Sunday, July 16, 2006
“Accessory to Advertising?”
And Now, a (Scripted) Word From Our Sponsors
SWG: “Accessory to Advertising?”
EXCERPTS
This past spring, SAG's magazine ran an article headlined “Are you acting . . . or an accessory to advertising?,"
[Also see: http://www.sag.org/Content/Public/Overview.pdf
and other articles in summer 2006 Techs issue of Screen Actors Guild Mag
http://www.sag.org/sagWebApp/application;JSESSIONID_sagWebApp=EySFhd2wu0dvDZmqqyz5pAzu1Amwfkzt1O63cazq1mTnzypgsj52!-294071337!NONE?origin=page1.jsp&event=bea.portal.framework.internal.refresh&pageid=Hidden&contentUrl=/NewsAndAnnouncements/announcementLander.jsp&cp=null&announcementPage=/Content/Public/newscreenactor.htm
and
http://www.sag.org/sagWebApp/index.jsp
And, see below for text of
Backstage.Com
“Where Product Meets Program Execs push for seamless integration,” June 26, 2006, By Andrew Salomon
http://www.backstage.com/bso/news_reviews/multimedia/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002728003 ]
And Now, a (Scripted) Word From Our Sponsors
Film, TV Dialogue Puts Product Endorsement In a Troubling Place: Characters' Mouths
By Bridget Byrne
Special to The Washington Post
Sunday, July 16, 2006; N07
It's always been there, but it used to know its place.
Now it's running riot, out loud.
Product placement -- or, as the marketing industry likes to call it, "brand integration" -- has made the leap from props to the mouths of actors in movies and on television. And it's at the point now, says Alan Rosenberg, president of the Screen Actors Guild, that **some actors are being asked to speak lines that are essentially commercials -- ones you can't TiVo through.
"Whereas they used to place product in a fairly innocuous way, they are actually giving actors dialogue extolling the virtues of these products," Rosenberg says.
SAG, in solidarity with the Writers Guild of America -- whose members are finding their dialogue can be usurped by the jingles of the ad world -- have been seeking to discuss these issues with the advertising industry, the networks, studios and producers.
This past spring, SAG's magazine ran an article headlined ****"Forced Endorsement: Are you acting . . . or an accessory to advertising?," which proposed guidelines for future contract negotiations and invited members to report examples of inappropriate shilling.
In a world obsessed with logos and status, it's only natural that brand names turn up in movies and television. In response to complaints, the Federal Communications Commission is calling for more hard-and-fast rules about disclosure. That might eventually affect the ****seamless integration of show and product.
But for now, the bigger problem with dialogue endorsement may be that it usually isn't seamless enough.
For example, Sony Pictures made a deal with the NBC show "Medium" last season and the result was hardly subtle: Main characters Allison and Joe discuss going to see "Memoirs of a Geisha," walk by a poster for the movie and then run into acquaintances who enthuse, "Oh, we just saw that, you'll love it!" Cut to a commercial for: "Memoirs."
They used to do it better.
In Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1954 thriller "Rear Window," when Jimmy Stewart queries Grace Kelly about whether she's brought a suitcase for her overnight stay, she replies: "A Mark Cross overnight case, anyway. Compact but ample enough." Her beauty and the sight of her glorious nightgown and satin slippers spilling out when she snaps the little case open no doubt sent legions of young women hunting for a similar carryall.
So why do we worry about similar stuff today?
"It's distracting," regular moviegoer Thom Shelden says of the practice in the current summer films he's seen, among them Adam Sandler's "Click," much of which is set in Bed Bath & Beyond. "They are doing it so much," he says. "It's everything, everywhere."
Sandler's Happy Madison Productions has long filled its comedies about the crassness and commercialism of modern life with overt product placement, and the fact that Sandler is both producer and star means he's clearly not being forced.
But other actors may feel strong-armed, and that's what concerns Rosenberg.
"Our members are really being given a triple whammy," he says, noting that ad dialogue can take work away from commercial actors, might be a conflict of interest for an actor who is a spokesperson for another product, and doesn't compensate the actor involved.
****It's not just about money; it's also raising ethical questions.
****Rosenberg predicts that product placement eventually may involve political or religious thought and worries that "when at the last minute you're given something that is anathema to you . . . you've got to have the right to say, 'Yeah, I'll do that,' or 'No.' "
Traylor Howard of the cable series "Monk," who plays the detective's assistant, notes, "We do it here. It's a pain." She cites the use of a bleach product that none of the actors wanted to be associated with, because it seemed inappropriate to character and story line. A seasoned commercial actress, she recalls she eventually said, "I'll do it. I'll figure a way to make it seem normal." Another example was a car placement that "didn't fit the script . . . but we ended up making it work. . . . But sometimes you just can't do it." She says, "Hopefully it pays the bills for the show, but I don't know. I try not to worry about it, but sometimes it's really annoying."
The companies seeking brand integration stress they are sensitive to what seems appropriate.
Volvo knew it couldn't get a car into a story that predates autos, so instead created a global multimedia treasure hunt for its sport-utility as a promotional tie-in to Disney's adventure film "Pirates of Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest." But many other recent movies, including "The Da Vinci Code," have featured the company's car on-screen.
Dialogue isn't demanded, but clients are happy to hear it, if it's apt.
"If it fits into the story line," says Roger Ormisher, Volvo's vice president of public affairs. "There's always the quip, you know, 'Oh, it feels as safe as a Volvo,' or something. It's fine, because it's reality. That's not cheating. But we've never in any product placement asked for a specific name check. If the director, the producer or the writer feels they can roll a joke off the back of it, that's okay."
Linda Swick, president of the North Hollywood company International Promotions, which secures "brand integration" for companies such as Volvo, Corona and Heinz, points to dialogue in films that showed up even though no such demands were made. In last year's "Four Brothers," Tyrese Gibson referred to Volvo as "one of the safest cars," and in the original "The Fast and the Furious" Vin Diesel said, "You can have any brew you want -- as long as it's a Corona."
***"The audience laughed," she says, "and there you go: That's a perfect integration because whenever there's humor behind the integration there's also much more recall value. So there is a way of doing it."
