mischa Barton, Sara Paxton and others on its own YouTube channel has worked well, according to show executives.
Basically, the show has gotten a second life, according to a story by CNN.
“If we put this thing on the Web more than half a million people will watch it on the Web,” Kutcher said in a video message posted on YouTube last month. “I want this to be the first show ever that gets more viewers on the Web than it did on terrestrial television.”
The five episodes combined, including three that never aired on TV, have been viewed about 2.7 million times in the three weeks they have been available online, according to CNN.
The Beautiful Life is scheduled to run for six months on YouTube, according to the story.
“It’s important to keep in mind that online audiences watch when they want to watch, so this content will continue accumulating views during its six-month run,” George Strompolos, YouTube’s strategic partnership manager told CNN. “These videos are clearly much different than the two-minute viral clips that spread like wildfire across the Web. For an original long-form scripted drama being distributed online, this performance is very strong.”
Star Sara Paxton commented on the success of the experiment.
“It’s pretty exciting for our friends and family to be able to watch the episodes that never aired,” said Paxton. “After it was cancelled, a lot of fans were reaching out on Facebook and Twitter and asking where they could see the rest of the episodes. Now that it lives on the Internet, who knows what it will turn into. I don’t know what to expect out of it.”
With the success of the show online, Kutcher and partner Karey Burke are even considering other options for the show.
“Now that the airing of the episodes on YouTube has been as successful as it has been, there are conversations about continuing with the show in some form or fashion. We haven’t had any discussions with the CW about bringing the show back, but anything is possible,” Burke told CNN. “There certainly could be a short form version of the show that could live on the Web if our studio partners were interested in that and enough of the cast were interested.”
Cool, huh?