Jackass was an American reality series, originally shown on MTV from 2000 to 2002, featuring people performing various dangerous, crude, ridiculous, self-injuring stunts and pranks.
History[]
Background[]
Origins and casting[]
By the late 1990s, aspiring actor and writer Johnny Knoxville had moved from Knoxville to Los Angeles and landed work in commercials in order to support his wife and infant daughter. Among his ideas was to produce an article that involved testing various self-defense equipment on himself as a homage to his hero, gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. The magazines that contacted him refused to cover the story due to liability concerns, but in 1999, Knoxville was contacted by Big Brother, a skateboarding magazine for which Jeff Tremaine was an editor, and convinced Knoxville to do the stunt and film it. The stunt featured Knoxville testing out pepper spray, a stun gun, a taser, and a .38 caliber gun with a bulletproof vest, which was included in Big Brother video entitled Number 2, which also featured an appearance by future Jackass cast member Jason "Wee Man" Acuña. Other contributors to Big Brother at this time were Rick Kosick, Chris Pontius, and Dave England, who went on to become a part of the Jackass crew.
Around this time, Pennsylvania resident and skateboarder Bam Margera was filming his family and friends, collectively known as the CKY crew, short for "Camp Kill Yourself", and released them on home video as part of the CKY video series that featured stunts, pranks, and skateboarding with a cast that included Ryan Dunn, Brandon DiCamillo, Raab Himself, Rake Yohn and Margera's family, mother April, father Phil, uncle Don Vito, and elder brother Jess. Like the Big Brother videos, the CKY releases became a cult hit and attracted the attention of Tremaine, who flew Margera to Los Angeles in 2000 and saw the second CKY video, CKY2K. The video convinced Tremaine that the CKY group would suit the idea of a stunt and prank television show that Knoxville, Spike Jonze, and himself had been planning. After demo footage had been shot and pitched to several networks, Saturday Night Live offered to make them subject of a recurring segment on the show. The offer was rejected, as a bidding war between Comedy Central and MTV resulted in the three accepting a deal from the latter for a half-hour weekly show and greater creative control. Knoxville, Tremaine, and Jonze are credited as executive producers. Van Toffler, president of MTV, said: "We just knew there were a bunch of knuckleheads out there who had a very high tolerance for stupidity and pain."
Soon after the MTV deal, Tremaine approached Florida native Steve-O where he worked as a clown at a flea market, and had him film videos of his stunts for the television show, but none were cleared by MTV management. To round out the cast, England brought in his friend Ehren McGhehey, a fellow Oregon resident and extreme stunt participant. Preston Lacy would be the last of what is now considered the main cast to join, auditioning midway through the show's run by eating four bananas with the peels on.
The show debuted on October 1, 2000. After the second episode had aired MTV gained its highest Sunday ratings in its history, drawing 2.4 million viewers among 12- to 34-year-olds, its target demographic.
Finale[]
In a 2001 interview with Rolling Stone, Knoxville questioned how long the MTV show could last, and soon after announced that the series would end after its third season aired. He also stated discontent with MTV and the censors, who, from the start of season two, increasingly gave notes regarding what the show could and could not depict. In addition, Steve-O claimed that the cast salaries paid by MTV were meager. Because of problems with MTV's standards and practices department, as well as the sudden departure of Bam and the CKY crew halfway through season three, the Jackass crew did not attempt to create a finale to bring the show to a close.
Cast[]
Main[]
- Johnny Knoxville
- Bam Margera
- Steve-O
- Chris Pontius
- Ryan Dunn
- Dave England
- Jason "Wee Man" Acuña
- Ehren McGhehey
- Preston Lacy
Supporting[]
- Lance Bangs
- J.P. Blackmon
- Sean Cliver
- Dimitry Elyashkevich
- Derek Freda
- Greg Iguchi
- Spike Jonze
- Rick Kosick
- Knate Lee
- Cordell Mansfield
- Manny Puig
- Sam Spiegel
- Trip Taylor
- Jeff Tremaine
- Greg Wolf
- Shanna Zablow Newton
Recurring[]
- Brandon DiCamillo
- Loomis Fall
- Tony Hawk
- Stephanie Hodge
- Mat Hoffman
- Mike Kassak
- Gary Leffew
- April Margera
- Jess Margera
- Phil Margera
- Jack Polick
- Chris Raab
- Rake Yohn
Series overview[]
:Main article: List of Jackass episodes
| Season | Episodes | Originally aired | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| First aired | Last aired | |||
| 1 | 8 | October 1, 2000 | November 19, 2000 | |
| 2 | 8 | February 18, 2001 | April 22, 2001 | |
| 3 | 9 | June 17, 2001 | February 3, 2002 | |
External Links[]
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