Jake and Amir

Infobox Television
show_name = Jake and Amir


caption = Jake and Amir episode "March Madness"
show_name_2 =
genre = Comedy Sketch
creator = Jake Hurwitz
Amir Blumenfeld
director =
developer = College Humor
presenter =
starring = Jake Hurwitz
Amir Blumenfeld
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country = USA
language = English
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location = Connected Ventures
New York City
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runtime = 1-3 min.
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first_aired = May 23, 2007
last_aired = Present
preceded_by =
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website = http://www.jakeandamir.com
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"Jake and Amir" is an online sketch comedy series featuring the lives of the two title characters, Jake Hurwitz and Amir Blumenfeld, two dope ass playa pimp, co-workers who sit across from each other at the CollegeHumor offices in New York City, New York. Jake's character is the traditional straight man in the comedy duo, with Amir playing the role of the funny man, much of his act being centered around his character's stalker-like obsession with Jake. The series started out with skits taking place entirely within the CollegeHumor offices, but eventually spread to other locations, including California, Florida, the streets of New York City, and the characters' homes.

History

Jake Hurwitz and Amir Blumenfeld met while working at the CollegeHumor offices in New York City. As a side-project they began shooting short videos with each other and posting them online for their friends. After getting positive feedback, they decided to create a website and make videos regularly. They registered jakeandamir.com in May 2007, [http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2429336&id=27472435064 Actual email thread that lead to making JakeAndAmir.com] , May 20, 2007. Retrieved 2008-06-11] and have since made over 130 episodes, usually between 1 and 3 minutes long. On June 9, 2008, Jake and Amir performed live for the first time in "Street Meat", a monthly comedy show at Cake Shop, a venue in New York City. [http://www.jakeandamir.com/post/37896273/jake-and-amir-live-at-street-meat-6-9-08 Jake and Amir Live at “Street Meat“] , June 9, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-11]

Releases

Jake and Amir post on an unofficial biweekly schedule. New clips are usually posted on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the late afternoon, although many videos may be posted on irregular days throughout the week.

Plot

The episodes center around the relationship between Jake and Amir, most commonly at the CollegeHumor offices. A typical episode, Lunch Meeting, [http://www.jakeandamir.com/post/24105887/lunch-meeting Lunch Meeting] , January 18, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-11] shows Jake attempting to discuss work with Amir, while Amir insists on calling for lunch before he can work. Amir initially dials 911 because he is so hungry that it's an emergency, and Jake immediately hangs up the phone. Amir continues to unsuccessfully try to order food, until an exasperated Jake takes the phone and tries to order for the both of them.

Motifs

Ace and Jocelyn

Several episodes of Jake and Amir are attempts by Amir to create a new television show, titled "Ace and Jocelyn: Astronaut Accountants from Outer Space". These episodes involve Amir pretending to be Jocelyn, a character in the show, and trying to get Jake to play along, much to his annoyance. [http://www.jakeandamir.com/tagged/ace_and_jocelyn Jake and Amir episodes tagged Ace and Jocelyn] . Retrieved 2008-06-30]

Chicken Nuggets

Amir only eats junk food, including chips, sprinkles, and frosting, and has been known to eat unorthodox sandwiches. But by far his favorite food is McDonald's Chicken McNuggets. He talks about them frequently and is often seen eating them. He even put candles in them on his birthday and has attempted to order them at an In-N-Out Burger. In one episode Amir explains that he orders the "special" which is only the skins of the nuggets and dipping sauce, or "jus' tha skin and tha sauce!"

Amir's Sayings

Amir frequently replaces real words with his own phrases that often carry over between episodes, for example saying "QQ" to mean quick question, or saying "shiatsu" instead of shit. He also incorrectly uses the word "comprende" which is the Spanish word for comprehend to mean friend (probably in place of the word Compadre). Amir also often uses words like "whatever" and "brother", exchanging the 'er' on the ends of the words to an 'ah' sound. Amir once used the phrase "FYE" (For Your Advice) instead of the phrase "FYI" (For Your Information). Jake responded by telling him that is was the wrong word, wrong spelling, and wrong phrase. Amir also uses the word nay instead of not, such as 'I do nay agree with you.' Other words that Amir uses are Gullies (friends) and Ace (awesome).

lapping

In many episodes Amir slaps Jake, often unexpectedly, and points his finger sternly at Jake's face. During their live appearance at "Street Meat" in June 2008, Jake blocked one of Amir's slaps and slapped him back for the first time.

"Jake."

