Uma Thurman is pissed. The actress filed a $15M federal lawsuit this past Friday against Lancome for, as WWD puts it, “allegedly continuing to use her image in advertising even though her contract had expired. According to Thurman’s lawyer, Bert Fields, her contract with Lancôme ended in 2004, but the brand has continued to use her image to sell products all around the world during the past four years.”
What… you guys thought she wouldn’t see her picture in the Paris subway. This is fricking Uma Thurman. Hello? The lady is beyond global. She’s intergalactic planetary.
Lancome is calling bullshit with a countersuit saying they don’t owe her a dime. They even trotted out a fuckwit of a PR rep for L’Oreal (Lancome’s parent company) who basically admitted their guilt:
“The use of Ms. Thurman’s image after her contract expired, however minor, was neither deliberate nor intentional.”
McCann is L’Oreal’s AOR. Not to say they are to blame or anything. A funny note about that… Overheard at the death star agency – a bigwig admitting that they just spend L’Oreal’s money on digital, just to say they’ve fulfilled their digital obligations. Forget strategy, social media, blah, blah… Just build something expensive, throw in some e-commerce, bill the client and hope for the best. How McCann continues to survive while their leadership wastes great talent and churns out mediocre work? No idea. None.