The Hardest Working Man in Show Business!

[BigGrim]

Start spreading the news...He didn't leave us just yet.

http://money.cnn.com/2003/07/23/pf/saving/...elebs/index.htm

Frank Sinatra might've died in 1998, but his music will live on. Still, I didn't think he'd be holding a concert at the Radio City Music Hall in 2003. What happened? Did he fake his death? Nope. People are going to "resurrect" him with technology to give the illusion that he's actually on stage singing and dancing. If you saw the Al Pacino movie "Simone", you'll have some idea of what they probably have planned.

Talk about hard working. The man is dead and he's still going out on tour, now that's dedication.

Seriously though, don't you just love the examples they show of Gandhi pitching Visa and Martin Luther King Jr selling Cell Phones? I understand that certain pieces of intellectual property like plays and musicals become community property without the need to pay royalties after a certain amount of time, but this just seems to not only reek of exploitation, but dishonoring the dead.

I'd have no qualm with a projection of Martin Luther King Jr. standing behind a podium, giving his famous "I have a dream" speech in front of an audience of school children, provided that there was no admission rate for the action. That would be continuing his legacy, but somehow I doubt he intended to be selling Cell Phones if he were alive in 2003. Sinatra might've still wanted to perform for a fee if he could today, so that may seem more appropriate.

Still, I think some distinctive lines need to be drawn. Some of the things advertisers do would probably have these people rolling in their graves. Let them rest in peace.

I don't even know what to say beyond that.

-Grim-

[Occhidiangela]

"I have a dream" and someone turns it to a cell phone campaign.

What did Aretha Franklin sing about?

R E S P E C T!

[Nystul]

To an extent, I agree with you. But keep in mind that most of these things are not community property; they cannot happen without being liscensed by the estate. Royalites are indeed paid, and in the Sinatra case I'd bet they will be pretty mindboggling royalties. Obviously, Martin Luther King Jr. could not decide whether or not to peddle cell phones, but his beneficiaries probably made the decision for him, and hopefully his payout for the ads is going to something worthwhile.

[Zarathustra]

I can see two sides of this coin.

(Honestly, I've yet to see a coin that had a different number of sides. Although there was an arcade near my house as a kid where the game tokens had the same impression on each side, they were definitely two sides.)

First, whoever owns the rights to that music has been able to sell it to the public all this time and no one has questioned that (using Sinatra as an example). I really don't see anything wrong with his "performances" that are scheduled, and I'm actually interested to see the show. It's a spectacle of technology seemingly "resurrecting" a man to continue performing, coupled with the quality of Sinatra's singing. I know that if I were a performer, I'd love for my work to live on. Similarly, I thought the Dirt Devil commercial with Fred Astaire was top-notch when I first saw it, and still do to this day.

However, the other side holds the fact that not everyone that is a "celebrity" is also a performer. Martin Luther King Jr., Ghandi, etc., are not presented in these ads in a way that reflects their life's work. If these people are to be resurrected to speak in some way, though the miracle of technology, let's do so in a way that WON'T have them rolling in their graves. Let's see Roosevelt speaking on our national parks. As mentioned above, let's see King Jr. giving his "I have a dream" speech in a classroom. Use them to promote the things they championed, not to make a buck.

[Ignatz]

But I agree completely: the whole practice is disgusting. It's bad enough that Dr. Seuss's Estate went against his direct wish to never see one of his stories on the big screen just after he died. Reanimating dead personas (that's really all they're getting) is much, much worse.

The scariest part is the precedent it sets. A decade or two from now, it will be frighteningly easy to do it, too. But who will bother to defend the dead? The family seems, more often than not, perfectly willing to cash in. And the actor/author/supermodel/celebrity isn't exactly around to defend himself.

It may sound extreme, but I'd love to see legislation passed to prevent this kind of thing. Either that or we can look forward to Abe Lincoln selling Lincoln Logs, James Dean selling car insurance, and Henry Ford selling Fords -- for all eternity. *shudder*

[Destroy-Titus]

I'm sure with that kind of technology there would be alot of amazing, never-before-seen "historical" footage around :lol:. I would love to see the long lost film of Hitler's suicide, or the murder scene of Rasputin in full color :D....with coke cans in the background $$$ ca-ching!


Look into my eyes! :ph34r:

[Ignatz]

Or Caligula doing the Houston 500! Jesus acquiring an AK47 from a time-travelling missionary and laying waste to Rome! Oo! How about Founding Fathers Gone Wild on Pay Per View!

Okay, I changed my mind. Technology is deeeeelicious!
:D

[Obi2Kenobi]

I really love those last 2. But on a more serious note, why stop there? Why not make Brittany Spears shoot someone? Or George Bush kick a puppy? Or, on a less serious note: make the other candidate for class president say, "I'm a dork. Vote for Jimmy instead."

[Zarathustra]

Those won't be a problem since the person is still alive. But as for the dead, I hold that there is no problem if they're doing the same thing they did in life. An above example had Henry Ford doing Ford commercials. What'd be wrong with that? If I were he I'm sure I wouldn't mind my image being used in commercials to this day. It was his life's work, and it's outlived him.

Brittney Spears, though.... if she's resurrected years from now to perform, I'll know it's time to completely lose faith in humanity.

[Obi2Kenobi]

If the person is still alive, then it is worse. Which image you see is real and which isn't? It takes crooked cops to a whole new level. Why not release a "7 eleven security video" about some person and then arrest them, all because you think they smell funny (there are some strange people)? :o

[Rhydderch Hael]

Has anyone seen the PC game The Great Escape? Unlike other loosely-based-on-a-movie games, you're not playing some generic character in a familiar setting-- you actually play out an escape from Stalag Luft III as Virgil "Cooler King" Hilts, with a character model built precisely to match Steve McQueen's character. Face, swagger, and voice.

Granted, this is a matter of playing a character based on a character played by an actor, but the situation struck me as similar, though I wouldn't imagine it to be as offensive. I'm more put off about (by neccessity of gameplay mechanics) how the game takes great liberties with the plot of the movie.

[Destroy-Titus]

Yeah, I remember the great escape, not too many people bought it unfortunately, I only played it for a little bit, then ignored it and now it's around here somewhere, and it is a "rip-off," but classic characters such as him are always copied-and-pasted over and over and over until their names become a generic term for something. B)

Bringing back dead people= can't do too much harm.

Flashing around fake footage of living people= Cops will be the highest rated show on TV, finally, they will take down Bill Clinton's gigantic toronto-based cocaine cartel :lol: .