The Rest Is Entertainment - Gino D'Acampo & The Superbowl

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

Which million-dollar ad slots captured Richard and Marina’s attention at the Superbowl this weekend? And will Trump’s presidency halt rap’s love affair with the prestigious half-time show? Billie Eilish is the latest singer to flog their perfume, but where does it sit in the pantheon of celebrity fragrances? 2025 is already proving to be another ‘difficult year for men’. Celebrity chef and presenter Gino D’Acampo has been accused of inappropriate and intimidating behaviour on set. Once again what does this tell us about production culture behind some of TV’s biggest shows? Join The Rest Is Entertainment Club for ad free listening and access to bonus episodes: www.therestisentertainment.com Sign up to our newsletter: www.therestisentertainment.com Twitter: @‌restisents Instagram: @‌restisentertainment YouTube: @‌therestisentertainment Email: [e-mail] Producers: Neil Fearn + Joey McCarthy Executive Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport 🌏 Get our exclusive NordVPN deal here ➼ https://nordvpn.com/trie It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! ✅ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's behind the Blue Cow Quality Milk logo? Proud Canadian dairy farmers. Is Canadian milk produced to high standards? You bet. And farmers who care for their cows? Always. And what about sustainable farming practices? It's our commitment. We're behind the Blue Cow logo. And that's what the logo certifies. Dairy farmers of Canada. Parents, when you visit California, childhood rules. If you don't remember how awesome childhood is, just ask yourself, What would kids do? Let childhood rule your family vacation. Start planning your trip to the ultimate playground at VisitCalifornia.com. Hello and welcome to this episode of The Rest is Entertainment with me Marina Hyde.

And me Richard Osmond. Hello everybody. Hello Marina. How are you Richard? You've been somewhere very exciting. I've been over to LA if you've ever heard of it. Little Ampton. That's not the bit I thought was exciting. And Palm Springs. That I did think sounded great. Which I've never been before, which I absolutely loved. It's so kind of 50s, it's like, you know, where Frank Sinatra lived. Like all the roads are called Frank Sinatra Way and Bob Hope Avenue and all that. No, I absolutely loved Palm Springs. Because they're not just called it my way. Oh, that's so clever.

When you move to the municipality, this is one of the first things you can suggest at your local council meeting. Yeah. And then you go go how do I get to the golf course? Well you can either take my way or the highway and I know that you've just been whenever we come to Spotify this is like behind the curtain stuff they always have snacks and the snacks are things you've never ever seen before anywhere it's almost like a basket full of things that people bring on to Dragon's Den and what have you just eaten? I've just eaten something called Kyo Mango Crunchy Chips. If you could take something as beautiful and pure as a mango and turn it into sort of a form of what's it that isn't nice like a what's it. This is no offence to Spotify who I love. The snacks are a war

crime and I'm being kind. But thank you for them. Obviously I asked you to. Do the whole thing, yeah. Oh yeah, the whole packet. What are we talking about this week? We'll talk about this week's cancellations. I see it's another difficult year for men in television. Yes, Juno De Campo. Juno De Campo.

We'll also talk about the sort of ongoing Carla, Sophia Gascon, Oscar's Amelia Perez controversy. I mean that's a cancelation, it's a rolling cancellation there. What else are we going to talk about? Billie Eilish has a new fragrance out. We're going to talk about the history of celebrity fragrances. We're doing a deep dive into celebrity fragrances, which is one of my specialist areas. You know what, there's a lot going on.

And it was the Super Bowl, we're recording this on a Monday morning and it was the Super Bowl last night and obviously we'll be talking about various sort of entertainment related angles to that. Should we start with Gino? Okay, so we'll begin with Gino De Campo. Investigated by your own channels news operation is never a good look but we see it quite often. Normally the BBC and ITN are thinking come on, surely we can get one. We must have a few, look at our schedules. Dozens of inappropriate remarks down the years and he's clearly been spoken to more than once by productions he's worked on. It's always to sort of, you know, people like runners

who are having to come and tell them, you know, what the next set up is. It is just so boringly, awfully familiar. And when you're one of those people who has to be on a crew and you're up at ridiculous times in the morning, you're working often for very low wages if you're in the really junior position. Also, by the way, you're just starting

and you're thinking this might be it. This could be a great career for me and I'm not gonna rock the boat and this is gonna be exciting. Yeah, I might be it, this could be a great career for me and I'm not going to rock the boat and this is going to be exciting. Yeah, I mean, there's going to be a little bit of swearing in this episode, but it's only in the Gino quote, Mark. So if one of the things he says to you is, I'd like to turn you over and f*** you against the kitchen counter. I mean, the person who reported that one said, you know, people sort of tittered, but nobody confronts him. And it's sort of interesting that nobody confronts in that situation. And there's lots of different reasons. There's a sort of reason that, oh, it's just Gino

being Gino. And there is a very much a persona that he has been encouraged to play up to. So we'll come to that. There's another reason, which we know is the type of shows he's involved in, they're not very expensive. If you go and take him away and say that, that's going to do really by you an hour or two. And there's these constant clearly sort of value judgments of being made by people. Yes. How bad is it? Is this okay? Perhaps this is okay?

Perhaps should we just get on with today and see if it happens tomorrow? I'm afraid to say I think that you can really feel that in so many of these accounts. I mean there are other ones sort of you know that are almost comical in their awfulness. There's one that he says if you don't get me a cornetto I'll f*** your girlfriend. Yeah so ITV have shelved some of the shows that he was involved with and are not doing more shows. Now it's interesting, isn't it? Because you could look at it on one level and some of the papers have done, and certainly

a lot of the commentators have done, and just said, oh my god, really, you can't say anything anymore and this is a huge overreaction and yada, yada, yada. This stuff does not happen. People do not lose their job just because they said a couple of things a couple of times. It's a pattern of behavior. It's upset a number of people over a number of years. And we've said before on this show, if you are in trouble as a presenter, but actually your crew loves you and the people that work with you just go, do you know what? That's just what they do and he's a really decent guy.

