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In the ultimate twist, marketing itself is becoming "content" on several new TV shows. Online auction house eBay is working with Columbia TriStar TV to develop a 30-minute program that features profiles of eBay users describing their collections. NBC's ShopNBC cable channel now sells everything from jewelry to computers and smoothie blenders featured on soap operas Passions and Days of Our Lives, and ABC hawks some of its soap-star accoutrements on the Home Shopping Network. This fall Dodge will roll out the Fast Enuff Challenge, a nationwide contest to find the best novice racetrack driver, which will form the basis of a one-hour documentary on MTV. And Who Wants to Be a Millionaire producer Michael Davies is working on a prime-time, commercial-free variety show called Live from Tomorrow that will include segments revolving around new products, like teams of teenagers scampering around the country photographing national monuments with a hot new camera.
When it comes to the blurring of art and commerce, FoodFight!--a digitally animated film to be released for Christmas 2003--may set a new standard. Independently produced by Threshold Entertainment, the small studio that has turned Mortal Kombat and Duke Nukem into billion-dollar entertainment franchises, FoodFight! tells the story of a supermarket come to life, where such brands as Twinkie the Kid, Charlie the Tuna, Mrs. Butterworth and Mr. Clean battle evil brand-X products for control of the shelves. (Guess who wins?)
Larry Kasanoff, CEO of Threshold and former president of Lightstorm Entertainment, the production company of Titanic director James Cameron, insists that his film doesn't technically engage in product placement because Threshold isn't getting paid for featuring the branded stars, which appear primarily in cameos next to other original characters. But he concedes that the participating brands will help with cross-promotion worth as much as $100 million. In his view, product characters are celebrities in their own right, worthy of the same place on the big screen. "In the digital world," he says, "you're hard pressed to tell the difference between Mr. Clean and Arnold Schwarzenegger." Of course, back in the real world, the line between advertising and life is getting just as fuzzy. --With reporting by Jeanne McDowell and Leslie Berestein/Los Angeles, Dody Tsiantar/New York City and Eileen Finan/London