The Art of TV Advertising
So this is a Great Age of TV Drama, with certain shows we could all name (and then argue the value of) achieving a high level of creative brilliance. Must be wonderful for the sponsors, eh?
Unfortunately DVD technology and boxed sets of TV shows have killed any tolerance I (and no doubt others) might have had for sitting through even decent shows when they’re interrupted every ten minutes by dreadful commercial “spots”. So the Monguls of Marketing are faced with a dilemma: how to create an audience for advertising. They’ve tried MTV-style funkiness, surreal oddness, CGI extravagance, rank amateurishness (come to Wollongong and watch the regional ads sometime), helpful hints, catchy jingles and, of course, celebrity endorsement. The first three are mainly useful for cobbling together “World’s Greatest/Sexiest/Most Pretentious Ads”-type programs, and gaining an industry rep for the agencies. “Rank amateurishness” leaves you so brain damaged you lose the capacity to exit the house, let alone buy anything, while “helpful hints” totally lack credibility when some down-to-earth (though attractive) handywoman advices you to use a revolutionary cleaning product that has already failed to deal with the soap-scum on your shower door (especially that damn image of the Virgin).
In the past, “jingles” have worked pretty well, but the agencies seem to have totally lost the knack of creating the sort of fatuous and creatively inane ditties that get in your head and refuse to leave no matter what. All the memorable jingles (”We’re happy little Vegemites as bright as bright can be… we all enjoy our vegemite for breakfast, lunch and tea…” or “Louie the fly, I’m Louie the fly, straight from rubbish bin to you… Spreading disease with the greatest of ease…”) are decades old.
That leaves “celebrities”. Celebs certainly retain their drawing power in the “women’s” magazines and in tearoom chat. Seems to me, though, there’s a basic problem and it’s this: our current celebrities lack the crucial element — talent that resides in themselves rather than in scripts, good directors or CGI eye-candy. Those celebs most in the public eye are there because of their scandal value or are simply of the “famous for being famous” variety. Where are the celebs with the resonant voice, the authoritiative and entertaining presence, the horror film background?
Well, check out this one from the past.
Why don’t we have celebs like Vinny any more?
3 People have left comments on this post
While I’m horrified by how many advertising jingles I remember from the 60s and 70s, I can only recall one effective use of a celeb in an ad: Edward Woodward, advertising a composite material called ‘Craftwood’. The punchline, IIRC, was “Would wood do this? Craftwood would, or my name isn’t Edward Woodward.” With a mostly straight face, too. I have no idea how many takes that must have required.
I watched the ad and I found it boring. TV in the 70s was for the most part excruciatingly boring (and yes I felt that way when I was a kid too). The thing about the commercials back then was they were unavoidable. Nowadays commercials are less boring but you can avoid them if you really want to.
Well, see, Jose… I guess one man’s resonant celeb is another man’s nobody. I can listen to Vincent Price for hours and he never gets boring. And that dismissive twinkle in his eye is just great. Whereas I could never say that I find today’s commercials less boring. They bore the bejesus out of me and after the third iteration make me want to throw something at the telly. As it’s a very expensive telly — and what I have near at hand to throw is a cat — this probably isn’t a good thing.
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