30 Rock product placement are real… big surprise!
By fred | November 29, 2007
Recently I came across a few people “finding out” that the product placement on 30 Rock were actually… real ! And some of them seemed to be really shocked to learn that, not so long ago when Baldwin and Fey praised Verizon Wireless services and then Tina Fey turned to the camera, asking “Can we have our money now ?“, they actually got paid by Verizon.
Really !??
No seriously, you thought they mention some actual real name of phone provider just cause they were feeling generous, or by mistake ? The only way this was not a product placement was if they’d used some name they made up. The fact that it’s real only makes the whole thing better !
I’ve even read people changing their mind on that whole thing, and arguing that if those were to be real they weren’t as good or funny as they originally thought and, thus, should be stooped.
Really !??
That comes as a shock to me, because I always assumed everybody knew those were real, because that’s the beauty and genius of it. This is yet another brilliant turn that Fey and her team was able to pull out, making fun of this new trend while embracing it at the same time. Just like when they promoted NBC schedule through their silly “SeinfeldVision”.
And it’s nothing new, did you really think the GE washing machine Greenzo promoted wasn’t real ? From the start 30 Rock used real names, as the show within the show airs on NBC, owned by GE, and they were never shy when it came down to making fun of those companies.
Since the pilot they satirized the world of television, inside and out, and if you remember when Jack arrived he made a little speech promoting some GE oven or something, of which he had a big paint on the wall, and it was already completely real !
And that’s why it is so awesome ! I fail to understand why it would not be right for 30 Rock to use product placement in such a creative way that is making fun of the concept of product placement, if not of the product itself, but it would be alright for The Office to really focus on how BlackBerry are cool, or for Heroes to dedicate a scene about how the new Nissan is a cool car !
At least they are making fun of the whole thing, as well as making fun of themselves for resorting to such things as illustrated when Tina Fey addressed the camera directly, and instead of diverting from the story and risking to be annoying as it can be done in other series (*cough*Heroes*cough*), 30 Rock is embracing it fully and turning it into something hilarious !
How the Hell could people see this as anything else than a great achievement from the creative team working on that genius and hilarious sitcom that is 30 Rock ? Really ?
So just be sure to watch it at 8.30 on Thursdays, at least while there’s sill some more episodes to come.
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