*Swick sees problems only if there is audience backlash to a movie coming over like one big commercial. She believes the writers and actors should have confidence that the "director is not going to do anything in his film that is going to interfere with its integrity." She adds that branding integration "may be evolving and going through many changes, but it will continue because it's life. It's life!"
**For now, Rosenberg is looking for compromise on the issue: "If you consult with writers and actors, we will find a way to help you do it seamlessly so it doesn't infringe upon the art," he says. ****"But to just foist it upon us is wrong, and now they don't even want to compensate us for selling ourselves out like they normally do when we sell ourselves out!"
© 2006 The Washington Post Company
Backstage.Com
“Where Product Meets Program Execs push for seamless integration,” June 26, 2006, By Andrew Salomon
http://www.backstage.com/bso/news_reviews/multimedia/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002728003
Last month, while the television networks were staging their upfront presentations for advertisers, the Writers Guild of America held a press conference to reiterate its objections to product placement — the practice of positioning name-brand items in a scene and weaving them into dialogue. This was the latest instance in a steady stream of disapproval by the artists' unions, whose leadership over the past year has pushed for a say in the process and, possibly, a financial stake.
Though money is most often the bottom line, both the WGA and the Screen Actors Guild say they are most concerned about their members being contorted into — in their view — nakedly shilling for companies. Nevertheless, marketers still need to sell their products and studio executives still have to generate ad revenue, without which free television would not exist and many movies wouldn't get made. In an ever-shifting media landscape — with new technologies competing for viewers' attention, sometimes enabling them to avoid commercials altogether — this has become more challenging. Thus there is product placement, which has been on the rise in television and film for the past decade. Its net worth, according to the research firm PQ Media, was $3.46 billion in 2004, a 30% increase over 2003. The company also found that product placement grew at an annual rate of 16.3% from 1999 to 2004.
Though there seems to be a great divide between management and labor over this issue, there is more common ground than some might realize. Like actors and writers, marketers and studio executives are wary of branded entertainment, because excessive commercialism can have a negative impact on the products being sold and the shows serving as a platform. Witness NBC's The Apprentice: According to advertising and entertainment industry experts, ratings for the reality show declined this season in part because of too much product placement.
A Virtually Simple Solution
To avoid that situation, advertising and studio executives are developing ways to seamlessly meld products with shows. One occurs during postproduction, when editors can insert the image of a soup can or box of cereal onto a kitchen counter — a process known as digital product placement. Developed by Marathon Ventures in Burbank, Calif., the service is sold to ad buyers and studios. Not only does it allow for more-discreet advertising in a show but the placement can be used in four different ways. For example, Coca-Cola can pay for a can of Coke on a table in the foreground of a scene, then change it to a carton of Minute Maid orange juice for the rerun, A&W root beer in the syndicated version — both of them Coca-Cola brands — then back to Coke for the DVD.
This innovation would seem to answer the complaints of the WGA, the most vocal critic of product placement among the unions, because it doesn't involve writing at all. However, it's hard to know the writers' position: Gabriel Scott, spokesperson for the guild, said the union would not comment on this technology.
The actors' unions seem to be sidestepping this issue, as well. When asked to comment, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists released a statement outlining its general policy on product placement, saying it's studying the matter and working to ensure that the process does not "compromise members' employment or employment opportunities."
Though SAG spokesperson Seth Oster also declined to comment on the issue, he pointed to the spring edition of Screen Actor, the union's magazine. It contains an article titled "Forced Endorsement," in which the union expresses its concern about digital product placement: "Technology now allows advertisers to digitally insert their products during postproduction, meaning actors may not even be aware of what is being advertised in their own shows."
According to several news reports on Marathon Ventures from outlets such as The New York Times and CBS's The Early Show, an episode of Yes, Dear in April 2005 was the first scripted program to use digital product placement — in a scene in which a box of Club crackers sits on a coffee table. In an email to Back Stage, Jean Louisa Kelly, an actor in the scene, indicated she didn't have a problem with it: "I was okay with the product placement on Yes, Dear and didn't notice anything really inappropriate."
'Perfect' Integration
Jeff Greenfield, executive vice president of 1st Approach, a branded-entertainment marketing firm based in Portsmouth, N.H., has long been a champion of product placement, but he also understands its limitations. "When it's done too much, it becomes exhausting to watch, viewers start to tune out, the bloggers pick up on it," Greenfield says. The resultant negative buzz can hurt show and brand alike.
Instead, he says, the future of integrated marketing will involve brands producing their own programs. "Why try to get pigeonholed into a show?" Greenfield asks. "What I tell my clients is, if you create good content, the distribution will be there&hellip. I see TV as an excuse to do marketing." Greenfield is working with two companies to develop two new programs, but they will be reality shows, not scripted.
Enter Lovespring International, an improvised comedy on the Lifetime channel that catalogues the tribulations of a sputtering dating service in the digital age. The fictional service's nemesis is the real-life website Perfectmatch.com, which paid for the tie-in that makes the show possible. It might seem that the talents behind a program in the tradition of Curb Your Enthusiasm and This Is Spinal Tap — which pillory the hypocrisy and self-seriousness of show business — would reject any kind of product integration. But the opposite is true, and not just because it provides work for actors and writers.
"When I was told about the idea, I thought it was terrific," says Jack Plotnick, an actor on Lovespring and one of its developers, "because we needed that idea anyway" — another dating service to serve as a foil. "It's a fun tie-in. I don't see it as a slippery-slope kind of thing."
Having a real-life competitor lends the show a legitimacy it wouldn't get with a fictitious company. In general, such verisimilitude can be a creative upside to product placement. Sam Pancake, another actor on the show, said he'd rather see a character eat Wheaties than a contrived, generic brand such as "Crunchy Flakes." "Seeing an actor hold a can that says 'Cola' takes me out of a show as much as excessive product placement," he says. Of the Perfectmatch.com tie-in, he adds, "It makes sense to me, and it doesn't bother me. I've never felt that it went against me creatively." The actors say they are not even required to mention Perfectmatch.com in every episode.
