Shane Madej is an American writer, producer and actor, possibly best known for his role as Ryan Bergara’s co-host in “BuzzFeed Unsolved”, and the co-founder of Watcher Entertainment. Learn more about the famous producer and show creator in the biography below.
Early Life, Family, Educational Background
Shane Alexander Madej was born on 16 May 1986 under the zodiac sign of Taurus, in Schaumburg, Illinois USA, to Sherry and Mark Madej. He has Polish and Caucasian ancestry, but holds American nationality.
Mark Madej worked as a serviceman in a private company, while Sherry served as the homemaker of the Madej household.
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Shane and his brother, Scott Madej, were raised by their parents in Schaumburg; Shane matriculated from Schaumburg High School in 1999, where he took German Classes for four years, after which he was accepted into Columbia College, Chicago.
Before Shane dived into Art full time, he spent some time in Illinois, ‘The Prairie State’ working in Public Access, at the Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg before becoming a video producer at Al Larson Prairie Center for the Arts.
Career
Actor/TV Host
Shane started his acting career in 2014, when he appeared in an episode of “BuzzFeed Video”.
Then, the “BuzzFeed Unsolved: True Crime” documentary started airing on the BuzzFeed channel in 2016.
Shane Madej and Ryan Bergara (the Ghoul Boys) were cast as lead investigators, alternating between two principal themes of True Crime and horror in each season.
Having held the role as a hosts for over five years, Madej and Bergara decided it was time to move on, and focus 100% on their own production company. They finished filming the eighth and last season of the show in mid-2021.
Speaking to Inverse on his last season on the show, Madej said, ‘it’s exciting to do this final year of “Unsolved” and still do a lot of crazy experimentation on” Watcher”’. After his initial appearance on BuzzFeed, Madej went on to feature in two episodes of the comedic TV show “Zack & Justin” (2015).
In 2017, Shane played the role of Clark Gable in “The Try Guys”, a TV show starring Keith Habersberger, Ned Fulmer, Zach Kornfeld and Eugene Lee Yang. In the same year, he starred in 17 episodes of “The Hot Daga”, which he also created.
Shane Madej joined the cast of the action drama “S.W.A.T” in 2020, playing Ira in the ‘Gunpowder Treason’ episode, and the same year he played a minor role as a male hiker in the short film “Beautiful Day”. Then he starred in 25 episodes of “Puppet History” from 2020 through 2021.
Shane and Ryan wrote and co-hosted the documentary “Weird (and/or) Wonderful World With Shane” (and Ryan)@ in 2020, which required them to explore/tour various places of interest.
He also appeared as himself on Katie LeBlanc’s “Too Many Spirits” (2020) and “Are You Scared?” (2020- 2021).
Writer
Before his stint with BuzzFeed, Madej created a viral video, “What Your Birthday Says About You”. Then, his first video for BuzzFeed was captioned “Unusual Facts About Diet Coke”, which earned him recognition in the online space.
Between 2016 and 2020, Shane Madej was the show creator of the TV Series documentary “BuzzFeed Unsolved: True Crime”, writing a total of 60 episodes of the show. Alongside Ryan Bergara, he ran the “BuzzFeed Unsolved Network” standalone YouTube channel, which was launched in 2018.
Under their supervision, the channel grew to a staggering audience of 5.14 million subscribers.
He was also the writer and show creator of the “Hot Daga” series in 2017, then Madej created the show concept for “Puppet History” in 2020, and wrote four episodes of the show.
Producer- Watcher Entertainment
In 2017, Shane served as the lead producer for BuzzFeed’s “Ruining History”. Two years later, he executively produced “BuzzFeed Unsolved: True Crime” from 2019 through 2021.
In January 2020, Madej partnered with his co-producers from BuzzFeed, Steven Lim and Ryan Bergara, to launch Watcher Entertainment, a production company focused on creating television-caliber, unscripted series in the digital space.
Some of the shows produced are “Making Watcher”, in which the three founders talk about launching their start-up without prior business experience; “Too Many Spirits” featuring Shane and Ryan Bergara, the TV documentary, “Tourist Trapped: Los Angeles” (2020); and “Spooky Small Talk”.
Madej’s production company also started two podcasts – “Hidden Narratives” hosted by Steven Lim, and “Here’s What You Do”, hosted by all three founders, each tagged as an optimist, pessimist and nihilist respectively.
Personal Life, Relationship
Shane Madej is currently unmarried, but in a serious relationship with Sara Rubin, social media personality and video producer at BuzzFeed. Shane also reportedly has a close relationship with his parents and brother.
He has an Instagram account (@shanemadej) with 850,000 followers, and over 200,000 Twitter followers.
On Rubin’s 31st birthday (23 October), he made a public tribute to her on Instagram saying, ‘happiest of birthdays to the person who makes everyday cozy and magical.’ However, the couple doesn’t have plans of marrying anytime soon. He lives with his girlfriend, and a cat named Obi.
Appearance, Clothing Style
Shane Madej is 6ft 4ins (1.93m) tall, and weighs around 140lbs (67kgs). He has short, dark brown hair and hazel eyes. Shane sometimes dresses formally in clean suits, other times you’ll find him in a button-down shirt and a pair of pants or T-shirts and a face cap.
Hobbies, Favorite Things, and Interesting Facts
- Shane loves traveling, also spending time on the beach.
- Corn chips are his favorite snacks.
- Shane shared his first Instagram post on 6 April 2012.
- He’s a supporter of the Black Lives Matter Movement.
Net Worth and Salary
In late 2021, Shane Alexander Madej has an estimated net worth of $2 million, accumulated from years of working as a producer, writer, actor and other personal projects. Details of property owned by Madej and his family remain undisclosed to the public.