Then you don't get fired. There has to be a whole series of things that happen. It has to go on long enough and for it to be tiresome enough, which is the word we never use, right? What it is, is tiresome. What it is, is people are trying to do their job and endlessly coming up against this. I've talked to a friend of mine who worked in the nineties with a very big Saturday night star and she was saying day after day after day

it was sexualized comments all day every day always being laughed in by the producers always being laughed in by the crew. In those days there's nothing you could do. There's nothing you could do. There's nowhere to go because what are you going to say? Are we, you know, you said some rude words to me and upset me. You would, there would be short shrift. And I think it's probably better that we live in a world where, when enough people, and we've talked before, people who work in TV are pretty tough. I mean, they really are.

These people are working long hours, you know, there's, there's, there's no very few hangers on on a TV set. And if enough of them had come forward and just said, do know what I'm just tired of all of this I'm tired I'm trying to do my job and I don't need sexualised comments every time I come in with a cup of coffee. You know at some point if you're a channel you have to go okay I've heard enough now I am uncomfortable with having this person on my channel I'm uncomfortable with paying this person an awful lot of money where there's other people I could be doing the same to. Well, I think that's a bigger part of it in lots of ways.

Don't forget that Gino Ducampo provides, he starts as the chef or whatever on this morning, but he's slowly taking over bits of the schedule. But during that time, he will have become more and more expensive. And there is a certain point that you just think, oh, you know, we used to pay you this, now we pay you this and this is definitely not acceptable at this price point. Some of the shows, people are saying, well you know they've been pulled from the schedules, all the shows have been pulled from the schedules and I was thinking, can I have a little look at what some of these are? And I was looking at some of them, there was something, first of all there's the existence of the channel ITVB which many people may not even be aware of

is existence there was Fred and Gino on something called Emission Impossible which is a show he did with Fred Syriac and that same sort of thing he comes up through one type of show and then suddenly they're presenting all the shows this one followed Fred and Gino on an epic eco-friendly adventure across Austria and Croatia as they discovered the true cost of going green I was like oh, oh wait, they're not going to be able to show that again? Oh no! Surely contextualise and explain. Don't pull down that beautiful statue. I mean, really, some of these things, I think, but we're also seeing the Greg Wallace effect, let's be quite honest, which is that other people are thinking, well I've put

up with this nonsense on with someone, people I've had to work with. Again, someone who started off as in quite a small role and then became bigger and bigger and bigger and more and more and more expensive. And then people are just saying, oh, I, you know, I don't have to be involved with it. Can we say a little bit though about the difficulty for certain, if you're not a master of intellect and nuance, and I'm not suggesting that Gino Dicampo is or isn't, I think I am. If your persona is you are an Italian cheeky chappy and we're gonna let you cook in an apron with no clothes on on this morning because you said if they ever won an award you'd do it. There is some sort of suggestion that your persona is supposed

to be that and that when you fail to understand the line that's not just on you. I wonder how many times he was spoken to. And also of course he did Celebrity Juice. And Celebrity Juice, if you want to stray close to that line, I mean it literally walked to the other side of that line almost endlessly. It's one of those shows that I suspect will age very, very badly. I suspect because it had a certain take which was of its time and that time probably no longer with us but yeah he was he was encouraged on that show to be that character as well and also by the way probably lots of that is his character you are allowed to do sexualized banter in your daily life you are you are allowed to do

it if your friends like it if your family like it for the people around you like it you are allowed to do it if whatever club you belong to if you're at the golf club and you do that and everyone's laughing all the time you must absolutely go ahead It's really great if you don't do it to people on sort of low to minimum wage who are just trying to get that start in the industry and are a lot younger than you. Exactly, so he is saying I don't recognize myself in this, you know, which we've heard a lot of times before. He doesn't recognise himself. I don't recognise my behaviour. But it's surely the exact behaviour but just a little bit more. I entirely recognise him in it and I don't even, I don't feel like he's a the exact behavior, but just a little bit more. I entirely recognize him in it and I don't even, I don't feel like he's a star for me. I don't really watch

the shows he's in. Well, you know, he is a pretty big star. So he does, um, family fortunes, which a big show for ITV. He does the, um, Fred Sirie X, Gordon Ramsay and Gino Ducampo, their big adventure, which is ITV's version of top gear really. Yes. And the very good numbers for them. He's a much loved presence on screen. Whatever you think about him, you know, he has people like him, viewers like him. We are, of course, now in a world where that sort of doesn't matter anymore because, you know, viewers are declining and, you know, you can replace people and nothing ever really happens which the channels have started working out.

But, you know, he's a significant presence on that channel. It's not like they've thrown someone under the bus who they don't work with, or who does a series of shows that don't really work for them. Well, firstly, it shows that people are incredibly bored of having to work in those sorts of environments. And by the way, it doesn't necessarily mean they're offended, right? Because, you know, no one's particularly being offended by this. They are bored by it because, you know, it's not...

