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Funniest Home Videos kid wins $50,000 more than Karise Eden

A toddler singing for 60 seconds wins more cash on Funniest Home Videos than Karise Eden won on The Voice.

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Why bust yourself cooking on MasterChef, or dating a geek on Beauty and the Geek for $100,000?

All you have to do is send in a video of your kid warbling to a pop tune.

Jonathan Bishop of Gorokan from New South Wales pocketed a cool $150,000 from Australia’s Funniest Home Videos for his video of a toddler singing Adele’s Someone Like You. It ran for all of 60 seconds.

That kind of moolah is $50,000 more cash than Karise Eden won on The Voice.

The 2nd Prize ‘Manger Madness’, from Melissa Stevens of Dundas, New South Wales wasn’t to be sneezed at either: two 4WD cars for a video of a kid pulling a baby Jesus doll out from under her dress.  Seriously?

Even the 3rd Prize- ‘Life Drawing’, from  Andrea Cheung of Forresters Beach, New South Wales was a very sweet $30,000, the same cash Darren Percival landed for being runner-up on The Voice. The video showed he had been drawing on his kid sister.

I’m at a loss to explain why any of these videos were actually Grand Final worthy, or indeed how the show manages to stump up with such exorbitant (or should that be ‘disproportionate’?) prizes.

But the lesson here is that filming your kids is a potential gold mine. Where’s my video camera?

25 Responses

  2. I watched this to the end waiting for the funny bit expecting the air bags to go off in the child’s face or a dog to leap into frame and bite it…but nothing happened.

  3. Don’t they still use phone voting? Cute kids and puppies n kitties will always win out…look at the target audience…families at home on a Saturday night. We had some beauties my year though…really think granny parachuting with her falsies flying out of her mouth should have won!

  4. who was the major sponsor? my theory is its always kid videos that win because alot of the advertisers or major sponsors are selling kid related products, i guess if a dog food co were the major sponsor it might be a dog video that wins it *shrug*
    I too am suprised this show is still going, probably alot of old people who don’t have the internet watch it. I used to find it funny but theres only so many times you can see people have near misses with serious injury & not see how sick that kinda is

  6. Amazes me that this show continues to go to air. If there was one single program made completely redundant by the internet it would be this one. I can see any number of “funniest videos” on YouTube 24/7.

  7. If those are the best videos, I’d hate to think what banal mediocrity was masquerading as entertainment for all of the weeks leading up to the GF. Can only imagine that the majority of the TV audience, and all of those voting, are not adults with their full faculties (or an awareness of YT).

    What next, a show where someone reads out amusing letters? “We have one from Prince Mbebe of Nigeria who says that he requires assistance with moving a large sum of money out of his country…”

  8. I keep saying to myself that I need to video my cat and dog in their wrestling matches! The money is insane! And the content of the show seems to be 70% US based…

  9. @DK – How much did Benjamin win on BB for being in a house for 12 weeks? Doesn’t seem fair either compared to other reality idiot fests.

    Its just a bit of family friendly piece of fluff. The sponsors must still be happy to spend that much money on it, and I’m guessing it must be cheap to make.

    Let it ride.

  10. Totally agree with you. The prizes on FHV have been wildly disproportionate in comparison to other reality shows for many years now. Those three videos that won such extravagant prizes on Saturday night were terrible. I am actually surprised this show still has a following. I thought the advent of Youtube would have killed it off by now.

  12. Oh, and I was warned a kiddie or animal video would beat mine, and lo and behold a video of a kid showing his little twin brother his poo in the loo beat my waxing video, damn!!!

  13. There’s usually a sponsor involved giving that kind of money away for pretty much a year’s worth of advertising. I remember Wizard Home Loans gave away $175K in 2004, the year my video came 2nd. I ain’t complaining about the prizes! 🙂

  16. Reading the description of the ‘Manger Madness’ video, why do I have images from The Exorcist in my head?!
    Completely agree with your disparity at the inequity of the prize money, though. Contestants on those other shows work bloody hard to get to the finals.

  18. I totally agree. I remember a few years back on Big Brother the housemates would get cars and lots of prizes for just for buming around in a house saying trash. This year there has been little mention of prize money and gifts.

  19. Great article! I was thinking the same thing and it is about time someone in the media said what we were all thinking. 5 of the 6 videos involved kids – one involved a dog. The animal ones are the only ones that are actually funny – there is the occasional good kid one but it is like the advertisers tell 9 to put the kid ones in the GF.

    It seems like a trend the last couple of years – they seem selective of who is in the GF. Those clips are no longer the 6 funniest of the season, probably just the ones that will get people voting.

    The only reason the show keeps getting viewers is TV stations haven’t been bothered to put on anything decent (Channel 10, I am talking to you)

  20. Did it also run 24.7 minutes over time, even though it was pre-recorded?

    Was it coded into 7 different programs during the finale so as to claim all the as many top spots of the night as possible?

    Was the studio full of unsubtle product placements through out the entire series?

    Did they cut to commercial in the middle of a sentence, only to come back from commercial and recap everything we heard in the five minutes before said commercial?

    Does the host over act and take up more screen time than the entrants?

    Sure… this low brow entertainment, but they certainly don’t treat the viewers as stupid as other programs on the box.

    Sour grapes Mr Knox?

  21. I don’t know how this inane brain dead show is still on air. And people seriously think it is funny, I bet there are even people who series link it in case they miss an episode. It just goes to show it doesn’t take a multi-million dollar drama to entertain some people.

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