Banana
2012 · Scripted webisode/sitcom core ("Teretana Banana") extended through comic-strip and mascot-led digital formats · Transmedia comedy IP development
Transmedia comedy universe linking Teretana Banana webisodes, Banana Strip, and social releases.
Transmedijski komičarski svijet koji oko maskote Slavka Bana povezuje Teretanu Bananu, Banana Strip i digitalne kanale.
This project credentials: Cross-media & events
Notes from the producer
Banana was me trying to build an IP the way a studio builds one, before I had a studio to do it with. The idea was a gym sitcom, Teretana Banana, but the world around it - the strip, the Slavko Ban character, an app - started to interest me more than locking a single script did. I put real contracts underneath all of it: A NING USLUGE as producer, a project valuation, financing thresholds, and individual agreements with Fran, Hrvoje, Dusko, Bojan, Sinisa, Denis and Maja. That scaffolding is the part I am still proud of.
The honest part is that the ambition outran the money. We planned an eight-episode web series at 220,000 kn and never shot it. What we actually finished and put out was the comic strip through August 2012, the visual identity, the launch posts, and the app. I prepared a Pixel Market application and have no record of how it landed. So Banana is not a sitcom I can point you to; it is the moment I learned to run a cross-media project as a system - casting collaborators, writing the contracts, shipping the parts that were shippable - and to stay clear-eyed about the parts that stayed on paper.
- Matija Radeljak
The story
Banana was a 2012 attempt to build a comedy brand that could live in several formats at once and still sound like the same joke. The core was a gym sitcom, Teretana Banana, populated by staff and members - Blanka, Igor, Vranko, Josip - but the property fanned out fast: a comic strip, a talking-banana mascot named Slavko Ban, a social and blog presence, and an Android app. The writing files show drafts being rewritten rather than a single locked script, which is the honest signature of a format still being tested in public.
What separated it from a loose sketch series was the paperwork. A NING USLUGE ran it as a contracted IP build: a business-cooperation agreement signed in February 2012, valid through 31 December, fixing a project value of 100,000 kn and a financing trigger that gated further work on securing at least 35 percent of that sum. Individual author contracts followed in Zagreb in August - Fran Strukan on illustration, Hrvoje Manz and Dusko Vorkapic on the app code, Bojan Kanjera on coordination, Sinisa Bahun on the travelogue and strip scripts, with Denis Rajcic and Maja Novak on the core writing. Matija Radeljak produced and directed. The telling part is the shape of it: one person assembling a multi-disciplinary team under contract to manufacture a whole universe, not just to film a few sketches.
The financial plan was more ambitious than the eventual output. A February 2012 document lays out an eight-episode web sitcom at 220,000 kn of planned inflows - product placement, a general sponsor, and content sales - against a detailed cost total of 215,525.44 kn, roughly 26,940 kn per episode across development, fees, postproduction and promotion. That filmed slate is where the record thins. The scripts, a shelved Kickstarter-commercial concept, and animation dubbing all exist, but there is no evidence in the archive that the eight-episode sitcom was ever shot and released.
What did ship was the world around the series. Between 8 and 29 August 2012 the team exported and published a run of six Banana Strip episodes, each with a matching teaser, on a visible near-weekly cadence, extended in September by the peglaona strip. The Slavko Ban persona got a full visual identity - logo, mascot, Facebook and YouTube covers, a blog skin - and launch copy posted across blog and Facebook. The Bananiziraj Android app was packaged as an actual artifact. The humor - a bear insisting his nudity is only natural fur, a banana narrating summer at the seaside - is recognizably local satire rather than aspirational branding.
Banana also reached outward: in July 2012 the team prepared an application to the Pixel Market, Power to the Pixel's international cross-media co-production market held that October at the BFI London Film Festival. Whether it was selected is not documented, and neither is any third-party press pickup nor a final reconciliation of planned against realized money. Read honestly, Banana is less a finished sitcom than a proof of cross-media development capacity: the ability to take a piece of local comedic language and stand up the contracts, the team, the branding and the multi-channel outputs that a scalable IP would need.
Milestones
- 2012-02 — A NING USLUGE cooperation contract signed; project valued at 100,000 kn, valid through 31 December 2012
- 2012-02-20 — Eight-episode web-sitcom financing plan documented (220,000 kn planned inflows)
- 2012-02-29 — English "Banana Gym" one-page pitch finalized
- 2012-06-05 — Croatian one-page proposal issued
- 2012-07-27 — Application prepared for the Pixel Market 2012 cross-media market
- 2012-08-03 — Contributor author contracts executed in Zagreb
- 2012-08 — Banana Strip episodes 1-6 published (8-29 August 2012)
Outcomes
- Banana Strip published — Six dated strip episodes with teasers exported for public release, 8-29 August 2012, extended by the September peglaona strip
- Slavko Ban brand identity — Mascot, logo, Facebook and YouTube covers and a blog skin, plus launch copy posted across blog and Facebook
- Bananiziraj mobile app — The comedy universe packaged as an Android application artifact
- Contributor contract set executed — Role-specific author agreements signed in Zagreb in August 2012 with named collaborators
- Pixel Market 2012 submission prepared — Application to the Power to the Pixel international cross-media market (BFI London, October 2012); selection outcome undocumented
Credits
- Matija Radeljak — Producer and director
- Denis Rajcic — Author (writing)
- Maja Novak — Co-author (writing)
- Fran Strukan — Illustration and visuals
- Hrvoje Manz — Mobile app development
- Dusko Vorkapic — Mobile app development
- Bojan Kanjera — Operations coordination
- Sinisa Bahun — Travelogue and comic scripts
- A NING USLUGE d.o.o. — Producer (company)
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