Thoughts
The Dish Network DVR Campaign
By Phillip Barnhard
The well-received comedian hawking products isn’t a new concept. Jerry Seinfeld showed us during the height of NBC’s Seinfeld that it’s oh-so-easy to swipe that American Express card. Recently, Ellen Degeneres has gotten in on the AMEX act. Dane Cook used his edgy persona in Major League Baseball’s large marketing campaign for postseason baseball in 2007. This strike-while-the-iron’s-hot mentality has advertising agencies searching for comedians to carry over their popularity and likeability into product endorsement.
Enter Frank Caliendo.
The former MADtv star took his “well-honed” craft of celebrity impersonations and created his own television sketch show, TBS’ Frank TV, which underwent its own massive ad campaign starring Caliendo and his impersonations. While he performs impressions of more than 100 celebrities, he’s renowned for his imitations of NFL commentator John Madden and President George W. Bush. It was only a matter of time before corporate America came courting.
In the dish-versus-cable television wars, Caliendo promotes Dish Network’s digital video recording (DVR) feature in television commercials and radio advertisements. In this national campaign, he uses the likenesses of Madden, Bush, former President Bill Clinton, NBA legend-turned-analyst Charles Barkley and actor Al Pacino to promote Dish Network’s DVR functionality and performance.
A few of the TV ads place Caliendo (as himself) and Caliendo (as a character) next to each other to dialogue and interact. Other ads simply have the impressionist in character with a DISH remote control to play off its funny features (i.e., the old “pause” rhymes with “paws” gag). Either way, Caliendo differentiates himself from other comic-hawking product-pushers with his impersonations, the source of which might also be his, along with the ad’s, downfall.
Caliendo and Dish Network landed in a legal limbo with representatives from the Madden and Barkley camps. The two sports personalities hinted at possible lawsuits that claimed Caliendo was improperly using their likeness to promote Dish Network in the campaign. Instead of idly waiting for the suit, EchoStar, parent company of Dish Network, went to court to get a ruling on the legality of Caliendo’s impersonations in promoting its products. The groups would later settle out of court, and the ads featuring the likenesses of Madden and Barkley were removed from television and the Dish Network Web site.
So what you’re left with is Pacino, Bush and Clinton ads, and, frankly, they’re getting annoying. If you happened to flip over to TBS for an episode of Tyler Perry’s House of Pain or the 2007 MLB postseason last summer, you were blasted with Caliendo impersonations promoting his television show. The American masses got their first dose of Caliendo’s hilarious take on Madden, Bush and many of their favorite celebrities during the 30-second spots that ran every commercial break. It was Caliendo overload, as he showed us his Dr. Phil, Jack Nicholson and Robin Williams.
I, like most of the population, figured his act out pretty quickly. The character, the impersonation and the mockery is the completely predictable Caliendo package – all that’s missing is a bereted-fellow sledgehammering a watermelon. His comedy is the equivalent of drinking a “suicide” at a local eatery. The idea of infusing the fountain flavors of Coke, Diet Coke, root beer, 7-Up and Orange Fanta seems intriguing, and you enjoy the unique concoction for the first few sips. But later, you realize that it’s simply a poor mixture of flavors, and drinking it gets kind of old and boring. You’ve had enough.
I bought into Frank TV. I watched a few episodes. By the third airing, the chuckles turned into polite smiles. I grew tiresome of Caliendo’s error-filled rendition of Bush. I grew frustrated with the amount of “turribles” he added to Barkley’s southern drawl. Caliendo can be funny, but, if I can be frank, I’m Frank-ed out.
E-mail the author: Phillip Barnhard
