Elizabeth Cheong's Blog

Are you curious?

Let me enlighten you.

In recent years, media and tabloids alike have noticed an eerie trend that unfolds post-Oscars.  Many recipients of the Best Actress Oscar have later faced detrimental marriage issues (aka the Best Actress Curse) that lead to very public divorces.  Of the 10 actors who have received the Oscar nod in the past decade, of which 5 were single at the time and thereby exempt, 4 of them have been struck by the curse.  Only the great Helen Mirren survived this seemingly absurd coincidence (although her husband of 13 years is currently the President of the Directors Guild of America and in fact has a directing Oscar under his own belt).  Hilary Swank, Reese Witherspoon, Kate Winslet, and most recently Sandra Bullock all filed for divorce from their husbands within two years of receiving the award.


Interestingly enough, the Best Actress Curse (B.A.C.) that has plagued our Hollywood starlets is not mere fluke.  A study conducted by the organizational behaviour department of the Rotman School of Management under the  University of Toronto found that Best Actress winners from 1936 to 2010 have a 63% chance of divorce sooner than Best Actress nominees.  The median marriage duration for Best Actress winners was 4.3 years (keep in mind that this includes the marriages of people like Frances McDormand and the previously mentioned Helen Mirren, whose respective husbands are Oscar-winning directors and have been married for ages), while the median marriage duration for non-winners was 9.51 years.

So why this huge gap between winners and non-winners?  The article that I read points out that because traditionally, males have a dominant and higher status in the family, and when that “norm” is violated with an Oscar for the leading lady, couples consequently feel confused with what their future holds.  Should the wife take on more chores to “compensate” or “make-up” for her career achievement so that the ‘equilibrium’ can be re-established?  Inevitably, however, the wife will receive a confidence boost from the award, and the husband may either feel intimidated or ashamed at his own relative un-success.  Problems easily stem from this issue of power dynamics, and happiness in the relationship is hugely threatened.

Whether or not the Best Actress winner in two weeks will undergo a divorce cannot truly be predicted.  But the study results are there.  How do you decipher them?  What factors do you think should be considered to determine the accuracy of this ‘Oscar jinx’?

Regardless, I myself am looking forward to watching the hosts of the 53rd annual Academy Awards on February 27th.  James Franco, as you can tell from my previous blog, is one of my favourites.  And Anne captured my heart since the first installment of the Princess Diaries; I hope she sings sometime during the show!

Enjoy!

Further reading: Does a Best Actress Oscar Lead to Divorce?

When I first read this article about Julia Roberts earning close to $2 million for a 45 second commercial, it reminded me of the film Lost In Translation. Similar to Bill Murray’s role in the Sofia Coppola directed Best Screenplay winning film, Julia Roberts is a Hollywood celebrity who is brought in to foreign country to promote a home-grown brand.

Lavazza is a manufacturer of coffee products and was founded and still headquartered in Turin, Italy. It has also expanded to coffee shops (80 in Italy and about 20 Expression concept stores worldwide in addition to a chain of Barista shops in India) and coffee-makers. This company keeps itself exciting and fresh with its sponsorship of film festivals and commissioning top-notch photographers to create an annually anticipated calendar.

Although spoken in Italian, even I find the new commercial starring Julia Roberts entertaining and interesting. Its dialogue probably says something along the lines of “Oh, only our coffee will make the gods smile!” and Julia is stunning as Venus. Still, how does one justify spending $1.6 million on the actress alone?

Thinking about it more deeply, however, it isn’t that hard to rationalize this expenditure. Julia Roberts has a internationally renowned million-dollar-smile. Her movies are consistent blockbusters and she is also a rare scandal-free A-lister. Featuring Julia in a commercial is a key strategy to appeal to a wide audience and gain positive associations with the star.

See the lovely Ms. Roberts in the commercial yourself – do you think the $1.6 million was well spent?

Louise Carnby, a British entrepreneur, has invented boot stirrups to resolve the calamity that every girl suffers from when tucking jeans into boots.

Demonstrating exemplary innovative entrepreneurship, Louise recalls,

‘After much research I discovered that there wasn’t any other option [to keep jeans neat], so I proceeded to create one myself.
‘They are modelled on the ski pants worn in the 80s but the difference is that they can be removed much more easily and worn with various pairs of jeans and trousers.’

Confident in her product’s practicality, she has even sent her Sturpz to Kate Middleton, the future Queen of England, who has been spotted sporting baggy jeans knees.

Louise spotted a problem that had no solution to it, and instead of waiting around for someone else to come up with an answer, she decided to tackle it herself. I find this very inspiring; it proves that anybody can be an entrepreneur as long as they set their mind to making life easier. I know these Sturpz will make my life easier, and for £9.99, it’s worth the risk of online shopping!

While slaving away at Case 3 research, I’ve found that the Olympics is not the only international sporting event that has heavily debated pros and cons.

The FIFA World Cup, an international football (widely regarded as the most popular sport in the world) competition held every four years, is another prestigious event that generally faces scrutiny by critics. Unlike the Olympics, the World Cup is not a competition that is themed around peace and equality amongst competitors. It is an intensely cutthroat athletic event but generates hype and buzz that equals if not surmounts that of the Olympic Games.

