BELGRADE - The Serbian version of the Big Brother reality show was suddenly brought to the end after three of the former housemates died in a car crash, the producer and broadcaster said today.

"Following the tragic death of former Big Brother's housemates Stevan Zecevic, Elmir Kuduzovic and Zorica Lazic, B92 and the production company Emotion decided to bring to an end" to the reality show late yesterday, the companies said in a joint statement.

The three were killed in a car accident early yesterday near Belgrade.

The remaining seven housemates were taken out of the house where the show takes place and told the upsetting news off camera, according to the producers.

The show was due to finish on January 5, when the three were supposed to come back to the house along with other former housemates on New Year's eve, local media reported.

It is reportedly the first time ever that the Big Brother reality show, famous worldwide, has been cancelled.

It was the second season of the reality show to be broadcast in Serbia and picked up in Bosnia and Montenegro.

Izvor: AFP

Morao sam jos i ovaj clanak iz L.A Times ( Burek je popularan i u USA, jbt), kako oni predstavljaju.....

Turning a lens on Serbian nationalism

The country's version of 'Big Brother' includes the odd Bosnian, Croat and Kosovo Serb. Probably unintentionally, it's forcing viewers to confront their social prejudices.

By Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

December 30, 2007

BELGRADE, SERBIA -- It didn't take long for voters to eject Burek from the house in Serbia's version of the "Big Brother" reality TV show.

A Serb from the distant (and disputed) province of Kosovo, Burek was clearly seen as a country bumpkin. He ate hot dogs and pickles for breakfast, he crassly tried to hit on women in the house, and his bathroom habits were, well, a little on the rudimentary side.

"Everything about him stinks of primitivism," one viewer wrote in a long-running Internet chat room that focused on the show -- and particularly on Burek, whose real name is Zivan Janicijevic and whose nickname is the word for a greasy cheese pastry.

So much for "Only Unity Can Save the Serbs," the battle cry of Serbian nationalists for generations: Burek, by popular vote, was unceremoniously evicted a few weeks into the program.

And then there was Elmir Kuduzovic: of all things, a Bosnian Muslim, who joined the housemates shortly before Burek was ousted. Elmir, it turns out, was something of a hit. Good-looking and macho, he got rave reviews.

"Women adore him," one fan wrote. "You can see he's cool. A little rough around the edges, but a true man."

In rejecting fellow Serb Burek and maintaining Muslim Elmir, the viewers of this Belgrade-produced television program were drawn somewhat tentatively into a debate about national identity and social prejudice.

The program managed (probably inadvertently) to bring exposure to issues, such as the lives of Kosovo Serbs, that do not normally penetrate mass culture in today's truncated, dispirited Serbia.

(Ultimately, the show ended abruptly and tragically when the popular Elmir and two former housemates were killed in a car wreck just days before the winner was to be chosen. The three were traveling along icy roads to a big year-end party that got its cachet from having "celebrities" from the show in attendance.)

Serbia is all that remains of what was once Yugoslavia; the other Yugoslav republics, including Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia, split off to become their own countries following devastating civil wars; and Kosovo, where Serbian forces in 1999 fought ethnic Albanians backed by NATO, is expected to bolt soon as well. Even tiny Montenegro has seceded.

Dragan Ilic, a psychologist who serves as a commentator on "Big Brother" for the B-92 network that broadcasts it, said the show forces viewers to confront uncomfortable realities.

"It exposes the worst in people -- that's why it's good," Ilic said. "It opened us to problems of society, a lot of prejudices, even political problems, although politics are not allowed."

That's one of the rules: no politics. But politics creep in.

The setup of "Serbian Big Brother" ("Veliki Brat") is identical to the versions aired in dozens of other countries: Contestants are confined to a house, given tasks, provoked into doing ridiculous things, all for the hope of money and a bit of fame.

Ilic said the producers' decision to include the odd Bosnian, Croat and Montenegrin as housemates was not a gesture of altruistic brotherhood but a business decision. The producers wanted to appeal to viewers throughout the former Yugoslavia, where the program is also sold and broadcast.

Officials from the Emotion Co., which produces "Big Brother," declined requests for an interview.

The success of the wildly popular show is in presenting the housemates without ideological or cultural baggage, "above reality," said sociologist Zorica Tomic, the host of a top-rated talk show.

"It's a kind of bonding . . . that we don't have in the real world," Tomic said.

The show even spawned a Romeo-and-Juliet-style romance in its first season last year, between Edin, a Muslim from the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo; and Maja, a Serb from the Serbian city of Nis. It didn't last; they couldn't agree on which country to live in.

But no contestant has generated as much debate and mostly snarly criticism as Burek, 26, a high school graduate with heavy eyebrows, slightly buck teeth and an unshaven mug.


Izvor: L.A. Times

Što oni imaju pametna posla kad pišu o nekom tamo Bureku iz Srbije, odnosno Kosova... jer u ovom tekstu očigledno razdvajaju ta dva pojma... 

I naravno, ništa bez politike i naglašavanja nacionalnosti... pih... 

Majko mila

Ja i kazem da to mozda nije istina...

Slazem se...
Kakve veze ima Burek i nacionalizam sa ovim?
Americka posla...

E da se ti i ja već jednom složimo... 

Ma dokonim budalama palo na pamet da pišu o nekom tamo u Bureku u nekoj tamo Srbiji...
A prosto bode oči to kako su ispred imena svakog ukućana stavili koje je nacionalnosti... Jbt, pa ni mi to ne primećujemo toliko, da ne možemo da spomenemo nekog bez navođenja odakle je ili koje je vere... 

Ja se izvinjavam... kakve veze ima prica o Bureku sa ovom temom?

Ispada da su ljudi u Srbiji bili ljubomorni na Elmira...ne kapiram sta je specificno u tome sto su se Edin i Maja zabavljali,pa to ne bi bio prvi mesoviti brak kod nas...eto mogli su da pomenu Marizelu i Danila 
Stvarno se to nije ni primecivalo,ali sta ces...
Mozda ce skoro intervenisati ovde pa im treba izgovor...oni sve cine za slobodu svog naroda... 
Nikakve!
I stvarno ne znam zasto su pominjali njega u tekstu...

imam dobar crnjak al neću da kažem pojedinci će se naljutiti

Malo veci off....

" Anea
 Moderator
Svedok stvaranja istorije"????

Ha?