Guy Shalem, the show's creator, says he was pitched several ideas for product placement by Lifetime, including one for a computer company. "Not only did [the company] want to be mentioned but also [wanted] some sort of story line," he says. "It was asking way too much of us. We wanted flawless integration, and in Lovespring [Perfectmatch.com] was the only company."
The Power to Persuade
Achieving a flawless integration of programming and product would appear to satisfy all parties: marketers who need to work around DVRs and consumers' general dislike of ads; studio executives who are under pressure to boost revenue each year; writers, actors, and other artists who don't want to blatantly promote a company's wares within the context of a show. Yet the very idea of commercial legerdemain unsettles people outside and inside the entertainment industry.
Product placement is "deceptive advertising," says Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, a consumer advocacy organization that agitates for a church-and-state-like separation between ads and shows. "It sneaks by people's cognitive capacities and plants messages in their brains when they're paying less attention," Ruskin explains. "We're already seeing the effects of subliminal advertising: obesity, addiction to gambling, Type II diabetes.… Americans are suffering."
The WGA addressed the issue in a position paper about "stealth advertising" released in fall 2005: "That Guild members are now being forced to take part in stealth and often subliminal advertising concerns us a great deal." The tract also raises the specter of the Federal Communications Commission by mentioning an FCC regulation that states, "Listeners are entitled to know by whom they are being persuaded."
The FCC has worked diligently to raise its profile and influence during the Bush administration, most notably with the passage of a much tougher indecency bill. Jonathan Adelstein, one of the agency's commissioners, told the Los Angeles Times last year, "Everything from Coke to soap is subliminally hawked in TV programs. In today's media environment, product placement has moved beyond Coke tumblers prominently displayed at the judges' table of American Idol. Now products have even seeped into plot lines."
Likewise, the WGA report states, "The Guilds do not want members put in the unacceptable position of facilitating violations of FCC regulations. We, therefore, think this issue ultimately requires discussion both at the bargaining table and before the FCC in Washington."
The Bottom Line
The uncertainty caused by technology and the changing tastes of viewers forces studios and advertisers to seek alternatives to traditional models of marketing so that everyone can achieve the same goal: to get paid. Although the unions try to negotiate the margin between craft and commerce, ultimately their members work for the studios — and everyone wants to work, period. "I was in pilot hell for six or seven years," Shalem says. "I haven't gotten anything on the air" before the Perfectmatch .com deal. Creative talents can advocate for what they see as a better system, but, in the end, advertising pays the bills. There's no doubt marketers are going to have a big say in how the system works at any given moment.
Consumer advocates such as Ruskin say that if the television industry struggles to survive, that's good. "For us, the television industry is doing great," he says. "They're making people want to watch less."
People won't stop watching television, of course, and Ruskin knows that. But he believes that artists who work in the medium will eventually be affected by the integration of products and programming. "The infomercial medium allows for fewer opportunities for acting brilliance and screenwriting brilliance," he says. "As the constraints grow on television and it starts to look more like QVC, it's inevitable that the quality is going to decrease. Good actors and good screenwriters will flee opportunities [in TV] for those of higher quality."
For some of those working in the television industry, their outlook is much more sanguine. Kelly, the actor on Yes, Dear, writes, "There will probably always be a tension between the advertisers' interests and the creators' interests." Says Shalem, "The bottom line is moderation. That's true for everything in life."
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'Branded Entertainment' Deals Mean More Money for Companies -- and More Complexity
By Amanda Bronstad
The National Law Journal
May 3, 2006
It's no accident that contestants of "The Apprentice," Donald Trump's reality television show, designed the actual marketing brochures for a new Pontiac model. Or that the Man in the Yellow Hat in the recently released "Curious George" movie drives a Volkswagen.
They're the results of a new type of promotional contract between advertisers and entertainment, loosely dubbed "branded entertainment," which is generating substantial revenue for many law firms throughout the United States.
Designed to incorporate a company's product or brand name directly into the script of a television show or movie, the new deals go far beyond the day when Reese's Pieces candy got a famous feature in the 1982 film "E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial."
They involve product placement, joint marketing of a film or show and Internet or cell phone promotions. In the most far-reaching deals, advertisers have agreed to pay for portions of a production, such as the recent opening of Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.'s "Akeelah and the Bee," which coffee giant Starbucks Corp. helped finance.
"The percentage of work for branded entertainment has grown exponentially in the last three to four years," said Brian Murphy, a partner at New York-based Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz, a media and advertising firm that has about 10 lawyers handling the new deals. "Our practice has bloomed."
But branded entertainment hasn't come without scrutiny. Jonathon Adelstein of the Federal Communications Commission has called for stricter and clearer rules regarding disclosures of branded entertainment. Ron Whitworth, a special assistant to Adelstein, a commissioner, confirmed that the FCC has received a number of formal complaints involving potentially inadequate disclosure of product placements.
In another legal wrinkle, the Screen Actors Guild and the Writers Guild of America are protesting the use of branded entertainment, describing it as a form of "forced endorsement" without compensation. The guilds may file protests with the FCC.
THE NEW 'REALITY'
The growth of branded entertainment comes as advertisers are seeking new ways to broadcast their message to consumers, who, with high-tech products such as TiVo and digital video recorders, or DVRs, are able to fast-forward through traditional 30-second commercials. It also comes as producers and television networks, which depend on revenue from commercials, are seeking new ways to obtain financing.
Nowhere has branded entertainment been more successful than in reality television programs, where product-placement deals have helped fund production of the shows.
One of the first shows to incorporate real products into the story line was "The Apprentice", which is in its fifth season on NBC. Last year, the winning team of one episode designed a brochure to market General Motors Corp.'s Pontiac Solstice, a new model that "sold out production output in a month," said Clark Siegel, a partner and co-chairman of the intellectual property and entertainment practice at Irell & Manella in Los Angeles, which crafted the product deals on behalf of Mark Burnett Productions, producer of "The Apprentice."
"They paid a lot of money, but it was incredibly successful," he said.
The recent deals are much more complicated than simple product placement, which only five years ago rarely involved lawyers. Advertisers want their brand or product to have the most screen time, be in the most retail shops and generate the biggest gossip on Web sites.
As a result, more companies are looking outside their own legal departments to craft the deals.
