Synopsis

Barenaked Ladies perform "One Week" as a chaotic pop-culture fantasy. The video opens with the band entertaining a royal court alongside a singing girl on a wind-up pedestal. They escape during the instrumental break, taking off in a pair of television-inspired cars. The chase leads to a suburban outdoor concert, where a female stunt rider dressed like Evel Knievel launches over a school bus. The surreal spectacle ends with the rider stranded in a tree, while the band continues its exuberant performance.

Factoids & Trivia

• The royal-court opening and wind-up performer recall the visual style of *Chitty Chitty Bang Bang*.

• The getaway cars reference two television favorites: a modified 1968 Dodge Charger modeled after the General Lee from *The Dukes of Hazzard*, and a Ford Gran Torino associated with *Starsky & Hutch*. The Charger carries the number 07 rather than 01 and omits the Confederate flag.

• The stunt sequence flips the usual Evel Knievel image by presenting a female daredevil in the role.

• Kiva Dawson plays the singing girl on the wind-up pedestal.

• Carmit Bachar appears as an angel. She later became known as a member of the Pussycat Dolls.

• The video's elaborate production design earned a nomination for Best Art Direction at the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards.

• The song's rapid-fire verses were assembled from Ed Robertson's basement freestyle sessions, recorded on a Hi8 camcorder. That improvised energy is reflected in the video's deliberately packed succession of visual references.

• "One Week" became the band's first and only Billboard Hot 100 No. 1, turning the video into one of the defining pieces of their late-1990s breakthrough.