They're not... They're the boss of the joke. Yeah, they're not they're not enjoying annoying and tiring in on the exact. Exactly. And you know, you can put up with that for so long, but 12 people complaining, I suspect tells his own story, but also the world where you know, talent is much more disposable. Now, you know, talents and channels, which have been tied together, yoked together for so many years, that bond is completely breaking in a talent golf and do their own things and have their own, you know, brand extensions and make their own money. channels have fewer and fewer bits of real estate and fewer and fewer new shows that they can give to talent anyway. So it feels like just one

of those things for ITV maybe five years ago, they wouldn't have done it 10 years ago, they wouldn't have done it 20 years ago, they certainly wouldn't have done it. But now there's nothing stopping them. Someone's complaining about him. They sort of agree. They've asked around people have gone, Yeah, that is actually what the atmosphere is like. And they're gone. Okay, we're done. And of course, Gino De Campo's origin story was he came out of prison and then set up a an Italian catering company. But he went to prison. People know this, I think, but anyone who doesn't, it's one of the most extraordinary showbiz facts. He went to prison people know this I think but anyone who doesn't it's one of the most extraordinary showbiz facts He went to prison for burgling Paul Young's house. So Paul Young's house in North London, Gino De Campo

Befriended his au pair steals Paul Young's guitars platinum disc video recorder fax machine jewelry cash All sorts of things was caught because he dropped a cigarette But it Paul Young's house and his DNA was on it and went to prison for two years and that seems to be slightly swept under the carpet when people talk about what a cheeky chappy he is. Crikey. I think he knew that it was coming because there's an interesting interview he gave at the launch of some, I can't remember who he was talking to, and he was saying, this is just in October by the way, I'm the most censored man on TV. He said, behind the scenes people on my shows freak out because they don't know because I don't know where to draw the line. Really. And then he said, the ITV freak out when they

give me a show, but they know that I mean well. And then whatever I say, it comes from a good place. I don't do anything I wouldn't do in everyday life. And he says, thinking about how many people are being canceled nowadays who came out of the spotlight for one reason or another, right or wrong, well, I'm still here and I have no intention of going anywhere. That was October. Oh no. Yeah, I think there is a sense though that all of these things are so sort of historical, well not historical, but they've just all been going on for so long that people have suddenly realized, belatedly, obviously belatedly, oh hang on, there are quite a few people before me but I've seen quite a few of them have been zent packing and now there's not much of a firewall

between me and the forces of cancellation and I think that someone like him probably thought oh it's coming. There is a level where you know. The interesting thing for the future of course is channels won't be able to sack talent because talent won't need channels exactly what we were just talking about. Actually you know they'll work for whoever they want to, they work for themselves. They have their own brands. They, you know, they have their own YouTube channels. So no one's going to fire these people. They're still going to have to have runners

and they're still going to have to have directors and they're still going to have to have people working for them. But they'll be the owners of the company. They'll be the CEO of the company. They'll be the star of the company. They'll be on a platform that's not going to sack them. And actually we live in the last days where a BBC or an ITV can actually fire you for this sort of

behaviour. We won't be able to fire these people ever in future. I wonder if it'll be the last one. I don't think it'll be the last one, but we're near the last, it's the last days of those type of cancellations. Because if you look in through lots of the comments, there's lots of people saying, I would not be offended by this and I don't care about this. It's not. They haven't, many of those commenters haven't necessarily absorbed the power and balance that we were talking about, which is, it's really, it's very, very different if you're a runner. And if he's saying it to, I don't know, his co-presenter, then fine. But it's very,

very different. The power and imbalance there is a thing. And also by the way, they haven't understood that it doesn't matter if they wouldn't be offended by it. I mean there's other things that they would be offended by that they would complain about and this happens to be a thing that... They're offended by this cancellation. Yeah, exactly. You've not done about that. And now I've got to hear about it. No, it's exactly, it's right. But you know and I think it's the same with the Greg Wallace thing. If you were able to do that banter with the people above you and they don't mind, there's an assumption you can do it with the people below you and they won't mind either.

And that's on you and that's also on the people above you. Yeah, if you haven't thought it through, there are people who are close to all sorts of lines and are funny, but they're, it's all equal opportunities and they don't sort of punch down as it were. Yeah. And there are lots and lots and lots of talented, creative, comic people in television like that who will never get canceled for reasons like this because they understand.

But I just feel like he's completely failed to understand. And also he's become expensive and they've probably thought we can just create another person like you. We don't have to worry. The basic rule is this I think, if it's someone's job to bring you a cup of coffee, they do not want to hear about your cock. And that, but you know, simple. Wow.

Put it on page one of Osmond's Rules to Telly because, but you know what? It served you very well. And I actually, yes, I think that should probably be rule one. I should obviously say that Gino has denied the allegations and said that he's never been made aware of any of the matters previously. I'm a father, husband, and have worked with well over 1500 people on around 80 productions in my career, which I've been so proud of. I take such matters extremely seriously and the suggestion that he's ever acted in an

improper way is deeply upsetting. He has not denied Burgling Paul Young's house though. That he accepts. Now from Gino De Campo to a very different sort of cancellation for a very different reason. This one in Hollywood, this one about the film, Amelia Perez, and this one, the cancellation of the actress Carla Sofia Gascon. Who is the star of Amelia Perez, which is a sort of strange semi-fantasy transgender

musical. She plays a Mexican drug lord who transitions. And as we've discussed before, somebody mined all the old tweets and found that racists, like disparaging towards Jews, Muslims, lesbians, African Asian people, George Floyd, perhaps most significantly towards the 2021 Oscar ceremony. This was acquired by Netflix. It's basically a French film that seems to have been shot somewhere just outside Paris but is set in Mexico and doesn't really have any Mexican crew or anything like that. But it was 100% going to win the Oscar. I mean it was so far ahead in the Oscar race in the betting, Emilia Perez was far and away the favourite. It's not now because they've...