"The prior deals were fairly simple, straightforward," said Larry Ulman, a partner at Los Angeles' Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher who crafted a $200 million deal last year with NBC Universal on behalf of Volkswagen of America Inc.
"You either supplied the goods for free in exchange for seeing your goods on television, or you paid a small amount of money to make sure your goods are shown," Ulman said. "But the deals now are much more complicated. That's why you'd go to a big law firm."
'TREMENDOUS GROWTH AREA'
Most of the law firms that structure brand entertainment deals already have developed advertising and entertainment practices, typically in New York and Los Angeles. With branded entertainment deals, both departments are working closer together.
"It's been a tremendous growth area for us, without question," said Murphy of Frankfurt Kurnit. "It's given us an opportunity to take the expertise in the entertainment area and have those attorneys work closely with attorneys who've been working with brands for decades."
Linda Goldstein, chairwoman of the advertising, media and entertainment group and a partner in the New York office of Los Angeles-based Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, said that five years ago the firm handled few, if any, product placement deals. Now, about a half-dozen lawyers, split between the advertising group in New York and the entertainment group in Los Angeles, structure up to 25 deals a year.
Few of the firms doing branded entertainment deals have a background in traditional motion picture financing.
"Unlike traditional forms of financing, where, if you put money into a film or television production you'd have the expectation of getting money back, in these deals there is no expectation of getting the money back," said Craig Emanuel, partner in the Los Angeles office and head of the entertainment practice at Loeb & Loeb, which has doubled to eight the number of lawyers working on branded entertainment deals in the past year. "The value to the product is getting your presence in the film."
Many branded entertainment deals involve some level of co-promotion, in which a movie is advertised or promoted by the financier. The movie "Akeelah and the Bee," for example, is advertised on Starbucks' cup holders.
"Anytime you can get somebody else to pay for your promotion of the movie, that is terrific," said Bob Darwell, chairman of the entertainment, media and communications group at Los Angeles-based Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, who called branded entertainment "a pretty meaningful part of our practice at the firm."
The deals come with an inherent challenge in getting advertising clients, who want complete control over the project, to communicate effectively with the various production heads who share their own creative input.
That becomes a challenge for lawyers, who spend much of their time making sure a product becomes a natural part of the story line, said Arnold Peter, a partner at Los Angeles-based Raskin Peter Rubin & Simon, which derives nearly 15 percent of its revenue from branded entertainment deals. He said many of the deals take months to negotiate.
"If you're representing the brand, you want to have as much of a product on the screen for as long as you can, but if you're representing the studio, you want to make sure you give value to the brand for the money they're paying you," he said. "You argue about the language. They want to say, 'No. Re-write that because you barely see the product.' Whereas, the producer will want as much discretion as they can [get] so that the product does not violate the integrity of the film."
As a result, the deals are "getting increasingly more complicated to negotiate because of issues of creative control," he said. For most attorneys, branded entertainment deals are unlike any other contract.
Ulman said he had to start from scratch in drafting Volkswagen's five-year deal with NBC Universal, the first of its kind by a major studio. In the deal, Volkswagen is allowed to work with producers in crafting its vehicles into the scripts and plot lines of the studio's movies, theme parks and television, including the SciFi and USA channels. One of the outgrowths from the deal is the recent movie "Curious George," in which the Man in the Yellow Hat drives a Volkswagen.
"It's not like you can pull out your standard promotions form," he said. "It's all new and creative; nobody knows the problems that will develop."
FCC GETS INVOLVED
One problem has been recent complaints made to the FCC related to the recent spate of branded entertainment deals. In its petition, Commercial Alert, a nonprofit organization based in Portland, Ore., asked the FCC to require better disclosures of product placement in television shows.
"Sometimes product placement is disclosed, sometimes it's not," said Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, which, in addition to petitioning the FCC, is lobbying Congress to introduce legislation that would require disclosures of product placement in all media.
Commercial Alert filed a similar complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, which rejected its request last year because displaying an image or brand name on a show was not enough to constitute "deceptive claims," Ruskin said.
"That argument is based on this very antiquated notion that advertising persuades only through objective claims, not images," he said.
Ruskin favors a "pop-up" that would notify viewers as the show is going on that a product placement is taking place, instead of disclosing the placement in the ending credits.
Rebecca Fisher, an FCC spokeswoman, said that the commission has not yet replied to Commercial Alert's complaint.
'STEP UP ENFORCEMENT'
But Adelstein, the FCC commissioner, noted in remarks posted on the FCC Web site that concerns over product placement "clearly indicate that the time has come for us to step up our enforcement in this area.
"In today's media environment, product placement has moved beyond Coke tumblers prominently displayed at the judges' table of American Idol," he wrote. "Now, products have even seeped into plot lines. Soap operas have woven cosmetic lines into their tales of who-did-what-with-who, while 'The Apprentice' sounds more and more like an hour-long infomercial for the latest corporate sponsors."
Adelstein called for stricter and clearer rules regarding disclosures, which should be more than "a split-second during the credits in small type that no one could possibly read," he said.
Ronald Urbach, a partner and head of marketing and communication at New York's Davis & Gilbert, agreed that the regulatory issues are "still open" with regard to product claims.
"If you make a claim in a particular program, what is that and what is that not?" he said. "What rights do I have in content versus advertising? It has First Amendment issues across the board."
Branded entertainment deals have raised several other legal issues about trademarks, copyrights and free speech.
"One of the issues that I think will be the subject of negotiation in future discussions is what the SAG is calling essentially a 'forced endorsement,' " said Peter of Raskin Peter.
He said actors might request in their contracts that they have a say in product-placement arrangements, especially if the show relies on their "name and likeness," he said.
Last fall, WGA and SAG held a news conference in which they threatened to petition the FCC if networks failed to make more disclosures of product placement. The guilds are making similar protests this month at the annual "upfronts" in New York, at which networks are scheduled to announce their fall programming lineups to advertisers.
"Creators, writers, directors and actors don't have either consolation or compensation for being required to integrate products into their programs," said Patric Verrone, president of WGA, west. "Not only is that not part of our contracts, but it conflicts in many respects with what we're obligated to do. We're supposed to be writing television. You try to make it realistic if appropriate, but if a product gets shoe-horned in, we need to be able to say, 'No.'"
