I know it's been posted on here before, but for those that haven't seen it, it falls in line with SLA's post.
I don't really see how a particularly piss-poor advert - and those automated CGI efforts really are dreadul and as tired as the Downfall rips - promoting a form of puffed up sales technique reinforces Bill Hicks rant.
Too right. Off the artistic roll call for ever as the great Mr Hicks once said. It would be a little easier to take if these people kept their heads down and stuck to doing sitcoms or whatever but people like Fry and Lydon are often sticking their oar into public debates. Nick Clegg has more credibility FFS.
You don't, okay.
I have a cousin who is the daughter and sister of a well known tv producer. (One was her father, the 2nd is her brother).
She wasn't really an actress, but had appeared in a bit part in a couple of small sitcoms.
She was invited to 'do' a refrigerator advert. In California. for 4 days.
And in the finished advert the camera showed a fantastic blue sky, it panned down to show a blindingly hot desert, then it panned sideways to show a white cube that slowly appeared to be a fridge.
Then it pulled back to show this fridge sitting there in the desert, then my cousin's hand (JUST her hand!) appeared on top of the fridge and someone's voiceover came on, blah blah blah.
So everyone got flown out to California out into the desert for a week, and my cousin got £4 grand for putting her hand on a fridge for about 15 seconds.
And that was about 35 years ago! Astronomical!
Since when did being paid to do a job of work suddenly make people less entitled to having an opinion? Why should people be pigeonholed and restricted to only one narrow facet of life? By your yardstick Bob Geldof's opinion's on the problems of the African continent are now completely worthless as he has done adverts for the likes of Kleenex, NS&I and the Milk Marketing Board. Bono Vox is an exception to this as his comments on the third world are sheer hypocrisy when set against his personal and corporate tax history - but that's down to his personal actions, not whether he was gurning at us all with his missus in some 'arty' ad about suitcases.
"I have a cousin who is the daughter and sister of a well known tv producer" ????????????
Sorry Paul, I did wonder about the phrasing of that....
Her Dad was a well known BBC producer.
Later on her brother became a TV producer for the BBC, Carlton etc.
I should have made it a quiz question!
Once you are up for sale to the highest bidder how can you expect anybody to take you seriously when commenting on other issues?"
If you want to be a voiceover artist or you're a struggling actor then fair enough but this is established celebs earning huge sums of money that they don't need to assist in the creation of want. Bob Geldof was a very poor example - its hard to think of anyone who adds more weight to Hick's argument.
The thing to remember is does the advert do its job of making you remember the product. I could happily assassinate the twat on go compare, and as for the bloke from we buy any car who looked like a newscaster and then did a dance - a plague of boils is too kind. You either love or hate aleksandr orlov and his little mate sergei.
However, go compare, compare the market and we buy any car stick in your mind as products so the advert has done the job.
So in your opinion Ken Livingstone's opinions are worthless, irrespective of your political stance, because he has done ads. Err, nope.
It doesn't destroy the value of his experience but it does lessen his credibility. It makes me have less faith in him and leads me to regard his views with more cynicism than I otherwise might have done.
Why is it suddenly different for someone to do voiceovers rather than appear in person, or for it to be okay if the person is 'unknown'? Surely if someone accepts money to endorse a product or service then in your terms that makes their views on anything else worthless? They've 'sold out', used their talents to seduce people to buy trinkets rather than tread the boards.
I'm not begrudging anyone the chance to earn a living
I don't see why Geldof should be a bad example. Again, irrelevant of your belief in his views or not (and personally I have a number of issues with the Third World and charities), he has a far deeper knowledge and experience of the problems in large parts of Africa than most others. But now he has no credible opinion in a debate about Africa because he apeared in some entirely unrelated ads? What nonsense.