| Subject: All My Children "Kisses Up to Revlon" |
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Couchie
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Date Posted: 19:13:12 03/19/02 Tue
Author Host/IP: h216-170-130-234.dsl.tds.net/216.170.130.234
From E!
"All My Children" Kisses Up to Revlon
Tue Mar 19, 8:24 PM ET
A kiss is just a kiss, but a lipstick is worth something.
All My Children, the Daytime Emmy-winning soap opera that for 32 years has dramatized the appeal of interlocking lips, has sold its newest storyline to a cosmetics firm.
The Associated Press reports that real-life cosmetics giant Revlon is paying ABC "millions of dollars" to be featured on the daytime series. Revlon will serve as the archrival to the fictional Enchantment brand of beauty products owned by Erica Kane.
Kane, played by the show's superstar Susan Lucci, catches scent of Revlon's scheme to headhunt one of her top employees, so she devises a ruse (no, we didn't say rouge) to have her daughter, Bianca (Eden Riegel), become a corporate spy. The glossy storyline will be featured over several months during which time Revlon will pay heavily to run support ads.
Revlon had no comment on the report. ABC would not reveal how much this plot line is worth.
Which came first: plot line or ad deal? ABC spokeswoman Sallie Schoneboom tells AP that the story idea was generated by the show's writers. Apparently only then did the network's ad sales department seize the opportunity to make a pact with Revlon.
"We would only have done it if it were organic to the storyline," Schoneboom stated.
Organic? Central would be more like it. More and more ad placement on television series is moving out of the background to blanket the screen. There are, seemingly, no boundaries between plot and product.
No Boundaries is, of course, the name of the WB's road-trip competition series, designed to match up in tone and toughness to the "No Boundaries" ad campaign for the Ford Explorer trucks--that just happen to be featured in the show. That cozy alliance was a direct arrangement between the show's producers, Lions Gate, and Ford before the midseason show was picked up by the WB.
With intense competition for scaled-back ad dollars amid a climate of falling ratings, networks are seeking new ways to seduce advertisers to spend money. You can't watch Survivor without noticing the not so subtle product placement. And as far back as 1997, the character of Dr. Lisa Catera on the (now dead and gone) CBS medical drama Chicago Hope had been so named as a plug for upscale advertiser Cadillac's auto, the Catera.
That now seems a very soft sell compared to the upfront and central Revlon placement.
It's easy to understand why this is happening--if an ad is part of the drama it can't be ignored by viewers as easily as it can during commercial breaks. Of course, we'll have to wait and see if fans buy into the Revlon-fueled plot or simply kiss it off.
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