Oh, now it's definitely not winning the Oscar. Yes, it's not now. Liberal Hollywood thought that they had to like that this is the thing that they should like because it has a transgender person in it. I ended up writing about it last week and I found it, I said it was a five star controversy for a three star film, which I feel is... I think it's a four star film. Okay. But I get, and a four star controversy. So eight stars from both of us. It's interesting, they're now in this sort of ridiculous situation where, because we

know how much Netflix wants awards, as we've talked about before, when they thought they were in with a shout for Roma, they literally bought an entire marketing agency that does just the awards. So let me tell you, when Netflix co-chair Ted Sarandos finds out who didn't go through the old tweets, because that really should be day one. And one of the interesting things that people are talking about now is, do you actually start tweet mining at the casting stage process? will not but I'm stunned that Netflix you care so much about this there'll be so many people working on this campaign didn't go back and sort of delete all the tweets because what it's interesting

isn't it because Amelia Perez like baby reindeer funnily enough slightly came out of left field in terms of being a huge hit you know it's not one of those ones where right at the beginning Netflix were involved you know were all over casting and all that stuff. This thing came into them and everyone's excited about it. They acquired it after it was a hit at Cannes. Exactly. They acquired it. So the due diligence perhaps wasn't done in a way that it might have been with a show that was wholly owned and or, you know, or had a lot of money behind

it. They won after you acquired it. You should have done it. It's just sloppiness. But for everyone in every film? Yeah. To go through every tweet of ever? That's a job I wouldn't wish on anyone. Oh, I think in a film like that, that is going to be eye catching for all kinds of reasons. Why didn't? I mean, everybody's now said, oh, it's another campaign that's done it. It's a form of sabotage. I don't actually think it is. And people inside the business

don't think it is. They think it's just an enterprising journalist who started to go through all these things themselves. But it's interesting. So now everyone's watching all the politics and they had one of these, I think it's some of like the American Film Institute or whatever had a big one of their sort of pre award season lunches anyway last week. And there was a an Amelia Perez table, which had Selena Gomez, Zoe Saldana and various people from that film. Ted did not sit on that table. He sat with the TV lot from Nobody Wants This. But you know, so people sort of notice things like that. I have to say, Ted did not sit on that table. He sat with the TV lot from nobody wants this But you know, so people sort of notice things like that I have to say in the case of this one that that is the lesson that people will take out of it

Which is that you have to be you have to nail down everything on all of these things There are some all sorts of other controversies now and people are saying oh, they should rescind the nomination and There are people who think that she should never have been nominated in the women's category. By the way, can I just as a little sidebar, I think it's ridiculous that, don't forget, it's really stupid that the acting category is the only category that is divided. Okay, we have best woman director, best male director, and this is purely because the acting branch of the academy wants to maximize awards and attention. As many actors as possible. There are actors, right? And that's fine, we're wants to maximise awards and attention.

As many actors as possible. They're actors, right? And that's fine, we're going to see the movies for actors. In my view, they should have 10 best performances, like we have 10 best pictures now, which we, and it should be like that. However, and that would show up much more clearly that women do not get nominated in the directing category. They didn't get nominated in all sorts of things. This is a way of like like making it so that people don't even look at it and say, oh, no, there's lots of women have turned up on one. So I think that there's no, we're not talking about Olympic sport here. There is no advantage in the female category.

I would say to you that it's much more important that we have directors, women represented in all of those categories, you know, the sound engineers, all the other many, many categories, none of these categories are divided at the Oscars. And this is purely an attention thing for performance that the actors branch loves. That sounded like something you'd wanted to say for years. No, no, I just find it sort of funny that people, because it is sort of, you know,

we talk about actor and actress and you say, you know, we don't even want to use those terms anymore. I do find it hilarious that, and it, but what it does is it masks the lack of women in all the other categories, because you end up seeing people in frocks getting awards and you see lots of pictures, but if you actually look, we'll go and have a look how many women actually win awards. We'll go. We're gonna go. We're not going to the Oscars. No, I don't think we want to say that. Gary Lineker is paying for us to go to the Oscars. But we'll see how many women won in all the categories if you strip out the acting category which is a sort of thing of its own and then you'll talk about what Hollywood needs to do in types of all types of

representation but particularly in terms of how many women have ever been nominated in the directing category. The interesting sidebar to this whole Carla Sevilla Gascon thing is, obviously Netflix are now not going to get the best picture Oscar for this. She's not going to get the best actress, but everything is being thrown behind Zoe Saldana still getting best supporting actress. Oh, they've tried to firewall it. They've all like, yeah. She's been very good and very impressive and talked about it. And I think she's going to

manage it. I think they will win that one. I think she's, as you say, she's very successfully firewalled herself from this whole thing. And I think Netflix have thrown every single thing they've got into going, well, listen, let's get that one. Because that's a nice Oscar to get. Oh, it's all so ridiculous. Honestly, I can't say I find it very difficult to take a huge amount of it seriously, but you know, I, we shall see at the end how many women you know, you know, this is, this is entertainment. Yeah, no, I know.

But it's, you have to laugh. Oh, the Oscars are ridiculous. You have to laugh. It's ridiculous, right? Absolutely ridiculous. It's, it's hard to, I mean, it's hard to take any of this in a sort of mega serious way. You have to sort of laugh in general. You have to realize that some, these general, you have to realise that these are

the most terrible people in the world, spending vast amounts of money to win prizes that don't even make much difference to the bottom line because they really care about that level of self-regard and let's not take all of it too seriously. On that note, shall we proceed to a break? Yeah, come on. This episode is brought to you by NordVPN. Now, it might be a new year, Richard, but online fraudsters continue with their same old tricks.

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The link is in the episode notes. Sick of dreaming smaller? Sick of investing but not seeing your money grow? Sick of feeling like you're leaving money on the table, to the the financial future you deserve. Get yours, Questrade. Welcome back, everybody. What are we talking about now, Marina? Well, I hope this section of the show is coming to everyone in smell-o-vision or smell-o-audio. Yeah, smell-o-audio. Because we're going to talk about celebrity fragrance in the parlance of what it is. Billie Eilish has launched a new fragrance which is called Your Turn.

