FunnyorDie.com: 'SNL' for the online crowd

Inside a darkened Hollywood warehouse, doe-eyed Adam Scott lay on a bed in his boxers earnestly flicking water droplets out of Jake Szymanski's fleshy belly button -- a stunt everyone agreed would be hilarious in slow motion. As the crew held its breath for this tricky maneuver, the gamin-starlet Rachel Bilson stood off camera, waiting to take her turn on the bed, talking about how her childhood admiration for Lucille Ball had led her to this moment.

It was a strange bit of theater, even by FunnyorDie.com's exaggerated standards. But the popular sketch-comedy website revels in awkward moments like these. FunnyorDie's production staff churns out three or four sketches like this one each week, filmed cheaply and on the fly.

And unlike other fledgling comedy websites, FunnyorDie's got a gaggle of stars like "The O.C.'s" Bilson and Scott from "Step Brothers" on speed dial, all of whom perform for free.

"There's been this whole comedy renaissance going on for the last five years, really hitting the culture in the right way and really resonating," Scott said when the scene was concluded. "FunnyorDie is inviting everyone to the party. . . . The free-for-all nature of it is exciting."

Like "Saturday Night Live" for the new millennium, the site has become home for celebrities eager to lampoon themselves in bizarre, even humiliating sketches because this awkward, alternative brand of comedy now holds such an exalted place in Hollywood that no one wants to be left on the sidelines.

"We suspected but weren't certain that it was time for an Internet version of 'SNL' or 'Letterman' where celebrities can go to promote and try stuff," the site's co-founder Adam McKay wrote in an e-mail interview. "Creative freedom is a huge carrot."

FunnyorDie.com, launched in 2007 by Will Ferrell and his producing partner McKay, draws hordes of visitors -- an average of 25 million per month. They come to see Lindsay Lohan spoof her tumultuous private life with a fake eHarmony ad and Jon Hamm shed his Don Draper veneer by donning a bald cap to play Lex Luthor humbled by the financial crisis. Studio marketing heads and other deep-pocketed advertisers took notice and now FunnyorDie.com is a hip place to promote a movie or slip in some product placement.

In fact, the website that started as a creative outlet for Ferrell and his friends is itself a brand with a successful comedy tour, an upcoming HBO series, a half-dozen offshoot websites and plans for a feature film division.