SWG: “Accessory to Advertising?”
EXCERPTS
This past spring, SAG's magazine ran an article headlined “Are you acting . . . or an accessory to advertising?,"
[Also see: http://www.sag.org/Content/Public/Overview.pdf
and other articles in summer 2006 Techs issue of Screen Actors Guild Mag
http://www.sag.org/sagWebApp/application;JSESSIONID_sagWebApp=EySFhd2wu0dvDZmqqyz5pAzu1Amwfkzt1O63cazq1mTnzypgsj52!-294071337!NONE?origin=page1.jsp&event=bea.portal.framework.internal.refresh&pageid=Hidden&contentUrl=/NewsAndAnnouncements/announcementLander.jsp&cp=null&announcementPage=/Content/Public/newscreenactor.htm
and
http://www.sag.org/sagWebApp/index.jsp
And, see below for text of
Backstage.Com
“Where Product Meets Program Execs push for seamless integration,” June 26, 2006, By Andrew Salomon
http://www.backstage.com/bso/news_reviews/multimedia/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002728003 ]
And Now, a (Scripted) Word From Our Sponsors
Film, TV Dialogue Puts Product Endorsement In a Troubling Place: Characters' Mouths
By Bridget Byrne
Special to The Washington Post
Sunday, July 16, 2006; N07
It's always been there, but it used to know its place.
Now it's running riot, out loud.
Product placement -- or, as the marketing industry likes to call it, "brand integration" -- has made the leap from props to the mouths of actors in movies and on television. And it's at the point now, says Alan Rosenberg, president of the Screen Actors Guild, that **some actors are being asked to speak lines that are essentially commercials -- ones you can't TiVo through.
"Whereas they used to place product in a fairly innocuous way, they are actually giving actors dialogue extolling the virtues of these products," Rosenberg says.
SAG, in solidarity with the Writers Guild of America -- whose members are finding their dialogue can be usurped by the jingles of the ad world -- have been seeking to discuss these issues with the advertising industry, the networks, studios and producers.
This past spring, SAG's magazine ran an article headlined ****"Forced Endorsement: Are you acting . . . or an accessory to advertising?," which proposed guidelines for future contract negotiations and invited members to report examples of inappropriate shilling.
In a world obsessed with logos and status, it's only natural that brand names turn up in movies and television. In response to complaints, the Federal Communications Commission is calling for more hard-and-fast rules about disclosure. That might eventually affect the ****seamless integration of show and product.
But for now, the bigger problem with dialogue endorsement may be that it usually isn't seamless enough.
For example, Sony Pictures made a deal with the NBC show "Medium" last season and the result was hardly subtle: Main characters Allison and Joe discuss going to see "Memoirs of a Geisha," walk by a poster for the movie and then run into acquaintances who enthuse, "Oh, we just saw that, you'll love it!" Cut to a commercial for: "Memoirs."
They used to do it better.
In Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1954 thriller "Rear Window," when Jimmy Stewart queries Grace Kelly about whether she's brought a suitcase for her overnight stay, she replies: "A Mark Cross overnight case, anyway. Compact but ample enough." Her beauty and the sight of her glorious nightgown and satin slippers spilling out when she snaps the little case open no doubt sent legions of young women hunting for a similar carryall.
So why do we worry about similar stuff today?
"It's distracting," regular moviegoer Thom Shelden says of the practice in the current summer films he's seen, among them Adam Sandler's "Click," much of which is set in Bed Bath & Beyond. "They are doing it so much," he says. "It's everything, everywhere."
Sandler's Happy Madison Productions has long filled its comedies about the crassness and commercialism of modern life with overt product placement, and the fact that Sandler is both producer and star means he's clearly not being forced.
But other actors may feel strong-armed, and that's what concerns Rosenberg.
"Our members are really being given a triple whammy," he says, noting that ad dialogue can take work away from commercial actors, might be a conflict of interest for an actor who is a spokesperson for another product, and doesn't compensate the actor involved.
****It's not just about money; it's also raising ethical questions.
****Rosenberg predicts that product placement eventually may involve political or religious thought and worries that "when at the last minute you're given something that is anathema to you . . . you've got to have the right to say, 'Yeah, I'll do that,' or 'No.' "
Traylor Howard of the cable series "Monk," who plays the detective's assistant, notes, "We do it here. It's a pain." She cites the use of a bleach product that none of the actors wanted to be associated with, because it seemed inappropriate to character and story line. A seasoned commercial actress, she recalls she eventually said, "I'll do it. I'll figure a way to make it seem normal." Another example was a car placement that "didn't fit the script . . . but we ended up making it work. . . . But sometimes you just can't do it." She says, "Hopefully it pays the bills for the show, but I don't know. I try not to worry about it, but sometimes it's really annoying."
The companies seeking brand integration stress they are sensitive to what seems appropriate.
Volvo knew it couldn't get a car into a story that predates autos, so instead created a global multimedia treasure hunt for its sport-utility as a promotional tie-in to Disney's adventure film "Pirates of Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest." But many other recent movies, including "The Da Vinci Code," have featured the company's car on-screen.
Dialogue isn't demanded, but clients are happy to hear it, if it's apt.
"If it fits into the story line," says Roger Ormisher, Volvo's vice president of public affairs. "There's always the quip, you know, 'Oh, it feels as safe as a Volvo,' or something. It's fine, because it's reality. That's not cheating. But we've never in any product placement asked for a specific name check. If the director, the producer or the writer feels they can roll a joke off the back of it, that's okay."
Linda Swick, president of the North Hollywood company International Promotions, which secures "brand integration" for companies such as Volvo, Corona and Heinz, points to dialogue in films that showed up even though no such demands were made. In last year's "Four Brothers," Tyrese Gibson referred to Volvo as "one of the safest cars," and in the original "The Fast and the Furious" Vin Diesel said, "You can have any brew you want -- as long as it's a Corona."
***"The audience laughed," she says, "and there you go: That's a perfect integration because whenever there's humor behind the integration there's also much more recall value. So there is a way of doing it."
