Summer madness
By SAMANTHA ETTUS
Scripps Howard News Service
09-JUN-05
It is only the second week in June and already summer madness has kicked in. This week we take a peek at three celebrities making headlines for some wonderful and wonderfully absurd reasons: Russell Crowe is plagued by anger management issues, Barbara Walters is suffering from an age gap, and Brooke Shields is impacting the medical community with her latest book. Let’s focus our microscope on their personal brand management and see how they’re holding up. (The brand-assets meter ranges from $ to $$$$.)
Russell Crowe
Crowe could not have picked a worse time to let loose with his latest outburst and subsequent arrest in New York City this week. The problem started at 4AM last Sunday at New York’s tony Mercer Hotel. Crowe was having difficulty reaching his wife in Australia and reacted by throwing a telephone at a hotel employee, hitting him in the face. He has been charged with second degree assault and fourth degree criminal possession of a weapon. Crowe’s new film, Cinderella Man, was released last weekend and he has disappointed his co-stars and the creators of the film by overshadowing the movie with his unbridled antics. This foolish incident once again draws attention to Crowe’s troubled history of fights and angry explosions, including allegations that he bit off a chunk of his bodyguard’s ear during the filming of Cinderella Man. While Crowe often plays tough characters and his bad boy image has not yet damaged his career, this latest transgression will likely have Hollywood second guessing future involvements with him. As a seasoned pro, Crowe knows the importance and impact of publicity surrounding opening weekend of a new film. By eclipsing his own Oscar-worthy performance, Crowe neglected his responsibility to his colleagues and demonstrated patently poor brand management.
Russell Crowe’s Brand A$ets
Brooke Shields
When celebrities leverage their fame to draw attention to an underexposed cause, it almost always produces positive results. Shields recently publicized her experience with severe post partum depression, and not since Katie Couric took on colon cancer has a celebrity made such a positive impact on a medical condition. When left untreated, the impact of post partum depression can be severe on the mother, the household and the new baby. But while at least 10% of women who give birth suffer from the affliction, only one in five are treated for symptoms. So Shields has been making public appearances to discuss her experience and has written a bestselling book on the subject. With depression often considered a shameful disease in our society, Shield’s bravery in going public with her own battle has served to inspire numerous articles on the condition, and has undoubtedly helped countless women recognize the symptoms and seek help for their own suffering.
Brooke Shields’ Brand A$$$$ets
Barbara Walters
Barbara Walters must have been more stunned than anyone when she became the target of breastfeeding activists across the country on Monday. The controversy erupted when the seasoned journalist and creator, host, and producer of ABC’s The View talked on-air of her discomfort at sitting next to a woman breastfeeding on an airplane. The comments sparked a bout of “lactivism” that peaked on Monday when 200 mothers held a “nurse-in,” appearing outside The View headquarters breastfeeding their babies. At a time when 70% of new mothers breastfeed their babies, the subject of breastfeeding has never been a more hot button topic, but Walters’ comments should not have come as a surprise to her viewers. And though the pro-breastfeeding movement has been highly effective and done great work, in this case they picked an inappropriate target. At age 73, Walters hails from a generation in which there was far less emphasis on breastfeeding and few women breastfed in public. Walters’ discomfort with public breastfeeding probably mirrors her reactions to a myriad of behaviors common to younger generations. Recognizing that a public apology would be disingenuous, Walters has not retreated from her remarks, nor should she. We know how she really feels and let’s leave it at that.
Barbara Walters Brand A$$$ets
Remember: the most dependable road to the top is to treat your brand as your greatest asset.
(Samantha Ettus is the author of "The Experts' Guide to 100 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do" (Random House). Contact her at Samantha@celebrityassets.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com) |
