Sarantos Studios

About

Sarantos Studios is the name of the acting class and entertainment agency behind several viral videos that were shot as part of an acting class taught by Ted Sarantos. The videos themselves are known for their non sequitur dialogue, noncontextual but repeated use of certain phrases and actions performed by a medley of actors, many of which became source material for early video editing memes. Some of Sarantos' most well-known videos are John, I Want A Divorce, You Could Stop at Five or Six Stores and Afro Ninja.

History

Originally founded in 1980 by Ted Sarantos,^[1] Sarantos Studios began operating in Chicago and ran various types of classes from acting and public speaking to confidence-building. Ted Sarantos had various techniques for showing people how to act or ways to deliver lines and would record the participants before giving them the recordings to study later at home. With the advent of YouTube, a channel for Sarantos was made and several of these videos were uploaded to the channel in the late 2000s. On March 9th, 2009, the first YouTube video by Sarantos was uploaded to the company's channel,^[2] titled "BOB MAR--," receiving 2,400 views in 13 years (shown below).

Online Presence

Though the channel itself didn't receive many views for its content in the late 2000s and early 2010s, some of the videos featured on it went viral individually. For example, the John, I Want A Divorce video was uploaded^[3] on December 11th, 2011, where it received 342,000 views in 11 years and later inspired memes (shown below).

The viral video known as You Could Stop at Five or Six Stores also came from Sarantos, but was not originally posted on the channel itself. Instead, it was posted by the YouTube channel Josh^[4] on February 2nd, 2014, where it gained 26 million views in eight years (shown below).

The ActingClassSarantos YouTube channel has stopped uploading new content since the mid-2010s, and as of March 2022, it has only 6,7300 followers overall.^[5]

Related Memes

John, I Want a Divorce

John, I Want a Divorce refers to a recording of an improvised acting scene in which a husband repeatedly laughs at his wife after she confronts him about wanting a divorce.

You Could Stop At Five Or Six Stores

You Could Stop At Five Or Six Stores is a scripted line repeatedly uttered by several actors while auditioning for an unknown commercial at the Sarantos Studio of Acting.^[6] The quote rose to online notoriety and became a popular subject of parodies after an edited montage reel of the audition, which consists of various actors awkwardly delivering the tagline along with other off-screen commentaries and dramatic poses, was uploaded to YouTube in 2010.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References