It's actually the fourth scent she's brought out. And if you're thinking, oh, that's not actually that Billie Eilish, is it? It doesn't feel like her vibe. Well, first of all, the people who you always make these fragrances in partnership with someone and they said, oh, actually, what's really special is her complete love of fragrance. Age 17, she had 120 bottles of fragrance, which is a lot. That's a party. And he's got top notes of peel, cardamom, fresh ginger, heart notes of night blooming jasmines and coconut water. And it dries down to captive musks, upcycled silver amber and Australian

sandalwood. Captive musk sounds like a headline we want to hear in about five years time. Five days time if possible. I'm very suggestible by the way, if you say any of those things like giving me a glass of wine, if you tell me what it tastes of, I can taste every single thing you're possibly saying. If you ask me to tell you what it tastes of, I don't know why. By the way, this is an absolute sidebar, I promise we'll get back to Billie Eilish, but in LA they're drinking salty wine now. They were like, oh we've got this wine, yeah so it's a salty wine and we're like, oh that just that must be something

different here and so we had some we think, oh no this is really salty and apparently people are drinking salty wine in LA. Anyway so it will be coming to us soon. Endless search for the new. Okay well I'm going to talk a little bit about the history of celebrity fragrances because it's really, it is fun and interesting. And lucrative. Well, that is the main thing. It's hard to know which the first one was. In some ways, the first, Givenchy created one for Audrey Hepburn.

They'd start, you know, they'd come together when they would, he was doing the costumes for Sabrina. And that was in 1956 and he he made her a set, because he then sort of fell in love with her. Oh, it's this Givenchy guy. Yeah, absolutely, Hubert Givenchy. And loved her so much and thought she was amazing and created a scent just for her. And then said, I mean, actually, it's quite good and I'd quite like to market it. And she said, je vous l'interdit, which means I forbid you.

But then in a couple of days, in a couple of years, he managed to get it out and it's called L'entendis, the forbidden. Oh, that's clever. And she did become its face. And then I think in it, 81, Sophia Loren had one, which was called Sophia. But really the patient zero as it were

of celebrity fragrances was Elizabeth Taylor, who in 87 launches Passion and she did it with Elizabeth Arden who's obviously sort of big cosmetics and... Are all these people real? Like Elizabeth Arden? I told you he's real, Max Factor. That's what I didn't know, Max Factor is a guy, right? Yeah. Just like a bloke. Some of the stories are really quite a sort of fascinating bit. Is Lotharick a person? Lomthorick, you don't hear that anymore.

That's really old fashioned, that's old school. I don't know, presumably yes. Yeah, Steve Brute. Yeah. Anyway, in 1991, what Elizabeth Taylor brings out is white diamonds. Now that was absolutely mega. The adverts, people, you know, if you're my age,

you'll remember the advert. And then there were about 18 more she bought out over her life. And that was the first one that went absolutely mega. White Diamonds goes absolutely mega. It is the trailblazer. Is it White Diamonds or White Diamond? White Diamonds. It is, okay. Oh, you think she's only got one? No, no, she's very much about, as we know, the multiple deals.

When she died, White Diamonds alone was making her $61 million a year. The range made so much more than her entire acting career. I mean, beyond, by multiples, all right? Which is a real harbinger of things to come. Yes, and which is why we see a lot. Anyway, the price point is always interesting. In today's money, 100 millilitres of Chanel number five is £145 at sort of full price. 100 millilitres of a celebrity scent might

be between £20 to £25. Now, if they have a younger audience, it might go down to sort of £18 or whatever or £16. But you're in a very different price point. It's because people feel like it's almost like a unit of a star. It's a way to identify with a star in the same way that people can't afford to buy clothes from Chanel because that's so great. Like very few people can afford to buy clothes from Chanel. But lots of people might think I want to get the ham. I want to get the scent because then I'm sort of identified with the brand. Justin Bieber, his scent was called Someday. That was launched with the, his quote on, that was launched with the strapline, this is what Justin likes girls to smell like.

Well, that was very, very clear. And because he's going for such a young market, they need to say, they sort of need to say that, whereas someone like Billie Eilish is going to be more sophisticated. And also we all do have these sort of parasocial relationships with these stars in some ways. It's a sort of way of Just being part of that as it's being buying into their brand about 20 years ago Maybe a bit less 15 years ago the New York Times for a short period of time did actually have a perfume critic Hilarious job. It was a guy called Chandler Byrne. He wrote a book which is quite interesting It's quite dated now But about a year in the development of two cents one which I think was for Hermes and one which was Sarah Jessica Parker's one, which when

it came out, by the way, everyone was like, oh yeah, that's what I think Harry Bradshaw would smell like. So that was one of the ones where it's the sort of essence of the persona and has sold brilliantly that one. But he said it's the single best tool for monetizing celebrity that has ever been created in the history of the world. Really? First of all, just the name on the bottle, that removes countless millions of ad spend, so you don't need to do that. Already scent is some of the biggest profit margins in the beauty industry, so you might

say if you're making sort of high-end scent, maybe it costs 25% of what retail value is. Some of these celebrity scents, which are cheaper, can go right down to sort of 3%, 5% of the retail value. And if one of them is successful, they have something called flanker fragrances. So you bring out something and then it's like, oh, the night's version of that, the summer version of that. So they slightly fiddle around with a formula, but it's the same basic thing. And then they all sell very well. It's like sort of diffusion lines of things. It's like cherry coke and vanilla coke. Yeah, exactly. After the Elizabeth Taylor sort of boom, the next and most significant

period is the noughties. Celebrity culture has sort of exploded. We've seen different kinds of celebrities, the ones we want. It comes in at a lower price point. You're aiming it at teens. So someone like Paris Hilton had a bunch. Paris Hilton had, I've done, listen it won't surprise you, no I've done a list of the top five people with the most sets ever and she's number five with 28. Yeah, she has a lot and she still sells them. Now there's two big ones in that decade. One is Britney Spears. She does a deal with Elizabeth Arden with Revlon. She's still around, is she?

