Hulu, Bing, G4’s Attack of the Show host Olivia Munn and SNL’s Jason Sudeikis tonight are presenting a live variety show. Well actually, it’s an hour-long commercial, with commercials and Fred Willard.
Munn is known among the younger-male sector for her role on super-cool-and-savvy Attack of the Show, or AoTS to those who know it, and lends her credibility in the ways of gadgetry/webbery/sexery to the show. Sudeikis carries the SNL-style variety form, though Munn is a center-piece for many low-brow, high-humor skits on her own show. Together they’re sure to be watched by the varietal group of young males Microsoft hopes will be the generation to usher in its newest product, Bing.
And the whole shebang is hosted on Hulu, where it will air live and hopefully without bandwidth interruption. The show begins at 8 p.m. EST and if you have Hulu’s new desktop app, watching it will be easier than fighting yourself away from Seinfeld and a bag of Doritos.
But whether the thing will be entertaining is all that remains to be seen. Personally I’d rather vie for Seinfeld and chips, but in the interest of analyzing the branded entertainment approach, we’ll give it a watch. We’ve posted the player below as well as a trailer.
Interestingly, this campaign piece is not the work of JWT, which is handling the more traditional aspects of this account. In fact it is a product of Creative Artists Agency, of Los Angeles. CAA is the biggest talent agency next to recently formed William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, according to the Times.
Talent agencies have in the last few years been taking a lot of the money this industry could be earning, if someone would just partner with a CAA or WMEE type. Here’s how it works: talent agents are presented with a property (this case, Bing). They create the ultimate branding machine by combining talent, production, media and creative from within their respective agencies. All the while, advertising’s most creative sit there and watch the money flows on by.