Monday, April 03, 2006
Paint me a picture, dead man.
posted by Anonymous : 1:14 AM
I would never want to do this man any wrong. I really wouldn't. Just look at him. He's everyone's buddy. I almost want to purchase his whole Joy of Painting set just so I can have it run non-stop on my DVD player as I rest my head to sleep. The sound of his voice is a lullabye in itself. My dad and I used to sit in complete silent awe as we'd watch Bob paint practically THE EXACT SAME landscape everytime on his PBS show.
Premise of the show is simple: Bob stands in a studio for a half hour against no backdrop whatsoever and just paints a landscape that pretty much always ends up looking like the one pictured on the left. But the catch is, no matter how predictable it is, you end up watching the WHOLE FUCKING THING without flinching. How does a man command such power?
My dad likened his voice to being that of an "all-night DJ," which is pretty much accurate. If Bob Ross handled peace talks and general foreign relations, I think the whole world would resemble his artistic vision and Saddam would be busy planting trees while Iran would be harvesting pot-- not uranium.
Too bad Bob is dead.
I'm not one to offend easily, but somehow something seems wrong when the likeness of Mr. Ross is handed over to Nintendo for creating a painting video game, meant to showcase the free-handed capabilities of the Big N's new console, code-named Revolution.
Granted, I'm extremely enthused about the possibilities this console has. And it's a cool idea to implement the idea of using the weird-assed motion-sensitive controller as a paintbrush. But why Bob Ross?
I'm not naive, and I know the answer to this question, but when does marketing go too far? I understand this is a growing controversy when it comes to using the likeness of dead celebrities to hawk products. I saw Gene Kelly dancing with a vacuum and Steve McQueen driving the new Mustang, and I thought they were both tacky (yet somewhat clever, purely in their presentation). And who could forget when TuPac made more post-mortem albums than pre-mortem and even landed a theatrical release?
Enough, though. Perhaps it's more of a dilemma as to how their image is handled and carried on after death. I don't doubt that CG will take a turn toward recreating deceased actors for full-length features, resulting in a move to protect their estates and all sorts of legal troubles. I already read a blurb this last week where Paul Newman expressed worry over the unauthorized recreation and mishandling of his likeness after his death. I worry about the unauthorized recreation and mishandling of his salad dressing.
To bring everything back to a point, though, something seems dirty about playing a game where the essence of a dead man was attempted to be resurrected by splashing his name on the title and using images of him to create some artificial experience that could have otherwise held up without him. I couldn't imagine the character of my recently-deceased grandfather being warped and reused to benefit a company or campaign he never would have stood behind when he was alive.
The legend of Bob Ross is great to honor and celebrate through the work he completed while he was alive. But it's hard to celebrate a man's current work when he's been in the dirt since '95.
In other words, R.I.P. Bobbie. I hope you're cruising down the highway in the sky with McQueen while listening to some House of Pain.
I would never want to do this man any wrong. I really wouldn't. Just look at him. He's everyone's buddy. I almost want to purchase his whole Joy of Painting set just so I can have it run non-stop on my DVD player as I rest my head to sleep. The sound of his voice is a lullabye in itself. My dad and I used to sit in complete silent awe as we'd watch Bob paint practically THE EXACT SAME landscape everytime on his PBS show.Premise of the show is simple: Bob stands in a studio for a half hour against no backdrop whatsoever and just paints a landscape that pretty much always ends up looking like the one pictured on the left. But the catch is, no matter how predictable it is, you end up watching the WHOLE FUCKING THING without flinching. How does a man command such power?
My dad likened his voice to being that of an "all-night DJ," which is pretty much accurate. If Bob Ross handled peace talks and general foreign relations, I think the whole world would resemble his artistic vision and Saddam would be busy planting trees while Iran would be harvesting pot-- not uranium.
Too bad Bob is dead.
I'm not one to offend easily, but somehow something seems wrong when the likeness of Mr. Ross is handed over to Nintendo for creating a painting video game, meant to showcase the free-handed capabilities of the Big N's new console, code-named Revolution.
Granted, I'm extremely enthused about the possibilities this console has. And it's a cool idea to implement the idea of using the weird-assed motion-sensitive controller as a paintbrush. But why Bob Ross?
I'm not naive, and I know the answer to this question, but when does marketing go too far? I understand this is a growing controversy when it comes to using the likeness of dead celebrities to hawk products. I saw Gene Kelly dancing with a vacuum and Steve McQueen driving the new Mustang, and I thought they were both tacky (yet somewhat clever, purely in their presentation). And who could forget when TuPac made more post-mortem albums than pre-mortem and even landed a theatrical release?
Enough, though. Perhaps it's more of a dilemma as to how their image is handled and carried on after death. I don't doubt that CG will take a turn toward recreating deceased actors for full-length features, resulting in a move to protect their estates and all sorts of legal troubles. I already read a blurb this last week where Paul Newman expressed worry over the unauthorized recreation and mishandling of his likeness after his death. I worry about the unauthorized recreation and mishandling of his salad dressing.
To bring everything back to a point, though, something seems dirty about playing a game where the essence of a dead man was attempted to be resurrected by splashing his name on the title and using images of him to create some artificial experience that could have otherwise held up without him. I couldn't imagine the character of my recently-deceased grandfather being warped and reused to benefit a company or campaign he never would have stood behind when he was alive.
The legend of Bob Ross is great to honor and celebrate through the work he completed while he was alive. But it's hard to celebrate a man's current work when he's been in the dirt since '95.
In other words, R.I.P. Bobbie. I hope you're cruising down the highway in the sky with McQueen while listening to some House of Pain.
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