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Posted in: Movies, Paramount Pictures | Tagged: Mean Girls, tina fey
Paramount Attempts To Justify Mean Girls Marketing Campaign
Paramount says they didn't market Mean Girls as a musical because if you say it's a musical, "people tend to treat musicals differently."
Article Summary
- Paramount's Mean Girls musical marketing strategy sparks backlash.
- Audiences feel misled by the film's disguised musical nature.
- Marc Weinstock compares Mean Girls to non-musical film marketing.
- The importance of honesty in film promotion and audience engagement.
Over the last ten days or so, social media has been flooded with people illegally filming audience reactions to people finding out that the current Mean Girls film is, in fact, a musical. The reactions from people watching tend to be a bit over the top, but you really cannot blame people for feeling duped. There is nothing wrong with being a musical. If it were any other year, president of global marketing and distribution Marc Weinstock would be right that people "treat people musicals differently," as he was asked about the decision to hide the fact that this is a musical from audiences by Variety.
"We didn't want to run out and say it's a musical because people tend to treat musicals differently," Weinstock explained. "This movie is a broad comedy with music. Yes, it could be considered a musical, but it appeals to a larger audience. You can see in [trailers for] "Wonka" and "The Color Purple," they don't say musical either. We have a musical note on the title, so there are hints to it without being overbearing."
He brings up Wonka, a film currently killing it at the worldwide box office. The thing is, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory wasn't a musical, but it had songs. So it wasn't that much of a stretch to think that this new film could also have some songs in it. The original Mean Girls didn't have any song numbers in it at all. While both trailers did have hints of a musical with some shots of large-scale dance scenes, it's the source material and what they are based on that really confused people. A prequel to a movie that had a few songs, adding a few more? People can wrap their heads around that. A movie adaptation of a musical adaptation of a film that didn't have any songs in its first version? Not so much.
Sometimes, hiding what a film is works out, but Weinstock isn't wrong about musicals being perceived differently by the public, and that's because they are different. Musicals are a different way to tell a story that not everyone enjoys and tend to be divisive. If Paramount had made it clear from the start that Mean Girls was a musical, they would have pulled in a different audience. However, that audience likely would have invited their friends, who usually aren't into musicals, to see it because it's not like sitting through Les Miserables. That's how you convert people, by showing them, willfully, what musicals can be, not by tricking them.
Mean Girls: Summary, Cast List, Release Date
From the comedic mind of Tina Fey comes a new twist on the modern classic, Mean Girls. New student Cady Heron (Angourie Rice) is welcomed into the top of the social food chain by the elite group of popular girls called "The Plastics," ruled by the conniving queen bee Regina George (Reneé Rapp) and her minions Gretchen (Bebe Wood) and Karen (Avantika). However, when Cady makes the major misstep of falling for Regina's ex-boyfriend Aaron Samuels (Christopher Briney), she finds herself prey in Regina's crosshairs. As Cady sets to take down the group's apex predator with the help of her outcast friends Janis (Auli'i Cravalho) and Damian (Jaquel Spivey), she must learn how to stay true to herself while navigating the most cutthroat jungle of all: high school. It's in theaters now.
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