The Dudesons

The Dudesons are a group of men from Seinäjoki, Finland, with a Finnish television show now also being shown on Spike TV in the United States and channel V in Australia. They perform varyingly deranged and dangerous stunts on the show, much like the American show Jackass on MTV (which had not yet aired when the first set of Extreme Duudsonit episodes were recorded in 2000). The group consists of childhood friends Jukka Hilden (born in 1980), Jarno "Jarppi"/"Jarno2" Leppälä (born in 1979), Hannu-Pekka "HP" Parviainen (born in 1981) and Jarno "Jarno1" Laasala (born in 1979). Laasala bought a video camera in 1993 and started shooting partying, extreme snowboarding and extreme downhill cycling videos. In 1999 he moved to Helsinki to study at the University of Helsinki where he stayed for a half year, then started working at the television station MoonTV as a cameraman and editor. It was while working at MoonTV that he got the idea to make his own television show, and Extreme Duudsonit was born. The group's stunts have included human dartboards, waking each other up by hitting each other in the genitals with baseball bats, indoor bonfires, driving while blindfolded, and snowboarding down stairwells. They have broken numerous bones and been severely injured several times. The first episode of Extreme Duudsonit was aired on MoonTV on January 25, 2001. The episodes were presented as world tours in such famous places as Las Vegas and Mount Everest, though it was obvious the stunts were actually filmed in and around Seinäjoki. The show quickly became the most popular show on MoonTV. The first season was rerun on the larger TV channel Nelonen in the summer of 2001, the second season (second world tour) on 2002. In the summer of 2002 the group toured and performed a live show together with the band The Odorants. In 2002 they were also elected as the media persons of the year by the readers of a popular magazine for young Finns, Suosikki. The next winter Leppälä, Hilden, and Laasala went on a tour performing at bars, while Parviainen was left behind because of an injured leg. In the spring of 2003, World Tour 3 was aired. The group performed on stage together with The Sleepy Jackson at the summer festivals Ruisrock and Ankkarock. On September 9, 2004 the first episode of their new TV show called Duudsoni elämää (Duudson Life) was aired, again at Nelonen. Duudsoni elämää consists of a total of 17 episodes. The show has been released on DVD. In 2005, "The Dudesons" began airing in Australia, on the pay TV channel Channel V, showing all of series one. The Dudesons Movie premiered in Finland on March 31, 2006 and was released on DVD in the United States on July 11th by Warner Rhino. Spike TV introduced "The Dudesons TV Show" (eight half-hour episodes) which aired on July 6th. "The Dudesons TV Show" will also be aired in more than ten countries. World Tour 1, 2 and 3 have also been released on DVD. They have been also featured on an episode of the World of Stupid. Jukka and Jarppi are good friends with Bam Margera, and have made three appearances on Viva La Bam (Jarppi only made two appearances; Jarno took his place on a trip to Las Vegas), an MTV spin-off of Jackass. On February 11, 2007 The Dudesons had "the best time of their lives!" They won the Finnish Oscar for their The Dudesons Movie on the category of "the favourite film of the Finnish movie audiences", with a record-breaking 47% of all score. Their comptetives were strong, since 2006 was a strong year for Finnish film with many big, local blockbusters.