When Hawking Chicken, Any Old Colonel Will Do
Loose talk
Actress Debrah Farentino on her preference for working on the NBC series “Earth 2” in New Mexico than the New York-based “NYPD Blue” (in the New York Times): “It sure beats pantyhose in a courtroom.”
Seen any of those new KFC ads that feature Col. Harlan Sanders hawking fried chicken? He hasn’t changed a bit, has he? The same white hair, goatee and suit? Not bad for a dead guy.
That’s right, the Kentucky Colonel has been dead for 14 years now. His new incarnation is an actor named Henderson Forsythe.
As KFC spokeswoman Jean Litterest singsonged, “He’s b-a-a-a-ck,” for the Dallas Morning News, KFC’s VP of advertising, Peter Foulds, was being more serious. “I think we’re doing America a service by bringing him back,” he said. “He was a character, an icon, as American as apple pie.”
Yet, insists Bob Garfield of Advertising Age magazine, “It may do no harm in this particular case, but it adds further fuel to the fire for those who suggest that there’s no truth in advertising.
He’s still rocking away with me and you, too David “The Edge” Evans turns 33 today.
How many believe that sturgeory is another word for fishing? Comedian Bill Murray, addressing “The International Conference on Sturgeon Biodiversity and Conservation” at New York’s American Museum of Natural History, was full of jokes. “How many of you are marine biologists?” the New York Times reported that he asked the audience. “How many are ichthyologists? How many are systematicists? How many believe that the sturgeon is kosher?”
Watch out, Barney, you now have some competition Chimp researcher Jane Goodall is, gasp, endorsing a line of toy animals. But relax. Profits from the toy chimps, rhinos, lions, cheetahs and elephants - the prices of which range from $39.99 to $1,500 - won’t just line Goodall’s pockets. Instead, they will help fund her work.
The next obvious question: Which one was merely for the bucks? When asked recently why she did five made-for-TV movies last year, Melissa Gilbert had a novel answer. “Each one had its own reason,” she said. “One was irresistible because of the role. One was irresistible because of the location. One was a chance to work with my fiance. One was strictly for money. I’m totally honest.”
He’s not much better as a writer, though the pay is higher Best-selling author Michael Crichton, a graduate of Harvard Medical School, had a good reason to change his planned profession. “I left medicine as a service to my patients,” he told the New York Times. “I was a really terrible doctor.”
The sequel will be `Revenge of the Freaks, Nerds & Weirdos’ Sandra Bernhard is curious about the title of her MTV special that’s titled “Freaks, Nerds & Weirdos.” As the comic told TV Guide, “I don’t know if I’m any of those things, or maybe I’m all of them.”