Yeah, Elizabeth. She does a deal with the company. Yeah, okay. Fair enough. And they have Curious by Britney Spears, which represents the young woman that pushes boundaries and revels in adventure. And that shifted 100 million units in the first year alone. You can't believe it how much money it made. Now over the years that has, without any question, her many, many, many, she then was followed by fantasy. Yes, that's a big one. By in control. Even when her life at that point, she was clearly not in control of her

own life. This is really close to the breakdown, all those sorts of things. Nonetheless, even then and ever since, the perfume lines have sold brilliantly for Britney Spears and when that documentary came out It was called framing Brittany or whatever it's called there were even bigger boosts But they are sold steadily and well all the time now This was quite a big plot line in the whole conservatorship thing because she kept being I don't know how wealth kept being avid Do you know what brief briefly? I thought you meant it was a it was a storyline in the conservative leadership election But no the conservative it would have made that a bit more interesting. Yes.

Robert Jenrick's fragrance did not sell well. Yeah, generic. Yeah. Jenrick by Robert Jenrick. By Lontarick. By Lontarick. So yes, she's definitely grossed sort of more upwards of two billion, I would have thought. And so people were saying, well, where is that money?

But she's still very big. She's recently gone over to give back beauty and Revlon Elizabeth Arden they're suing her because it's good that beauty is a different brand It lots of the executives went from one to the other and she's moved all of her fragrances over there She still makes a huge amount of money for this. The other big one is JLo now Glow by JLo sort of changes everything. Biggest of all, right? Yeah, the first year's sales

was something like $300 million. It was crazy. She launches it, this is a bit of a period piece, launched in Trump Tower, party attended by apprentice host Donald Trump. Whatever happened to him? Yeah, Trump has got absolutely loads of them. And I can't, like, you can go, President Trump's official fragrances, they're called. Yeah, I think one of them and I can't like you can go President Trump's

official fragrances that I think one of them called Donald Trump one of them is called Empire and one of them is called success. Yeah, my favorite one. I sound like Martin Amis novel. Yeah. I'm really upset that I didn't buy you this for Christmas. I don't know. Maybe it wasn't out then because it is called fight, fight, fight. Oh, I love that. And it's the thing just, it's got the picture of just after with raising his fist just after the assassination attempt in which a bit of the lectern male may not have hit his ear. Don't mind him. And it's absolutely overwhelmed. Whatever, whichever, whichever plotline you believe in, in anyway, and it's absolutely overwhelmed by Musk. Yeah. I love that. Actually, its official description is,

for patriots who never back down like President Trump, this sentence your rallying cry in a bottle featuring Trump's iconic image and raised fist, this limited edition cologne embodies strength, power and victory. How did I not buy it to you for Christmas? That sounds amazing. And then a lovely sort of touch of bergamot.

Yeah, always. But as you say, the mask notes, interesting. I want a Megan. I keep thinking we're going to do her show when it comes out, which is called With Love Megan, which absolutely sounds like the name of the celebrity fragrance. And I bet you she does one. I bet you Megan will do one. That will be the next thing.

Maybe there'll be a Megan and a Harry one. Michael Jackson had a great friend of Elizabeth's day, of course. He had, in 1993, he had one called Mystique de Michael Jackson. You know, why does it have to be in French? The conventions, like diplomatic language, like it has to be, and Légende de Michael Jackson. And there's, I mean, there's some, Neil Gaiman has got a- Shut the front door, Tommy. Lemon scented sticky bat. I tell you, he's got a lot. Has Neil Gaiman got got a lemon scented sticky bat. I tell you who's got a lot. Has Neil Gaiman got one? Yeah. Did he have one? That's been remained in right now.

Yeah, well and funny you should say did he have one because puff daddy is also Because P did he's got a load his first one. It's called unforgivable. Okay, and then later on I am king Yeah, I mean, listen, I am king, I am king of the night and unforgivable night. Yeah, those are the flankers. I mean, come on. That's in the, yeah, unforgivable night is, yeah, again, that'd just be remediate or they'll just put somebody else's face on the bottle maybe and see if they can't repurpose.

But you can tell the money people can make. Prince once did a perfume, he signed up with a perfume company and then decided in Prince's wisdom not to promote it in any way whatsoever and had to pay them back four million dollars. So you think, I mean if Prince is getting four million dollars to do a perfume, there is a lot of money in this world. But that's just your sign on thing, that's about the price. You get in the under 10 millions to sign on, and then you get a percentage of sales between five and 10%. So they make huge amounts of money, the ones that do well. So everyone feels like there's low risk here. The weirdest one ever, which I might finish on,

because I think this one is genuinely the weirdest. In 2009, there was this company called MyDNA, which used, they had MyDNA which used MyDNA fragrance and they used DNA samples from hair and they did Michael Jackson's hair. In order to do this they partnered with a guy called John Reznikoff who claims to own the largest authenticated hair collection of famous people in the world. No way is that the largest. Yeah don't arrest him, go into business with him. Yeah he's got the largest authenticated hair collection. Yeah I mean I would be backing away quite quickly at this point. I would be writing a

police procedural. Yeah absolutely. Where we find out celebrities have committed crimes. I'm sure he's got a great story for how he got all the hair. Anyway they had sent supposedly based on the DNA of Obama, Marilyn Monroe, Joan Crawford, Michael Jackson, Einstein. I mean, we had a lot of hair. Firstly, does DNA smell? Yeah. So they wanted it to be, they wanted to say this was this thing that I talked about at the start where you are saying, are you buying what you think they might smell like? Or are you buying some sort of ineffable essence of them? And this was very much the essence. It doesn't have their DNA in it. Oh yeah. I've seen Jurassic Park. I mean, they're just people will buy in. I mean, people will buy

anything. People bought TOWIE B ream. Yes. So yeah, if you're telling me I'm buying Einstein's DNA, I mean, I'm not actually going to buy. I would as an ironist buy it for you again. Yes, I'd love that. You're going to have 120 bottles of ironic fragrance by the end of this. To go with my hair collection. Yeah, people bought Kermit's Amphibia and Miss Piggy's Moir. Well, I mean, I like that. I wonder what they smell like. I'd like to, yes, I'd like all of these.

