Kickstarter Campaign Launching for Sitcom Wok in Progress

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BEIJING: After self-financing the pilot, the creators of the bilingual sitcom Wok in Progress are gearing up to launch a Kickstarter campaign to fund the rest of the production.

Show creators Murray Clive Walker and Victor Muh, along with producer Ad Valorem International, are due to kick off the crowd-funding initiative next month. They’re hoping to raise $30,000 to pay for the 13×23-minute series, which follows two U.S. college dropouts living in Beijing. The show will be available via a distribution agreement with Youku in China and VOD outside of that country.

“After living and working in China for almost ten years, we’ve grown to love the Chinese culture and language,” said Walker. “The adaptation to such a foreign environment, although exciting and meaningful for the most part, is still often fraught with challenges and frustrations. Westerners and Easterners have very unique cultural backgrounds which leads to weird and wonderful perspectives on this thing we call life.”

Muh added: “We wanted to create a sitcom that would address these cultural discrepancies, but also convey the idea that although culture is important, sharing the same culture is not paramount to getting along with each other. Yes, we are all different, but it’s these differences that make us interesting and unique. Failing to bridge the cultural gap is inevitable, but it’s how one tries to breech the gap that is important. Cherishing the similarities and relishing the differences is the theme of our sitcom.”