Amir often quickly says "Jake," as if to get Jake's attention, even when they are already talking to each other, or right after they finish a conversation. Many episodes end abruptly with Amir saying "Jake."

Quick Endings

Episodes will frequently end abruptly, a technique once employed by Frederick Faust. The abrupt termination of episodes is usually executed by ending the episode before the characters have fully played out the situation or to end without letting the audience know the full extent of the punchline.

"Dinner tonight?"

In many episodes, Amir asks Jake to have dinner with him. Jake almost always refuses these requests. However, in a few episodes, Jake has agreed, including "Bowling for Soup", "Date - Part 2", and "Hallie Part III". Jake's motives are more self-serving in the "Bowling for Soup" episode, since he agrees to have dinner in order to prevent Amir from telling the office he likes the band Bowling for Soup. In "Date - Part 2", Jake plays the role of a compassionate friend and has dinner with Amir to cheer him up after Amir is dumped by Jake's cousin, Diana. Finally, in "Hallie Part III", Jake, who seems psychotic after finding out that Amir may have slept with Jake's ex, Hallie, asks Amir out for dinner.

High Voice

Amir often speaks and repeats irritating or nonsensical phrases in an extremely falsetto voice. Often, he stops when Jake asks him to.

Loose Change

In several episodes, when Amir is seen falling or flipping, lots of coins fall out of his pockets. In an interview, the creators said this gag wasn't originally planned, it just happened while filming and they liked it so much that they decided to make it a running gag. [http://www.goggleburn.com/episode/GGB_20080121 Goggleburn Interviews Jake and Amir] , January 21, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-23] Several outtakes of the loose change gag can be found at Jake and Amir's facebook page. [http://www.new.facebook.com/home.php#/video/video.php?v=5152604964&oid=4749436683 Keep Away Outtakes] , November 16, 2007. Retrieved 2008-09-16]

Penguin Suit

Amir inexplicably owns a penguin suit, which he often wears for no reason. He seems to be able to do it impossibly fast, as evidenced in the first episode in which it is seen. The episode starts with Amir in normal clothes, cuts to Jake asking a question, then cuts back to Amir, already in the suit. It is implied that the first time he wore it was due to him mistaking the date that Halloween falls on, but it also seems likely that he had just felt like wearing it, and the thought of Halloween never even crossed his mind.

Amir's Freestyles

There are several episodes where Amir attempts a freestyle rap that he admits to writing ahead of time, which is the opposite of the definition of a freestyle. Mostly they are spontaneous with no relevance to what is going on at the moment. Amir has also used the same word twice to rhyme with one another and incorrectly "sampled" lyrics from Kanye West's "Stronger".

Jake Impression

It is revealed late in the series that if Amir holds his throat a certain way, he can do a perfect impression of Jake's voice. To film the video, the effect was most likely achieved by recording Jake saying something, and then having Amir lip-sync it while the audio was dubbed in. Amir has used this skill to get information out of Jake's parents that Jake doesn't want him to know about.

Other Characters

There are various other recurring characters in the series played by employees of the Collegehumor office. For the most part, they play their "normal selves", often dragged into Amir's bizarre antics despite Jake's attempts to stop him. Amir seems to hate most of them, but it is generally hinted that he doesn't actually like anyone except Jake.

Jeff "Rosie" Rosenberg

Jeff Rosenberg, or "Rosie" for short, was seriously injured by something that Amir did to try to defend Jake in Rosie's eponymously-named episode, and continues to fear Amir's unusual physical strength (often hinted at but never actually shown on screen). Though it is never made clear what exactly Amir did to him, it is known that he had to be taken to the hospital, and was actually crying at one point. He flinches and shrieks whenever Amir acts as though he is going to punch him, which he constantly does. Despite the notion that everyone except Jake and Amir are "normal" people, at one point it is hinted that Rosie is meant to be a stupid character, as Patrick Cassels refers to him as "too dumb to defend himself" in the episode "DVD Part 2".

Patrick Cassels

Often bullied into assisting Amir with his schemes, he was once forced to be the first "villain" of the Ace and Jocelyn series. Thinking that Patrick was a burglar (because Amir never told Jake about the episode, and attempted to film it extremely late at night at Jake's apartment), Jake punched him in the face, presumably sending him to the hospital. Because of this, Patrick seems to continue to hold a grudge against Jake, and oftentimes sees the worst of him due to his anger at Amir (example: Jake once broke Patrick's DVD of "Knocked Up" in an argument with Amir, then tried to deny it when confronted).

