Dan Savage, an online columnist who has been dishing out sex and relationship advice on The Onion and in other publications since 1991, is going to be shooting a pilot for MTV.
According to sources for Entertainment Weekly, Savage will be filmed as he tours several college campuses and gives his characteristically entertaining, frank and actionable advice to students and others. The format will be a Q&A between Savage and his auditorium audience, much like a live version of his column, Savage Love.
We have no doubt that Savage will make for excellent and watchable television; his last name could also be an accurate descriptor for his sometimes-scathing indictments of people who write to him asking for advice.
“I treat people who write me the way my friends and I all treat each other when we go to each other for advice,” he said in an A.V. Club interview, ” which is sometimes with supreme cruelty. I think that’s what helps the advice sink in.
“If somebody comes at you with both barrels, the first shot opens your head, and the second shot allows the advice to get lodged inside.”
But Savage isn’t always a double-barrel-shotgun type of figure. In fact, he’s made significant contributions to increasing the self-esteem of LGBT teens, and his stance earned him a well-deserved place atop Mashable‘s list of captivating online personalities in 2010.
Last fall, Savage responded to a rash of gay teen suicides with a YouTube channel, which featured inspiring messages from celebrities — including President Obama — and others telling teens, “It gets better.”
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