Zoran Kesic -- Making Serbia laugh

26/10/2009

Zoran Kesic is the host of one of the most popular entertainment shows in Serbia, Fajront Republika (Closing Time Republic), on FOX TV. In the laid-back "tavern" atmosphere of the show, Kesic has welcomed numerous famous figures, actors, musicians, and politicians.

By Bojana Milovanovic for Southeast European Times from Belgrade -- 26/10/09 Photos by Nikola Barbutov

Koran Kesic hosts Fajront Republika (Closing Time Republic).

The rule on Zoran Kesic's Fajront Republika (Closing Time Republic) is "expect the unexpected". Kesic is well-known for his unusual and provocative questions, as well as sketches in which he portrays his guests in a humorous and honest manner.

His excessive honesty, however, has even resulted in a few guests refusing to stay at the shoot. The main characters in the sketches are Kesic's creations and serve as representations of some of the people in Serbian society -- from the farmer to the businessman.

Thanks to his sense of humor and direct approach, Kesic has become one of the most popular TV figures in Serbia. Although his audience is mostly made up of younger viewers, the number of older fans watching the show is also increasing.

In an exclusive interview with Southeast European Times, Kesic discusses his show and Serbian television.

SETimes: Your beginnings were in journalism and television?

Zoran Kesic: After graduating from high school, I started working at Belgrade's city television Studio B. I applied for an audition [to work on] the morning programme, and started as a reporter. I focused on communal issues: the green market, parking service, city administration. Then I became interested in editing and shooting, so much so that I began shooting and editing all features myself. Those were short films rather than reports and features. I began to realise I was more interested in making up stories on my own, than in being a journalist.

SETimes: How would you describe Fajront Republika and the reason for its popularity?

Silly things that aren't related to any current situation make me laugh, Kesic says.

Kesic: It's a talk show with mostly famous people as guests, with sketches in which my associate Igor Bugarski and I act. The audience is an important element of the story, because it's not the kind of audience for hire that goes from show to show; it consists of my friends from Facebook and those who come because they think it's fun. The energy of everyone wanting to be there is palpable, that may be the main characteristic of the show.

Each shoot is like theatre and after the shoot we all go to a party, usually at my place. I really don't know any host that takes their audience home after the show, it's all truly very hospitable.

SETimes: You are known for asking unusual and provocative questions to your guests. Do they ever get upset?

Kesic: This one guest, I won't say who, didn't like the sketches about them and their work and left the show after 10 minutes. But the reactions of my guests are generally OK, since they already know what the show is like and what I'm like, so they can't be too surprised if I say something funny or act weird. I simply behave according to how I feel at a given moment and often ask a question I hadn't even planned to ask, but that came to my mind at that moment.

SETimes: What makes you laugh, what is humour in your opinion?

Kesic: Silly things that aren't related to any current situation make me laugh. I don't find satire funny, rather some kind of classic humor, of course the guys from Monty Python, always. When we do something completely silly on our show, my associates and I roll around laughing during editing. There was, for example, this sketch where [Labour and Social Policy Minister] Rasim Ljajic goes to the US and has a "pretend" meeting with [California Governor Arnold] Schwarzenegger. There might be no special point there, but the very fact Rasim met with Schwarzenegger, and Schwarzenegger told him "I'll be back" during the interview was funny to me.

SETimes: Is there such a thing as "Serbian humour" and is there anything special about it?

Kesic: We like to brag about being a funny people, about how much we like to fool around, but I don't really know what the characteristics of Serbian humor are. Maybe we can't put it in simple terms, we can't generalise it. There are funny people who like to fool around, it's up to them. The main characteristic of an intelligent person is their sense of humour, which means we Serbs are intelligent beings.

SETimes: What do you think about the programs offered on Serbian TV channels?

Kesic: Croatian TV, for example, looks much better and tidier than our state TV. We think that we can do it better, yet all of their shows look more professional. Croatian TV, in my opinion, is closer to global standards than our public broadcaster. Our television is sort of dry straight and it seems like the stink of mould still spreads from that programme. I'm not even going to talk about reality shows, they always offer the same guests and cheap entertainment. People like to watch that and peek into other people's bedrooms. I don't like reality shows because they have very little reality. The conditions in them are fake. What kind of reality is it on Big Brother when one can't even go outside? I'm against such shows because I think they lower people's intelligence.