by Freddy J. Nager, Founder & Fusion Director, Atomic Tango LLC
Hollywood is experiencing a “Freaky Friday” that’s lasting all summer — and perhaps beyond.
In the 1976 movie “Freaky Friday,” a mother and daughter magically swap bodies. After a series of icky moments milked for laughs, they predictably come to understand and respect each other.
Now, unpredictably, the entire movie industry is experiencing a similar switcheroo.
Categories: Media Review · Random Observations
Tagged: acting, actors, casting, celebrities, City Garage, Hollywood, Ionesco, movies, plays, Santa Monica, stage, theater, theatre
by Freddy J. Nager, Founder & Fusion Director, Atomic Tango LLC
So here I was flipping through the Calendar section of the L.A. Times. (Only in Hollywood is the entertainment section of the major newspaper called the “Calendar.” No, we don’t do anything else in this town but entertain or be entertained.) My eye caught the full-page ad for new movie Tetro. The ad brims over with critical raves, with the first quote proclaiming “Francis Ford Coppola, 70, has returned to his roots…”
That must be referring to his grape vine roots. (more…)
Categories: Case Studies
Tagged: advertising, films, Francis Ford Coppola, Hollywood, movies, Tetro, Vincent Gallo
And so it began...
To prep for a video I’m producing, I watched Undead or Alive, the 2007 comedy-horror flick about zombies in the old west. It’s moderately entertaining, with Chris Kattan as a cowboy wannabe and Navi Rawat as the intellectual kung-fu fighting Native-American babe. The hitch in this giddyap? The zombies themselves. Although they have more dialogue than most zombies (better agents, perhaps?), they’re still just another iteration of the lumbering brain eaters who have populated every zombie flick since Night of the Living Dead. Not exactly scary. I’d be more terrified to find a stray pitbull approaching me on a city street. Or Ann Coulter.
And yet…
Categories: Media Review · Random Observations
Tagged: Ann Coulter, Annalee Newitz, Hollywood, horror, Jed Rowen, movies, new zombie movies, Night of the Living Dead, Republicans, The Outbreak, The Worldwide Scoop, Undead or Alive, Zombie walk, zombies
by Freddy J. Nager, Founder & Fusion Director, Atomic Tango LLC
So I’m thoroughly digging on Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog — the surreal webisodic series by Joss Whedon — and I’m thinking that Hollywood’s foray into online video might not be a bad thing… (more…)
Categories: Media News
Tagged: Charlize Theron, Dollhouse, Dr. Horrible, Gemini Division, Hollywood, Joss Whedon, Metacafe, movies, Neil Patrick Harris, Rosario Dawson, UGC, user generated content, video
Only Hollywood could make waste this beautiful.
From the industry that gave us the likes of Paris Hilton comes yet another exquisite example of empty décor…
Categories: Case Studies
Tagged: Academy Awards, advertising, environmentalism, green business, Hollywood promotions, hypocrisy, marketing, Miramax, movies, oil industry, Oscar, publicity, publishing, stupidity, tchotchkes, There Will Be Blood, waste
"Common sense is the little man in a gray suit who never makes a mistake at addition, but it's always someone else's money he's adding up."
- Raymond ChandlerLet's hear it for uncommon sense: that inner itch that inspires you to stray from the herd, ditch the training wheels and leap into the fast lane. As we all know, it's the risk takers who get their faces on the cover of Wired magazine and their words on National Public Radio. No one ever remembers who won "honorable mention"...
Cool Rules Pronto celebrates uncommon sense in marketing and media. It's written by Freddy J. Nager, the Founder & Fusion Director of the L.A.-based marketing agency and production company Atomic Tango. For Cool Rules Pronto, he draws on two decades of experience in advertising and entertainment, including 15 years in new media. He has created campaigns and projects for agencies Saatchi & Saatchi and Magnet Interactive, and for such clients as Toyota, MCA Records, National Lampoon, Nissan & Infiniti, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, the NFL on Fox and numerous startups.
Freddy also serves on the Board of Directors of City Garage Theatre in Santa Monica, California. He holds a BA from Harvard University and an MBA from USC (go Trojans!), and currently teaches marketing through Antioch University L.A. and the University of Wales/Robert Kennedy College. He also wrote the satirical book, Claw Your Way To The Top: Ten Things I Learned About Business From My Cat, which he'll get around to marketing someday.
