The entertainment business has been in so much turmoil lately that I can’t tell you who’s making money from what any more. Maybe actors are making twice as much money from commercials than they are from movies and TV, for 1/10th the work. If that’s the case, who can blame them?
The first ones I thought of are the ones who pushed Crypto and FTX. I remember Matt Damon, Larry David, Tom Brady, and many others advertising heavily for a time. When FTX collapsed their reputation took a hit, but with the passage of time their association with it has almost been completely forgotten.
Anyone old enough to remember an older John Wayne hawking Datril (an early actaminophen-type drug)? There was outrage that this American icon would stoop to shilling merchandise!!!
His career was winding down anyway at that point but people felt he had debased himself. Times have changed.
Yeah.
The Joe Namath ads are kind of sad, because I’m almost old enough to remember him in his prime.
Joe probably didn’t have a lot to fall back on. His acting career died young. He probably didn’t get paid that much in his prime.
And don’t forget his panty hose commercial!
Wayne also did commercials for Wells Fargo around the same time.
As did his TV sports announcing career, which seems to have petered out around 1990. In addition, he had the infamous sideline interview with Suzy Kolber in 2003, when he was inebriated, and which led to a stint in rehab for alcoholism.
He probably made a fair amount of money from endorsements and appearances back in his heyday, but he played in an era in which pro athletes (even stars) didn’t make a great deal of money, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he isn’t doing terribly well financially now.
What about Milton Bradley’s Dark Tower electronic game?
I’m old enough to remember him being a big deal
“Blansky’s Beauties” (that was the name of his sitcom, wasn’t it?)
ETA: Nope. It was “The Waverly Wonders” (The Waverly Wonders - Wikipedia). Blanksky’s Beauties was a Happy Days spinoff, joining the string of successes that included “Out of the Blue” and “Joannie Loves Chachi”
And the film CC and Company I think he was trying to be a Burt Reynolds-type.
I see he was in a few other films, but that’s the only one I’ve seen.
According to various online sources of which this seems to be the most…reputable, Namath’s net worth is somewhere around $25 million, thanks in large part to a variety of endorsements. How that figure is derived is something of a mystery.
Well, good for him if true.
Most of those endorsements were 40 to 60 years ago now, and that article simply says “partaking in smart investments” explains why they think he’s wealthy today. If he did invest well, and not piss (or drink) away his money from those years, yeah, he could well be doing nicely.
Other than the Medicare Advantage ads, I suspect that any other actual income he’s getting these days is from doing appearances and signing autographs, assuming he’s still well enough to travel much; his days as a valuable national figure for product endorsements are long behind him.
Advertising pioneer David “Ogilvy & Mather” Ogilvy hired Eleanor Roosevelt to do a margarine commercial, and she later reported that her mail was evenly split between people that were sad she’d damaged her reputation, and people that were happy she’d damaged her reputation.
Not the first time she did something like that. She changed her name to “Warwicke” in the 1970s because she thought it was classier, and when her record sales didn’t surge, changed it back.
Henry Winkler hawking reverse mortgages is a big disconcerting to me.
I honestly do not understand the popularity of “Ancient Aliens.”
Who’s Walton Goggins?
Anyway, that was a name I had never seen before, and when I looked him up just now, he’s been in things I have never seen.
He’s definitely striking while the iron’s hot. Can’t say I blame him. I don’t think it’s hurting his reputation at all. He usually seems to play someone quite unlikeable, but in the commercials he’s the opposite - like he’s winking because we’re all in on the joke.
Well, sure. We all have actors that fall through a cultural hole in our own personal zeitgeist. But once you’ve seen (and heard) Walton Goggins he will stick with you as that guy. He’s no chameleon - rather he has one of those pretty distinctive presences. Exactly the sort of person advertisers covet as a celebrity endorse/commercial actor. Because if you know him (and he’s been in several prominent TV shows in particular), he’ll immediately catch your attention in a commercial as your mind goes ‘oh, it’s that guy.’
Very Wilford Brimley. Wilford Brimley and Walton Goggins were/are both very fine actors. Genuinely talented. But they were/are always distinctively Wilford Brimley and Walton Goggins. Like a casting director searching for a “Walton Goggins-type” distinctive.