Don’t you love when bloggers refer to their own blog entries? I sure do.
My self-annoyance at self-quoting, however, is surpassed by my would-be (will-be?) self-annoyance at becoming one of those people who just writes the same blog entry over and over with different opening paragraphs. So travel back with me now to Christmas Time 2008, when I was being the Awesome New York Gal that I am, sitting on the couch at my dad’s house in Connecticut watching Batman with the fam:
On Christmas, my dad, sister and I were watching The Dark Knight.
I was playing with my phone during this blessed event, and decided to
do some research on who the next Batman movie villain(s) would be.
According to various bloggers, Johnny Depp and Eddie Murphy are both
being considered for The Riddler, and Philip Seymour Hoffman will be
asked to play The Penguin. Someone also mentioned Angelina Jolie as Cat
Woman, meow, and one very eager lad is pushing Guy Pierce as The Black Mask on account of his – Pierce’s, not B. Mask’s, though who knows – history with director Christopher Nolan.At
what point do these things become self-fulfilling prophecies? That is,
in 2008, how powerful is would-be, or potential will-be, audience
participation? I’m not going to pretend I know anything about Hollywood
beyond what Entourage teaches us, but one presumes casting
directors, or at least interns in casting departments, read these blogs
and are consequently aware of the casting buzz, true or completely
false. And if casting teams learn from blog entries, blog comments and
online discussion forums that there is an existing fan base for a
certain casting choice, does that affect their decisions, even in the
slightest? If Guy Pierce is cast in the next Batman movie, producers
know x number of people who believe they are responsible for the
decision are guaranteed to go see the movie. That’s worth something.
Similarly, might a studio “leak” a few casting options and see how the
blog-o-sphere reacts before making a final decision? I have no idea,
but wouldn’t be surprised if that happened all the time.
I then blather on about blogger Adam Brinkley, who launched [Sarah]palinforvp.blogspot.com in 2007 (New Yorker article here) and then I somehow get to whether or not critics want artists to actually take their reviews as constructive criticism. All of this is to introduce the thing with Betty White (we’re in today’s blog post, now), that you may have heard about:
The Internet has gotten its way: Betty White will host “Saturday Night Live.”
NBC said Thursday that the 88-year-old actress will host the show May 8. “SNL” executive producer Lorne Michaels says he can’t think of a better way to spend Mother’s Day weekend than with White.
The announcement followed a campaign on Facebook urging the sketch show to make White a host. The group attracted nearly half-a-million supporters. [Via Yahoo!]
The Facebook campaign started after White was featured in a Super Bowl ad for Snickers. According to PopEater, White will be co-hosting a Mother’s Day episode with former Saturday Night Live cast members Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Molly Shannon, Maya Rudolph, Ana Gasteyer and Rachel Dratch.
Obviously, all this interwebz buzz is great for SNL, Snickers, the Super Bowl, and of course, for Betty White herself. I’ve wondered on this blog before why orchestras don’t present their communities with three possible soloists for, say, a world-premiere or a well-known concerto, and let audiences decide who they want to hear. Viral campaigns could be started by passionate fans who would lobby for their choice of soloist, thus making audiences feel like they were part of the booking process and getting everyone excited for the concert. Local and industry media would most likely cover the promotion, generating press not just for the concert, but for the actual process leading up to the concert.
This all has fantastic marketing and publicity potential, but aren’t we supposed to trust presenters (producers, casting agents) to do their jobs? Lorne Michaels has been producing Saturday Night Live since he created it in 1975, and despite what anyone says about its decline in quality in recent years blah blah, no one can argue that the history books will be kind to Saturday Night Live. So why does Lorne Michaels, creative genius, top business man, suddenly need, as Joel Keller at TVSquad writes, “users
of a decidedly 21st century technology, Facebook…in
support of a star who started working before the vast majority of the
site’s users were even born”?
Of the internet pressure for White’s casting, Michaels said to PopEater: “[White as the host] isn’t something we would have said no to, [but the
campaign] validated that, ‘Oh, that’d be fun’ … It was the outpouring
of affection from fans, and we feel the same way.”
Without the Facebook campaign, I find it extremely difficult to believe that SNL “would not have said no” to Betty White as its host. That would be a terribly booking all around: she has no movie, TV show or projects coming out, and before the ad, I’m sure most viewers barely knew she was still alive (no offense meant). So a brand that’s been successful for over three decades is now curated by the people. What happens now?
I actually think it was good of SNL to have Betty White on. Whether or not you actually watch SNL, the buzz about this has been very good for SNL’s general attention to the public, and b/c of the amount of people who voted, more people might watch. The show only can gain revenue from ads since they can expect higher viewership that night.
I’m not saying that every situation warrants a brand/company/org/etc giving in to what the people want. But, in this situation, the voice was quite loud, and I thought SNL was smart to have her on and cash in from the gain of attention.
One of those obnoxious sideline facebook ads tells me that Betty White will star in a sitcom called “Hot In Cleveland” beginning in June on TV Land. So I guess she has something to market after all, and somewhere behind the scenes a presenter was doing his/her job. The fans might’ve just been a catalyst; said presenter should be grateful. 🙂
I suppose it makes sense to poor budget money on that type of thing since a higher viewership equals more sponsors which equals more money. I think it worked for SNL in this case.