But yeah, the top three best selling ever, Fantasy by Brittany, number three. Number two, Heat, Beyonce. And number one, the best selling fragrance of Fantasy by Britney, number three, number two Heat, Beyonce, and number one the best selling fragrance of all time and the one that made the most money is J Lo's Glow. All of those are made into the billions in sales. And none of them could have done it without Elizabeth Taylor going first, I have to say. As so often. Yeah. Okay, now the Super Bowl, I think as we said before on the podcast, this is America's biggest sporting event and everyone always talks about what happens at halftime and what Okay, now the Super Bowl, I think as we said before on the podcast, this is America's biggest

sporting event and everyone always talks about what happens at halftime and what adverts they showed, which doesn't happen in the rest of the world's version of football, the World Cup final, but it's their culture and I respect it. It's how they do it. It's the biggest TV show in the world, pretty much. It's the biggest TV show in the English speaking world. And we talk about what happens in the ad breaks. Yeah, and the ad breaks are essentially their version of the John Lewis Christmas ad. People are obsessed. It's the one time of the year where people really, really, really want to watch adverts.

And everyone launches their big new ads. You kind of work out who's famous or not that year. You kind of work out who's got money or not that year. Like in the 60s it was all tobacco. And a few years ago it was all crypto. So it does give you an interesting image of where America is at at any given time. But what have we learned this year do we think?

Well, to me it's interesting, like what entertainment properties, specifically movies get pushed in the ads and what they get, and we'll talk about the halftime show in a minute. So the ads, they had ads for Megan Two, which is the Blumhouse Universal the horror one not Megan not not with love Megan

Meghan Markle show which we're going to talk about when that happens. Thunderbolt asterisk as I have to say in the title which is the Marvel one that's coming up soon. By the way this is super significant because it costs I think this year eight million dollars for 30 seconds so this is if you're spending money on this you are these are the these are your absolute bankers these are the ones the studios think are absolutely gonna go eight million dollars or that they needed to go they had a lot longer than eight than 30 seconds I don't know what they had maybe it was two and a half minutes they had a lot of Thunderbolt which is what that's

40 million dollars Jurassic World Rebirth I think that would be big as I I don't know what they had, maybe it was two and a half minutes. They had a lot of Thunderbolt. Which is what? That's $40 million. Jurassic World Rebirth, I think that would be big as I say. That was something called Novocaine, which is a kind of comic superhero thing. Oh, I saw an advert for it and it had a very good tagline. It was like the guy was called Nick Kane. Yeah, he can't feel pain. He can't feel pain. Novocaine, Nick Pain, he can't feel pain.

Something like that. There were sports and teasers for things like How to Train Your Dragon, which when I told them my list of movies that I thought would be big, Lilo and Stitch, the Smurfs, which I didn't even include in my movies, which I thought were, they're pushing that, you know, to save their world, they have to come to us, that old chestnut. The Smurfs in trouble. Yeah, the Smurfs in trouble. The Smurfs world is in trouble.

Like, yeah, once again, to save someone else's world, that someone else has to come to our world. Is father Abraham okay? Yeah, it's, it looked quite tiring that. The thing I think was a real mess. That's not the tagline, surely. It looks quite tiring. Be prepared to be tired. The thing I thought was a real mess, and I knew they'd do it because I thought the sporting

crossover is too big, is the F1 movie. We bear in mind, obviously, none of this, which is mind obviously none of this which is the f1 movie starring Brad Pitt I'm sorry to get a bit worried about that because I I really think that has the potential if they do it right to be a sort of Surprise hit they've filmed it alongside all the f1 seasons. They filmed it on the track It's gonna feel very sort of authentic now. We haven't really seen any of this at all This is Warner's by the way way and they had a chance to show the world this thing at a sporting event but this was no dialogue it was just

montage so I could see like Javier Bardem shouting but you couldn't hear it because there was some music. They had Brad Pitt sort of getting pushed passionately against the wall by a woman but it was a really... yeah, Pit Stop. That's what they should everyone it's yeah it was a bad trailer I don't know you've got if you're going to pay all that money they I cannot believe they couldn't do something to make that sound more exciting you saw a bit of fire a bit of crash but otherwise you know it's stuff I can see anyway you know I would honestly they would probably have been better showing a bit of drive to survive that's the weird thing about um when movies advertise in the super bowl because you know brands are paying an absolute fortune

And they throw their sort of greatest new adverts and their greatest new ideas The you know the first one to really really go mega was the Apple 1984 at the Ridley Scott and see any times ever been shown was in that Super Bowl You know the Budweiser was up that was. Budweiser always used to win the best advert. So an awful lot of creativity sent into this, but the TV shows and films which advertise tend to just show trailers, which you can see anywhere. And there's not, you just think,

well, you can be shown the trailers three weeks ago and just do something incredible here. Cause some of the big adverts this year are actually using film IP. So the biggest advert, the one people are most talking about was there's a remake of when Harry met Sally Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan are both in that same diner both recreating that scene advertising mayonnaise advertising Hellman's mayonnaise

exactly and instead of Rob Reiner's mother at the end saying I'll have what she's having it is of course friend of the podcast, Sydney Sweeney. And they have a sort of, you kept thinking something really funny is gonna happen, it doesn't, but it's just, it's nice to see the two of them where they are and Sydney Sweeney is a good get for them. And then, you know, there was a big Groundhog Day one a few years ago, there was a Twins one last year