Diana

Diana, who is Jake's cousin, briefly dated Amir because she thought he was funny, but soon came to realize the full extent of his personality and began to get scared, especially since, as she put it, he "only eats chicken nuggets, and nothing else, not even water". In the end, she talked Jake into breaking up for her (since she was afraid of Amir's reaction). Jake's sympathy toward Amir in this situation led to one of the only times that Jake has ever offered to take Amir to dinner.

Jeff Rubin

Jeff was also once tricked into assisting Amir with an Ace and Jocelyn episode (of course, Jake wasn't aware of Amir's plan to film the episode), and subsequently tries to avoid him. Amir considers him a "earth nerd", in consistence with his general hatred of the office members.

am Reich

Sam doesn't seem to like Amir either, but was forced to be his secretary when he lost a bet regarding how many consecutive days Amir could eat McDonalds for. He bet 12 days, which Jake later said was a stupid bet, especially when Sam discovered through receipts that Amir had already been eating it for 43 consecutive days. The "secretary" deal was originally supposed to last a week, but Jake tricked Amir into losing a bet over how long Amir could go without saying Jake's name (he didn't even last 5 seconds). Despite Jake never having set terms to this bet in the first place, he managed to convince Amir that Sam was now his secretary, thus giving Sam the "freedom" to finally lash out at Amir. It is unclear whether Sam will return in future episodes, but since he is a regular employee at Collegehumor, it is highly probable.

arah Schneider

At first, Sarah thought Amir's act was a joke, but after realizing that it wasn't, she sometimes assists Jake in using Amir's trust in him to make him do bad things to himself. Sarah is also supposed to be Jake's "real" best friend, since they were children.

Ricky Van Veen

Amir's boss in the series, and the actual boss of the CollegeHumor office, Ricky is often mentioned, but is only actually seen in a few episodes. His name is brought up when Jake (often) wonders why Amir hasn't been fired, since he never seems to do any actual work. In one episode, Amir crosses the line by slapping him, for which he apologizes profusely and begs for one more chance. When Ricky says yes, hoping to get Amir to stop embarrassing himself, he asks for "two more chances". When Ricky again complies, Amir slaps him again and calls him a "fucking pushover".

Media Coverage

In December 2007 Jake and Amir appeared together in character on Yahoo!'s vlog The 9. [http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1794684 Jake and Amir on Yahoo!'s "The 9"] , December 21, 2007. Retrieved 2008-09-05] In addition, "Jake and Amir" was mentioned in the April 2008 issue of "Wired" [http://www.wired.com/entertainment/hollywood/magazine/16-05/pl_screen The Web-to-TV Stars Human Giant Predict the Next Web-to-TV Stars] , April 21, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-11] as up-and-coming web stars by the sketch comedy group Human Giant. The show was also mentioned in the July 2008 issues of "Cosmopolitan" [http://jakehurwitz.tumblr.com/post/37891982/attention-girls-who-didnt-talk-to-me-in-high Jake's blog with scan of Cosmopolitan Magazine] , June 10, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-11] and "Us Weekly". [http://jakehurwitz.tumblr.com/post/38917159/me-and-amir-are-in-the-latest-us-weekly-i-cant Jake's blog with scan of Us Weekly Magazine] , June 18, 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-19]

References

External links

*Official Website - http://www.jakeandamir.com
*Jake Hurwitz's Blog - http://jakehurwitz.tumblr.com/
*Amir Blumenfeld's Blog - http://www.beingfamous.com/blog/wordpress/
*Amir on Aim - http://amironaim.tumblr.com/
*Jakke and Amir. Title goes here, brotha. Hello? - http://jakkeandamirdidthisworkhowdoihitsendisthisanemailjakke.org/
* [http://www.theapiary.org/archives/2008/03/inside_with_jak.html Inside With: Jake Hurwitz and Amir Blumenfeld] - [http://www.theapiary.org/ The Apiary] interview
* [http://media.www.statehornet.com/media/storage/paper1146/news/2008/05/07/Features/Jake-And.Amir.Setting.The.Bar.For.College.Humor-3366040.shtml Jake and Amir: Setting the bar for College Humor] - Sacramento State newspaper interview
* [http://www.gearcrave.com/buyers-guide/features/interviews/gearcrave-interview-amir-blumenfeld-jakeandamircom/ GearCrave Interview: Amir Blumenfeld, JakeAndAmir.com]
* [http://www.uncrate.com/men/culture/web/jake-and-amir/ Jake and Amir] - [http://www.uncrate.com/ Uncrate] interview