Blue skies ahead for Blighty TV blurbs
Mime group will appear on tube weather forecasts
Eschewing typical show promotion, the silent cobalt-tinted comics will instead build brand recognition by adorning TV weather forecasts on the ITV London region. It's the first time a West End show has entered a sponsor partnership with ITV.
Although Blue Man Group began life in New York in 1982, London only discovered the phenomenon when it opened in November at the New London Theater. Reviews were split between terrific and terrifying.
Capitalizing on the celebrated British fondness for talking about the weather, the show's original creators, Chris Wink, Phil Stanton and Matt Goldman, are in the U.S. filming short spots to bookend the weather bulletins.
James Charrington of Stage Entertainment Intl. Marketing sealed the deal with London Weekend Television via 7 Stars, a media planning and buying agency launched in 2005. Speaking from the set, Charrington told Variety: "Blue Men will be shown becoming fascinated by an old-fashioned TV weather broadcast and reacting according to the weather, tossing confetti for snow or squirting tanning lotion for sunshine."
Blue Man Group's advertising potential first bloomed with the Intel Pentium III campaign in the late 1990s. The new spots are scheduled to air on or before March 25.