*Swick sees problems only if there is audience backlash to a movie coming over like one big commercial. She believes the writers and actors should have confidence that the "director is not going to do anything in his film that is going to interfere with its integrity." She adds that branding integration "may be evolving and going through many changes, but it will continue because it's life. It's life!"
**For now, Rosenberg is looking for compromise on the issue: "If you consult with writers and actors, we will find a way to help you do it seamlessly so it doesn't infringe upon the art," he says. ****"But to just foist it upon us is wrong, and now they don't even want to compensate us for selling ourselves out like they normally do when we sell ourselves out!"
© 2006 The Washington Post Company
Backstage.Com
“Where Product Meets Program Execs push for seamless integration,” June 26, 2006, By Andrew Salomon
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Last month, while the television networks were staging their upfront presentations for advertisers, the Writers Guild of America held a press conference to reiterate its objections to product placement — the practice of positioning name-brand items in a scene and weaving them into dialogue. This was the latest instance in a steady stream of disapproval by the artists' unions, whose leadership over the past year has pushed for a say in the process and, possibly, a financial stake.
Though money is most often the bottom line, both the WGA and the Screen Actors Guild say they are most concerned about their members being contorted into — in their view — nakedly shilling for companies. Nevertheless, marketers still need to sell their products and studio executives still have to generate ad revenue, without which free television would not exist and many movies wouldn't get made. In an ever-shifting media landscape — with new technologies competing for viewers' attention, sometimes enabling them to avoid commercials altogether — this has become more challenging. Thus there is product placement, which has been on the rise in television and film for the past decade. Its net worth, according to the research firm PQ Media, was $3.46 billion in 2004, a 30% increase over 2003. The company also found that product placement grew at an annual rate of 16.3% from 1999 to 2004.
Though there seems to be a great divide between management and labor over this issue, there is more common ground than some might realize. Like actors and writers, marketers and studio executives are wary of branded entertainment, because excessive commercialism can have a negative impact on the products being sold and the shows serving as a platform. Witness NBC's The Apprentice: According to advertising and entertainment industry experts, ratings for the reality show declined this season in part because of too much product placement.
A Virtually Simple Solution
To avoid that situation, advertising and studio executives are developing ways to seamlessly meld products with shows. One occurs during postproduction, when editors can insert the image of a soup can or box of cereal onto a kitchen counter — a process known as digital product placement. Developed by Marathon Ventures in Burbank, Calif., the service is sold to ad buyers and studios. Not only does it allow for more-discreet advertising in a show but the placement can be used in four different ways. For example, Coca-Cola can pay for a can of Coke on a table in the foreground of a scene, then change it to a carton of Minute Maid orange juice for the rerun, A&W root beer in the syndicated version — both of them Coca-Cola brands — then back to Coke for the DVD.
This innovation would seem to answer the complaints of the WGA, the most vocal critic of product placement among the unions, because it doesn't involve writing at all. However, it's hard to know the writers' position: Gabriel Scott, spokesperson for the guild, said the union would not comment on this technology.
The actors' unions seem to be sidestepping this issue, as well. When asked to comment, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists released a statement outlining its general policy on product placement, saying it's studying the matter and working to ensure that the process does not "compromise members' employment or employment opportunities."
Though SAG spokesperson Seth Oster also declined to comment on the issue, he pointed to the spring edition of Screen Actor, the union's magazine. It contains an article titled "Forced Endorsement," in which the union expresses its concern about digital product placement: "Technology now allows advertisers to digitally insert their products during postproduction, meaning actors may not even be aware of what is being advertised in their own shows."
According to several news reports on Marathon Ventures from outlets such as The New York Times and CBS's The Early Show, an episode of Yes, Dear in April 2005 was the first scripted program to use digital product placement — in a scene in which a box of Club crackers sits on a coffee table. In an email to Back Stage, Jean Louisa Kelly, an actor in the scene, indicated she didn't have a problem with it: "I was okay with the product placement on Yes, Dear and didn't notice anything really inappropriate."
'Perfect' Integration
Jeff Greenfield, executive vice president of 1st Approach, a branded-entertainment marketing firm based in Portsmouth, N.H., has long been a champion of product placement, but he also understands its limitations. "When it's done too much, it becomes exhausting to watch, viewers start to tune out, the bloggers pick up on it," Greenfield says. The resultant negative buzz can hurt show and brand alike.
Instead, he says, the future of integrated marketing will involve brands producing their own programs. "Why try to get pigeonholed into a show?" Greenfield asks. "What I tell my clients is, if you create good content, the distribution will be there&hellip. I see TV as an excuse to do marketing." Greenfield is working with two companies to develop two new programs, but they will be reality shows, not scripted.
Enter Lovespring International, an improvised comedy on the Lifetime channel that catalogues the tribulations of a sputtering dating service in the digital age. The fictional service's nemesis is the real-life website Perfectmatch.com, which paid for the tie-in that makes the show possible. It might seem that the talents behind a program in the tradition of Curb Your Enthusiasm and This Is Spinal Tap — which pillory the hypocrisy and self-seriousness of show business — would reject any kind of product integration. But the opposite is true, and not just because it provides work for actors and writers.
"When I was told about the idea, I thought it was terrific," says Jack Plotnick, an actor on Lovespring and one of its developers, "because we needed that idea anyway" — another dating service to serve as a foil. "It's a fun tie-in. I don't see it as a slippery-slope kind of thing."
Having a real-life competitor lends the show a legitimacy it wouldn't get with a fictitious company. In general, such verisimilitude can be a creative upside to product placement. Sam Pancake, another actor on the show, said he'd rather see a character eat Wheaties than a contrived, generic brand such as "Crunchy Flakes." "Seeing an actor hold a can that says 'Cola' takes me out of a show as much as excessive product placement," he says. Of the Perfectmatch.com tie-in, he adds, "It makes sense to me, and it doesn't bother me. I've never felt that it went against me creatively." The actors say they are not even required to mention Perfectmatch.com in every episode.
Guy Shalem, the show's creator, says he was pitched several ideas for product placement by Lifetime, including one for a computer company. "Not only did [the company] want to be mentioned but also [wanted] some sort of story line," he says. "It was asking way too much of us. We wanted flawless integration, and in Lovespring [Perfectmatch.com] was the only company."