with DeVita and Schwarzenegger. So these brands are using films all the time, but films are not going the other way around and using brands to promote new movies. They just show trailers and no one no one's particularly interested. There's never been a movie trailer in the top 10 most favorites Super Bowl adverts ever because you know, people are throwing so much there's a great David Beckham on this year with Matt Damon, who else has got one? Glenn Powell, he does the Ram Dodge advert, which is very, very good. So that, you know, they've got these incredible adverts, the Dunkin' Donuts ones now, which are great. So Ben Affleck really leaning

into an amazing personality and character. And they've got Jeremy Strong, Kendall from succession, who very famously takes himself incredibly seriously and he's sort of Dunked in a big jar of molasses not taking himself seriously. So it's there's Seconds in my life of not taking myself seriously So put me make sure I'm doing in the Super Bowl. Yeah, make sure you're paying me three million dollars I make sure yeah, and then I never have to do it again until the 2040s Yeah, he does it very well. God bless him. But yeah, so it seems to me like a sight waste of movies time to just show a trailer when you can be doing something really spectacular with your stars with other, but you know.

I agree. I do think it's good for recognition, but I'm surprised that some of those really wasted it. Can we talk about the Halftime Show, which was Kendrick Lamar? Yes. It was short, quite impactful, not necessarily in a great way. I don't think it was adored. He did, obviously, you know the whole story of the beef with him and Drake, which, well, they just every few, over a few days, they just release endless diss tracks. Yeah, and Kendrick sort of won like 15-0. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. Well, the last one, Not Like Us, basically accused Drake of being a

paedophile, having sex with underage girls. The cover of that single when it came out was a picture of Drake's actual house with the tags on it showing that sex offenders live there. Drake denies all of this. And in fact, they're both on the same record label, Universal, and Drake is suing Universal for not giving him sort of pastoral care and not having a duty of care to him and allowing this to happen. And also not like this. Imagine someone releases a diss track about you and it's got all that stuff and then it becomes the biggest song in the whole world for a whole year. Not like us, yeah. Not last summer. There was some question about whether the NFL would allow this,

I mean it is a family show, to be performed, but he did do it and he didn't personally sing the word pedophile, but you know the crowd stepped up to fill in that blank for him. I would say as I say it didn't go down that well this halftime show and it's quite interesting. Obviously you know Trump was at the Super Bowl, he's the first sitting president I think to have gone to the Super Bowl. Jay-Z's rock nation has been in charge of that halftime slot since 2019, and he basically decides who goes on and who doesn't. He's partnered with the NFL there. My feeling is that that will be another partnership blown away by the winds of Trump quite soon. I don't know how long it's got left to run on it, but they used to say, it used to say end racism in the end zone. Now

it said, now it doesn't. There are a a lot of people saying make the halftime show great again You know why can't someone just stand there in a nice dress and sing to us? Yeah We have goth Brooks. Yeah Taylor Swift was sort of booed by by by Philadelphia Eagles I agree. I agree. She was saying what's going on? But it's I have to say that I think that there was a sort of sense that you've been seeing in lots of different places like, oh, things are changing and remember how much someone like the NFL just cares about money. And if they feel that it's better, I don't think that partnership with Jay-Z for instance,

will go on. Everything's going mega for the next couple of years. That is for sure. Being out in America, you could just sense everything is doing that. But you know, the pendulum swings back always. The further the pendulum goes in this direction, the further it swings back. But yeah, you could tell everything is now just thinking, oh, maybe we should be a bit more in middle America for the next couple of years. Yeah. I mean, whatever the most money is, whatever the most money is, that's what the NFL will do. Yes, without any question. So there we go. The Eagles thrashed

the Chiefs, but that's the last thing that anyone wants to hear about the Super Bowl. Yeah. The result. Recommendations, listen, the American Traitors, if you've watched one episode of the American Traitors and gone, oh, I can't do this, there's all these Americans, they all know each other and they're all sort of, you know, they're so noisy oh I can't do this, there's all these Americans they all know each other and they're all sort of you know they're so noisy and I can't deal with it. Please go back in. I think it's one of the great series of traitors. It's a sensation, I love it. It's filled with people who know how to play the game, who really really really play it well. There's some great characters in there, there's some amazing twists and turns and

I just it's been dropped once a week now, so the first seven have come out, so we have to wait, unfortunately, till Thursday for the next one. But it is really, really, really great and just great game players who really know what they're doing and who really respect each other's game as well. I've absolutely loved it. I also utterly love it. I want to recommend High Potential on Disney+. I've tried to get my family to watch the show for about two weeks. It's got Caitlin Olsen in it who I absolutely love from Always Sunny in Philadelphia. She plays the daughter in Hacks, Jean Smarts' daughter. It's really good, really well made, story of the week, police procedural. She's great. You'd love it. Oh, amazing. And everyone was complaining about being forced to watch this by me.

Yeah, well we've watched all available episodes now and it's really, it's so well done. It's made for Disney, I like loads of their shows the way they do it. Is it a comedy drama? Yes, it's a comedy drama but it's just very nicely done, you'll really like it. Oh fantastic. It's right up your street. And it's one of those, it feels like it could have been on a network

in the old days, just very, very well made. And the stories are good. And she's a wonderful character. She's a very, very, very clever person who can't hold her life together and is cleaning for the police when she's enlisted to help them with their investigations as a sort of consultant.

And she's funny and brilliant. Amazing. Shall we see each other for the question and answers edition on Thursday? Please let. We also have bonus episode this week is all about shows that were canceled after one episode. For a variety of reasons.

For a variety of reasons, yes. Those bonus episodes are available to members. If you want to become a member, you go to. Therestisentertainment.com, where you can sign up and you get ad free bonus episodes and you can chat as well. And we thank you so much for everyone who is signing up. There's a lovely, lovely community there now

and some really, really good episodes as well. But we'll also be back on Thursday for a question and answers edition. So hopefully we'll see you then. See you then. See you then.