Homme family retrieves Friendly Giant puppets in skit spat
Rusty and Jerome, the two puppets from beloved CBC children's TV show The Friendly Giant, have been returned to the family of late star Bob Homme after a ruckus over their appearance in a satirical skit last month.
Homme's son Richard and daughter Ann picked up the puppets Tuesday from a display at the public broadcaster's downtown Toronto headquarters that also included The Friendly Giant's tunic, boots, castle set and mini furniture.
"I'm sorry this whole thing happened, but we felt we had no choice," Richard Homme told CBC Radio's As It Happens on Tuesday.
"I think it was time for us to take the display back."
The family objected to use of the rooster and giraffe puppets in a videotaped skit that aired during the Gemini Awards broadcast from Regina on Oct. 28. The skit turned up on the video-sharing website Youtube on Tuesday and commentary online about the footage has ranged from indignation to praise for its "daring."
Seemingly created in the vein of Comedy Central's TV program Puppets Who Kill and the hit stage show Avenue Q, the satirical Gemini skit depicted a fictional charity appeal in support of a retirement home for puppets from defunct TV shows.
Featuring a cameo by Canadian actress Camilla Scott, the skit shows a series of children's show puppets — including Rusty and Jerome — complaining of being forgotten. At one point, an actress in the skit adds that the puppets are "bored. All they do is drink and smoke and have sex."
Any media use of the puppets must be approved by the family, Homme said, adding that he felt the skit was "misrepresenting the puppets. They seemed like aliens to me with their different voices. It occurred to me that this is not anything we would have approved of, as far as the script goes."
Homme said that a new employee working at the CBC Museum who didn't know about the permission requirement allowed the puppets to be used.
The CBC apologized to the Homme family on Nov. 2, when they first contacted officials to express their displeasure, according to CBC spokesman Jeff Keay.
"We sincerely regret they feel any trust was breached," Keay said.
"The Friendly Giant pieces will be missed, but we respect the family's decision to have the items returned to them."
He added that as the CBC proceeds with plans to redevelop the Toronto building's main floor space, "we fully intend to include displays, objects and information that will represent CBC's rich history, its programs and its people."
'30 Rock' rolls ads into story lines
In the Nov. 15 episode of NBC's "30 Rock," Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey, in their roles as Jack Donaghy and Liz Lemon, sang the praises of Verizon Wireless before Fey looked right into the camera and asked, "Can we have our money now?"
At least in this case, art did indeed imitate life. Verizon said it handed over an integration fee to NBC, in addition to some marketing support, for the mini-commercial within one of the network's hottest shows.
The scene in question featured Jack saying, "These Verizon Wireless phones are just so popular. I accidentally grabbed one belonging to an acquaintance." Liz responded, "Well, sure that Verizon Wireless service is just unbeatable. If I saw a phone like that on TV, I would be like, 'Where is my nearest retailer so I can get one?' " She then broke the fourth wall and addressed the camera with the plea for cash.
"We talk with NBC on a consistent basis about opportunities," said Lou Rossi, director of media and sponsorships at Verizon Wireless. "We had engaged them to think about some ways we could help increase our presence in the marketplace, and they came back to us with the '30 Rock'-specific opportunity."
Rossi declined to disclose how much Verizon paid for the "30 Rock" integration but said that in addition to fees, it provided marketing support for the show with a co-branded ad in Maxim magazine and promotional content on VerizonWireless.com. "We want an integration to be as organic and natural to a show as it can be," he said. "Certainly with the '30 Rock' humor and writing, this type of integration just works well for them and for Verizon Wireless as well." NBC declined comment on the financial terms of the deal.
It's not the first time the irreverent NBC comedy has made a joke of the increasingly common practice of product integration while at the same time plugging a network advertiser. In fall 2006, there was a similar spoof with Snapple in the episode "Jack-Tor," which featured Lemon and the show-within-a-show's other writers protesting a directive from GE and Donaghy to write product placement into the show all while talking about how much they love Snapple. The dialogue included lines like "I only date guys who drink Snapple" and ended with Donaghy saying, "Yes, everyone loves Snapple. Lord knows I do." There was even a guy in a Snapple suit who walked out of the elevator asking for the human resources department.
Snapple's integration was part of its media buy on the network, a company spokeswoman said.
Despite the integration deals, "30 Rock" has made it onto Nielsen's list of the top 10 shows with product placement only one time since the fall season started. "The Office," another NBC show known for cutting major integration deals with advertisers in the past but which insists it no longer is involved in any such deals, turned up on the Nielsen top 10 list for four of the first five weeks of the fall season.
Through Nov. 18, Nielsen tracked 142 placements this season for a total of 779 seconds, or nearly 13 minutes, for "30 Rock," compared with 381 occurrences for a total of 2,505 seconds, or nearly 42 minutes, for "Office." From Sept. 24-Nov. 11, there were more than 80 brand mentions on "Office," according to Nielsen. But sources at Reveille and NBC insisted the placements were all scripted and viewed as adding to the humor of the show rather than emerging from any media buys or integration deals with NBC Entertainment or Reveille.
"Office" showrunner Greg Daniels has said that the show is no longer doing product integration because he "found it pretty impossible to balance the desires of the ad agencies and their clients with the creative needs of the show."
Among the brands with the most frequent or longest-lasting placements in "Office" this season are Hewlett-Packard, Boise Paper, Cisco Systems, Ever apparel, Microsoft, Vizio televisions, Toyota, Ford and Office Depot.
Staples, which cut a major integration deal with "Office" last season, had only three placements this season, lasting a total of nine seconds, compared with 56 occurrences lasting 334 seconds, or 5 1/2 minutes, in the full 2006-2007 season through Sept. 23, including repeats.
All of last season, including repeats, "Office" tallied 1,463 placements -- 427 verbal and 1,086 visual -- for a total of 9,110 seconds, or slightly more than 2 1/2 hours.
Billie Piper to return to Dr Who
Actress Billie Piper is to return to Doctor Who, the BBC has confirmed.
She will star in three episodes of the sci-fi drama, reprising her role as the Doctor's companion, Rose Tyler.
Rose's return will mean the Doctor has three assistants in next year's series - Donna, played by Catherine Tate, and Freema Agyeman as Martha.
The new series begins in March and will run for 13 episodes. There will be three special editions in 2009 before the show takes a break until 2010.
Piper left Doctor Who last year, when Rose was transported into a parallel universe.
The character had been a hit and Piper won a number of awards for her performances. She was named most popular actress at the National Television Awards in 2005 and 2006.
A separate show based on Rose had been planned by writer and series producer Russell T Davies, but was scrapped when Davies decided the programme was "a spin-off too far".
Filming is currently under way in Cardiff for the new series of Doctor Who, which sees the Doctor meeting an old group of enemies - the Sontarans - 35 years after first encountering them.
Before that, the programme will return to television screens at Christmas with a special episode set on the Titanic, which will co-star singer and actress Kylie Minogue.