Shannen Does Comedy
TV actress Shannen Doherty, who has been dogged by a so-called "bad girl" image for years, is looking to make her first foray into comedy. The former "Beverly Hills, 90210" and "Charmed" star has inked a deal to headline a show about a young woman who is stuck with a reputation of being headstrong and nasty but is nice and fragile at heart. Hmm...sounds familiar. The show will be produced by Pariah TV for NBC.
Doherty's persona on the Fox hit "90210" in the early 1990s blended with her highly publicized offscreen exploits and reports of clashes on the set. She exited the WB's supernatural drama "Charmed" in 2001 after a couple of seasons amid reports of difficulties with her co-stars.
The only comedic experience Doherty has had to date was during a guest appearance on "The Ortegas," also produced by Pariah. Doherty is currently host of the ridiculous Sci Fi Channel's hidden-camera series "Scare Tactics." Here's hoping she does well with comedy.
In this spot, several friends are regaling a buddy singing, "Ted's a jolly good fellow." He's jolly because he has insurance. He's also not so jolly for reasons that will become clear at the end of the commercial. Via TTR2.
George Simpson writes in this MediaLife piece about the loss of moral fortitude and the sad results that loss has produced. No particular group wants to take responsibility for our morale fiber blaming the other groups for the problem. It's the media's fault. It's bad programming. It's sleazy politicians. And it's gotten to the point where the "cumulative effect on our culture has been to debase it to the point that we wink at presidential blow jobs and dont howl in protest when a steroid-nourished, woman-hating movie star (and a bad one at that) runs for governor of the largest state in our union."
He may have a point. To some degree, we have all thrown our hands up in disgust with the frustration that it seems whollyy out of our control to stop the moral slide. His suggested solution is to take it upon yourself and assert some control with your advertising dollar. Buy what's right. Leave the sleaze on the table.
The Connected Multi-Tasker
Generation Z will be the most connected generation that has ever walked this planet. With usage of electronic media devices rising rapidly along with the simultaneous use of those devices, advertisers will need to dramatically shift the strategies they use to communicate with this generation.
A recent study from Knowledge Networks/SRI entitled, "How Children Use Media Technology" reveals 61 percent of children 8-17 have televisions in their rooms, 35 percent have video games and 14 percent have a DVD player. Seventy-five percent of those who have a television in their room report multitasking with other media. With the rise of broadband and wireless access, these numbers are destined to move upward.
To accommodate this multitasking trend, the creation of entirely new devices by electronics manufacturers is in its infancy but growing fast. Companies like Nokia are releasing phones that are also cameras, video recorders, MP3 players, FM radios, gaming stations, IM stations and web browsers all rolled into one device. Media will cease to be time and place based with content delivery control shifting from provider to user.
Old media that do not adapt will die a long, slow and painful death. Refusal among network executives to acknowledge TiVo-like time shifting technologies and those who do not adopt some form of brand integration will also be left on the sidelines. The Internet revolution was nothing. The Gen Z media revolution will shake the industry as well as culture to its core.