The Power to Persuade
Achieving a flawless integration of programming and product would appear to satisfy all parties: marketers who need to work around DVRs and consumers' general dislike of ads; studio executives who are under pressure to boost revenue each year; writers, actors, and other artists who don't want to blatantly promote a company's wares within the context of a show. Yet the very idea of commercial legerdemain unsettles people outside and inside the entertainment industry.
Product placement is "deceptive advertising," says Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, a consumer advocacy organization that agitates for a church-and-state-like separation between ads and shows. "It sneaks by people's cognitive capacities and plants messages in their brains when they're paying less attention," Ruskin explains. "We're already seeing the effects of subliminal advertising: obesity, addiction to gambling, Type II diabetes.… Americans are suffering."
The WGA addressed the issue in a position paper about "stealth advertising" released in fall 2005: "That Guild members are now being forced to take part in stealth and often subliminal advertising concerns us a great deal." The tract also raises the specter of the Federal Communications Commission by mentioning an FCC regulation that states, "Listeners are entitled to know by whom they are being persuaded."
The FCC has worked diligently to raise its profile and influence during the Bush administration, most notably with the passage of a much tougher indecency bill. Jonathan Adelstein, one of the agency's commissioners, told the Los Angeles Times last year, "Everything from Coke to soap is subliminally hawked in TV programs. In today's media environment, product placement has moved beyond Coke tumblers prominently displayed at the judges' table of American Idol. Now products have even seeped into plot lines."
Likewise, the WGA report states, "The Guilds do not want members put in the unacceptable position of facilitating violations of FCC regulations. We, therefore, think this issue ultimately requires discussion both at the bargaining table and before the FCC in Washington."
The Bottom Line
The uncertainty caused by technology and the changing tastes of viewers forces studios and advertisers to seek alternatives to traditional models of marketing so that everyone can achieve the same goal: to get paid. Although the unions try to negotiate the margin between craft and commerce, ultimately their members work for the studios — and everyone wants to work, period. "I was in pilot hell for six or seven years," Shalem says. "I haven't gotten anything on the air" before the Perfectmatch .com deal. Creative talents can advocate for what they see as a better system, but, in the end, advertising pays the bills. There's no doubt marketers are going to have a big say in how the system works at any given moment.
Consumer advocates such as Ruskin say that if the television industry struggles to survive, that's good. "For us, the television industry is doing great," he says. "They're making people want to watch less."
People won't stop watching television, of course, and Ruskin knows that. But he believes that artists who work in the medium will eventually be affected by the integration of products and programming. "The infomercial medium allows for fewer opportunities for acting brilliance and screenwriting brilliance," he says. "As the constraints grow on television and it starts to look more like QVC, it's inevitable that the quality is going to decrease. Good actors and good screenwriters will flee opportunities [in TV] for those of higher quality."
For some of those working in the television industry, their outlook is much more sanguine. Kelly, the actor on Yes, Dear, writes, "There will probably always be a tension between the advertisers' interests and the creators' interests." Says Shalem, "The bottom line is moderation. That's true for everything in life."
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'Branded Entertainment' Deals Mean More Money for Companies -- and More Complexity
By Amanda Bronstad
The National Law Journal
May 3, 2006
It's no accident that contestants of "The Apprentice," Donald Trump's reality television show, designed the actual marketing brochures for a new Pontiac model. Or that the Man in the Yellow Hat in the recently released "Curious George" movie drives a Volkswagen.
They're the results of a new type of promotional contract between advertisers and entertainment, loosely dubbed "branded entertainment," which is generating substantial revenue for many law firms throughout the United States.
Designed to incorporate a company's product or brand name directly into the script of a television show or movie, the new deals go far beyond the day when Reese's Pieces candy got a famous feature in the 1982 film "E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial."
They involve product placement, joint marketing of a film or show and Internet or cell phone promotions. In the most far-reaching deals, advertisers have agreed to pay for portions of a production, such as the recent opening of Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.'s "Akeelah and the Bee," which coffee giant Starbucks Corp. helped finance.
"The percentage of work for branded entertainment has grown exponentially in the last three to four years," said Brian Murphy, a partner at New York-based Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz, a media and advertising firm that has about 10 lawyers handling the new deals. "Our practice has bloomed."
But branded entertainment hasn't come without scrutiny. Jonathon Adelstein of the Federal Communications Commission has called for stricter and clearer rules regarding disclosures of branded entertainment. Ron Whitworth, a special assistant to Adelstein, a commissioner, confirmed that the FCC has received a number of formal complaints involving potentially inadequate disclosure of product placements.
In another legal wrinkle, the Screen Actors Guild and the Writers Guild of America are protesting the use of branded entertainment, describing it as a form of "forced endorsement" without compensation. The guilds may file protests with the FCC.
THE NEW 'REALITY'
The growth of branded entertainment comes as advertisers are seeking new ways to broadcast their message to consumers, who, with high-tech products such as TiVo and digital video recorders, or DVRs, are able to fast-forward through traditional 30-second commercials. It also comes as producers and television networks, which depend on revenue from commercials, are seeking new ways to obtain financing.
Nowhere has branded entertainment been more successful than in reality television programs, where product-placement deals have helped fund production of the shows.
One of the first shows to incorporate real products into the story line was "The Apprentice", which is in its fifth season on NBC. Last year, the winning team of one episode designed a brochure to market General Motors Corp.'s Pontiac Solstice, a new model that "sold out production output in a month," said Clark Siegel, a partner and co-chairman of the intellectual property and entertainment practice at Irell & Manella in Los Angeles, which crafted the product deals on behalf of Mark Burnett Productions, producer of "The Apprentice."
"They paid a lot of money, but it was incredibly successful," he said.
The recent deals are much more complicated than simple product placement, which only five years ago rarely involved lawyers. Advertisers want their brand or product to have the most screen time, be in the most retail shops and generate the biggest gossip on Web sites.
As a result, more companies are looking outside their own legal departments to craft the deals.
"The prior deals were fairly simple, straightforward," said Larry Ulman, a partner at Los Angeles' Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher who crafted a $200 million deal last year with NBC Universal on behalf of Volkswagen of America Inc.
