The mighty Christopher Guest – Likely Stories – "Dead Ringer"
The early work of the comic genius
Dollars from Dollies
Annual events that we all know and love, especially those in the U.S., began more often than not, as cheap publicity stunts. The Miss America pageant started as a stunt to lure tourists to Atlantic City in 1921. The stunts became so shameless in their purpose, that by the late 1920’s the American Association of…
Macabre
In the 1950’s, the Hollywood producer, William Castle, became so frustrated by the lack of PR ingenuity and the general disinterest from publicists to plug his movies, that he started to concoct his own publicity stunts. His 1958 movie “Macabre” starring William Prince and Jim Backus received the familiar, “don’t ring us, we’ll ring you”, so…
The Real Deal
Sorry for the blog silence over the past few days but I’ve been deeply immersed in mud, sweat and tears at this year’s Glastonbury Festival. What a colossus it has become – physically and culturally. It’s such an amazing, stand alone event, but one which to some is probably just another summer music festival. If you’re…
Animal Magic
Following on from my blog Mark My Words, about stunts and stories being done before, the idea to pander to animals and treat them like humans (for example, the well publicised dog wedding that one of my consumer teams organised for Harrods’ “Anything is Possible” campaign) has been around for decades. Way back in 1951,…
Circus of Horror
The world renowned venue at Olympia in London saw the Bertram Mills Circus grace its doors in 1919. Members of the Mills circus agreed to a publicity stunt which involved catering for the whole Bertram Mills Circus. As it was nearly Christmas, the team put on a lavish Christmas lunch with all the trimmings. The…
The Big Question: Is Glastonbury Too Big, and is it still Europe's most important music festival?
By Ian Burrell 20th June 2007 Just how big is Glastonbury? Glastonbury 2007, which begins on Friday, is expected to have an attendance of 177,500, making it the biggest since the festival started in 1970. Organisers sold 137,500 tickets in one hour and 45 minutes on 1 April. The first festival, the brain child of…
The Late Bernard Manning
Bernard Manning is dead. And somewhere in London there is a full size wax effigy of Mr Manning that I commissioned in 1992. Jonathan Margolis’ obituary in today’s Independent was staggering. I particularly liked his comment that “Bernard Manning was in a sense the last “legitimate” racist in Britain. Legitimate because the gags which caused…
"Green" Stories
I note that my blog about the recycling of stories and stunts got some response;one in particular caught my eye, from a Heather Yaxley. Her comments go to prove my point that nothing is original anymore, because somewhere way back in time, someone else had the idea. It’s all been done before. I wasn’t suggesting…
Horses for Courses
These days it’s almost impossible to promote anything to kids, alcohol, cigarettes, chocolate, burgers, chips are all no go areas, but not so in the 1920’s. Jim Moran was hired to promote a now defunct brand of beer. In true Moran style, he took a pantomime horse into numerous bars across California as a guerrilla…