A recipe for eyeball indigestion
The Colonel’s 11 secret herbs and spices can’t save this.
Is marijuana one of KFC’s 11 secret herbs and spices?
Every now and again, I get the feeling bigwigs at the chicken conglomerate are definitely
fried. You know who comes up with an idea like edible nail polish? Someone who is high. Ditto for the holiday KFC firelogs: “This season, the warmth of delicious fried chicken will fill more than just your belly — now it can fill your home, too.”
But the company’s latest marketing stunt is its weirdest yet. KFC is trying to turn the late Colonel Sanders into a
heartthrob.
In a “first-of-its-kind” project announced this week, KFC is joining forces with Lifetime on a minimovie titled “A Recipe for Seduction.” The original film, which premieres Sunday at high noon on U.S. airwaves and social media channels beyond, is described as “full of mystery, suspense, deception, ‘fowl’ play and — at the heart of it all — love and fried chicken.”
In the trailer, which by Tuesday notched the No. 4 spot on YouTube’s trending list, the plot is very much on brand with Lifetime’s holiday treacle that combines the torqued plot twists of a telenovela soap with the trashy ethos of a Harlequin Romance: a beautiful heiress is to marry a rich control freak hand-picked by her mother. But the heiress falls for a young “cook” who possesses a “secret recipe that’s going to change the world.”
That would be Colonel Harland Sanders, as played by — wait for it — Mario Lopez.
I know. Lopez is not exactly out of central casting to portray the fast food icon who was born in 1890 in a sleepy Indiana town. I won’t raise the issue of cultural appropriation. But it’s as if McDonald’s part
nered with BET to create a new urban short about Ronald, as played by Denzel Washington.
Since the real Colonel Sanders died 30 years ago, the company’s ad agencies have hired a revolving door of celebrities to bring him back to life in clever campaigns. The list includes Darrell Hammond, Rob Lowe, Jason Alexander, Ray Liotta, Norm Macdonald, Jim Gaffigan, George Hamilton, Rob Riggle and, most inspired, Reba McEntire.
Mr. Sanders has posthumously cross-pollinated with RoboCop and DC Comics.
But in all of the above, the creative goal was to rewrite Sanders with irony.
Now it seems the plan is to turn his nonagenarian ghost into a fictional stud.
Last year, KFC commissioned a video game called “I Love You, Colonel Sanders! A Finger Lickin’ Good Dating Simulator.” Players forged a romantic relationship with the
poultry god. Again, very odd. It was like playing a game called “Chimp Love,” in which a young Jane Goodall is pixelated as a seductress in garters and stilettos.
The Colonel of my childhood was emblazoned on buckets in his Van Dyke beard and crisp white suit. He looked like he came from a long line of plantation owners.
There was nothing in that headshot to suggest he could one day be reimagined as a millennial Casanova in cooking school or a marketing vehicle for Lopez to glower as a misunderstood “chicken man” who makes the gals’ hearts go pitter-patter.
And you know what, KFC? That’s how I want to remember Colonel Sanders — not as a sexy leading man, but as an asexual weirdo who devoted his life to ridiculously delicious fried chicken. During this godforsaken pandemic, if my wife gives me permission to
pick up a 10-piece bucket — and that’s highly unlikely — I’d like to enjoy these empty calories without thinking about the Colonel getting busy with a debutante.
Wendy’s could partner with HBO to remake “Sex and the City” with its mascot Wendy in Sarah Jessica Parker’s starring role and that won’t boost sales for Baconators. If Burger King wants my Whopper business, one thing it can do is not create programming with the W Network in which the King makes cameos at orgies. Keep on your toga, Little Caesar. I don’t want to hear squat about your lurid fetishes, Mayor McCheese.
I get that sex sells. But it absolutely does not sell fast food.
This “unprecedented” partnership between KFC and Lifetime is an abomination to our eyes and our bellies. Romance has no place in the world of Big Macs any more
than religion does in pet stores. My cat is agnostic. And Colonel Sanders was no Hugh Hefner.
Isn’t reality itself under assault as it is in 2020, KFC? We are surrounded by lunatics who believe the truth is whatever they wrongly believe. The coronavirus is a hoax! The election was stolen from Donald Trump! Lou Dobbs is human! The last thing we need right now is to have our brains gravy-clogged with the images of Mario Lopez as Colonel Sanders as a chicken matinee idol in a “steamy holiday love affair.”
That’s not cross-promotion. It’s visual indigestion.
And it’s an insult to the profoundly unsexy Colonel Sanders we remember.
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