"You either supplied the goods for free in exchange for seeing your goods on television, or you paid a small amount of money to make sure your goods are shown," Ulman said. "But the deals now are much more complicated. That's why you'd go to a big law firm."
'TREMENDOUS GROWTH AREA'
Most of the law firms that structure brand entertainment deals already have developed advertising and entertainment practices, typically in New York and Los Angeles. With branded entertainment deals, both departments are working closer together.
"It's been a tremendous growth area for us, without question," said Murphy of Frankfurt Kurnit. "It's given us an opportunity to take the expertise in the entertainment area and have those attorneys work closely with attorneys who've been working with brands for decades."
Linda Goldstein, chairwoman of the advertising, media and entertainment group and a partner in the New York office of Los Angeles-based Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, said that five years ago the firm handled few, if any, product placement deals. Now, about a half-dozen lawyers, split between the advertising group in New York and the entertainment group in Los Angeles, structure up to 25 deals a year.
Few of the firms doing branded entertainment deals have a background in traditional motion picture financing.
"Unlike traditional forms of financing, where, if you put money into a film or television production you'd have the expectation of getting money back, in these deals there is no expectation of getting the money back," said Craig Emanuel, partner in the Los Angeles office and head of the entertainment practice at Loeb & Loeb, which has doubled to eight the number of lawyers working on branded entertainment deals in the past year. "The value to the product is getting your presence in the film."
Many branded entertainment deals involve some level of co-promotion, in which a movie is advertised or promoted by the financier. The movie "Akeelah and the Bee," for example, is advertised on Starbucks' cup holders.
"Anytime you can get somebody else to pay for your promotion of the movie, that is terrific," said Bob Darwell, chairman of the entertainment, media and communications group at Los Angeles-based Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, who called branded entertainment "a pretty meaningful part of our practice at the firm."
The deals come with an inherent challenge in getting advertising clients, who want complete control over the project, to communicate effectively with the various production heads who share their own creative input.
That becomes a challenge for lawyers, who spend much of their time making sure a product becomes a natural part of the story line, said Arnold Peter, a partner at Los Angeles-based Raskin Peter Rubin & Simon, which derives nearly 15 percent of its revenue from branded entertainment deals. He said many of the deals take months to negotiate.
"If you're representing the brand, you want to have as much of a product on the screen for as long as you can, but if you're representing the studio, you want to make sure you give value to the brand for the money they're paying you," he said. "You argue about the language. They want to say, 'No. Re-write that because you barely see the product.' Whereas, the producer will want as much discretion as they can [get] so that the product does not violate the integrity of the film."
As a result, the deals are "getting increasingly more complicated to negotiate because of issues of creative control," he said. For most attorneys, branded entertainment deals are unlike any other contract.
Ulman said he had to start from scratch in drafting Volkswagen's five-year deal with NBC Universal, the first of its kind by a major studio. In the deal, Volkswagen is allowed to work with producers in crafting its vehicles into the scripts and plot lines of the studio's movies, theme parks and television, including the SciFi and USA channels. One of the outgrowths from the deal is the recent movie "Curious George," in which the Man in the Yellow Hat drives a Volkswagen.
"It's not like you can pull out your standard promotions form," he said. "It's all new and creative; nobody knows the problems that will develop."
FCC GETS INVOLVED
One problem has been recent complaints made to the FCC related to the recent spate of branded entertainment deals. In its petition, Commercial Alert, a nonprofit organization based in Portland, Ore., asked the FCC to require better disclosures of product placement in television shows.
"Sometimes product placement is disclosed, sometimes it's not," said Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, which, in addition to petitioning the FCC, is lobbying Congress to introduce legislation that would require disclosures of product placement in all media.
Commercial Alert filed a similar complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, which rejected its request last year because displaying an image or brand name on a show was not enough to constitute "deceptive claims," Ruskin said.
"That argument is based on this very antiquated notion that advertising persuades only through objective claims, not images," he said.
Ruskin favors a "pop-up" that would notify viewers as the show is going on that a product placement is taking place, instead of disclosing the placement in the ending credits.
Rebecca Fisher, an FCC spokeswoman, said that the commission has not yet replied to Commercial Alert's complaint.
'STEP UP ENFORCEMENT'
But Adelstein, the FCC commissioner, noted in remarks posted on the FCC Web site that concerns over product placement "clearly indicate that the time has come for us to step up our enforcement in this area.
"In today's media environment, product placement has moved beyond Coke tumblers prominently displayed at the judges' table of American Idol," he wrote. "Now, products have even seeped into plot lines. Soap operas have woven cosmetic lines into their tales of who-did-what-with-who, while 'The Apprentice' sounds more and more like an hour-long infomercial for the latest corporate sponsors."
Adelstein called for stricter and clearer rules regarding disclosures, which should be more than "a split-second during the credits in small type that no one could possibly read," he said.
Ronald Urbach, a partner and head of marketing and communication at New York's Davis & Gilbert, agreed that the regulatory issues are "still open" with regard to product claims.
"If you make a claim in a particular program, what is that and what is that not?" he said. "What rights do I have in content versus advertising? It has First Amendment issues across the board."
Branded entertainment deals have raised several other legal issues about trademarks, copyrights and free speech.
"One of the issues that I think will be the subject of negotiation in future discussions is what the SAG is calling essentially a 'forced endorsement,' " said Peter of Raskin Peter.
He said actors might request in their contracts that they have a say in product-placement arrangements, especially if the show relies on their "name and likeness," he said.
Last fall, WGA and SAG held a news conference in which they threatened to petition the FCC if networks failed to make more disclosures of product placement. The guilds are making similar protests this month at the annual "upfronts" in New York, at which networks are scheduled to announce their fall programming lineups to advertisers.
"Creators, writers, directors and actors don't have either consolation or compensation for being required to integrate products into their programs," said Patric Verrone, president of WGA, west. "Not only is that not part of our contracts, but it conflicts in many respects with what we're obligated to do. We're supposed to be writing television. You try to make it realistic if appropriate, but if a product gets shoe-horned in, we need to be able to say, 'No.'"