Recently, the host cities for World Cup 2018 and 2022 have been announced. Russia and Qatar have respectively secured their bid to host this fierce competition. I’ve learned that sponsors are not the only ones who want to come out of these events with profits; countries compete to host the World Cup to increase tourism, generate economic growth, and emerge with an image of capability that proves to foreign investors that the country is more than doing well.

So how can Russia maximize its ROI from this new venture? Russia will have to invest in building infrastructure and stadiums suitable for both winter and summer sports now as its Sochi is hosting the XXII Winter Olympic Games and this will likely be a heavy burden on their budget. Luckily for them, apparently it won’t be difficult at all. John Davis, the author of The Olympics Games Effect, states in an interview,

“First, you need to have a clear sense of your Destiny….Second, management must develop a unique Brand Strategy….The third dimension is Culture.”

Similarly to a business, Russia can follow Davis’ guidelines to secure valuable gains from this investment and emerge as an international role model of overall success.



Click to view full image.

This was too good for me to pass up.

Here‘s the source.

With the recent news clips of airport employees patting down every inch of a flyer’s body, it seems as if the “privacy bubble” we all used to talk about in elementary school has been obliterated. Issues of molestation are also of concern over intimate pat-downs of young children.



Quickly reacting to the huge public outcry and uproar over invading privacy, Timmovations’ dynamic duo Tim Geoghegan and Matthew Ryan came up with an ingenious current-affairs-awareness-inducing-while-trendy business. 4th Amendment Wear is a collection of articles of clothing that feature the 4th Amendment in metallic-based ink, which will show up on the TSA (Transportation Security Administration of the U.S.A)’s new scanners.

Since 9/11, security techniquess have become more and more sophisticated, but also more and more intrusive. American citizens have been mostly unresponsive to the invasion of privacy until the TSA introduced state-of-the-art body scanners that “would have caught the underwear bomber”. Apart from pilots, nobody is exempt from these procedures (a scan and/or a pat-down), and flight attendants are still negotiating against this double standard between the two professions.

I think Timmovations have come up with a brilliant idea, they reacted swiftly to target growing abhorrence of the public and their entrepreneurial thinking is outstanding. As of right now, the lady intimate styles are sold out, so if you’re planning on flying to the U.S. over the break or want to buy a witty Christmas present for your American relative, put your pre-order in now!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/8048720/The-Social-Network-Face-off-at-Facebook.html

Facebook, the social networking site that racked up an extremely impressive 200 million users within a year, has completely changed the face of society since its start-up in 2004. Issues of privacy, controversy over bans from certain countries, and even pedophiles have plagued Facebook’s track record. However, it seems that the history of the beginning of Facebook deserves more attention. The Social Network,

“We don’t have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well we do it.”

I’m sure everyone has, at least once in their life, tried to look for lyrics to that song on a search engine.  And about 90% of these people should have stumbled upon a lyrics site named MetroLyrics.

MetroLyrics is a subsidiary of MetroLeap Media Inc., a company started by then 15-year-old Milun Tesovic.  After already running a successful hosting company, he found that web users were constantly on the lookout for music and music videos, and lyrics just seemed to be the missing puzzle piece.  Describing how obvious a task it was for him,

“So I made a quick script with my own code and started a database of music lyrics. … It cost $9 a month to buy up the domain.”


Milun, with the help of his business partner and family friend Alan Juristovski, led the online lyrics industry and ventured on the pathway of providing free and public information through the funding of ads and sponsorship.  MetroLyrics has continued to pioneer partnerships, such as the licensing agreement with Gracenotes in 2008 (compensating songwriters and copyright holders).  The company is the world’s largest lyrics supplier and boasts 40+ million unique users every month.

At last year’s Enterprize conference, Milun was a guest speaker addressing a topic none other than Entrepreneurship.  Establishing a new business is no easy task, and this young and bright star is definitely one entrepreneur to watch.

In my opinion, one of the most ludicrous and despicable businesses in the world is the shark finning industry. It is most unethical, and I often wonder how the murderers of these sharks can sleep at night. Of course, one may blame the shark’s demise to the Chinese people, due to their excessive consumption of this “luxury food” product, but what truly is the root cause of this issue?

Watch Rob Stewart’s stunning and award-winning documentary Sharkwater and decide for yourself.

As an avid and genuinely proud James Franco fan, I like to keep myself up-to-date with all of this talented actor’s ventures. From his blockbusters (namely, the Spiderman franchise with Tobey Maguire) to his schooling (UCLA, then Columbia, and finally Yale this September for his Ph.D…with many many more in between), James Franco’s projects have never ceased to interest me.

So when I heard about his new film, 127 Hours, I immediately wiki-ed it and almost keeled over with anticipation for this dramatic biographical film. When I googled the movie today, I was pleased to find that it screened at three prominent film festivals. However, in that same article, attention was more drawn to the fact that no less than 6 people have fainted during the movie’s daring amputation scene. You see, James Franco plays Aron Ralston, the unbelievably determined mountain climber whose claim to fame is amputating his own arm to escape from death because it was trapped behind a boulder.



So would this type of extreme audience reaction be a marketing dream or nightmare? Fox can certainly use this as a strategy for building hype, but as 127 Hours isn’t a horror movie, this may affect the target audience it originally intended to reach. Regardless though, I feel that this film’s admirable approach to cinematography is most respectful, and Academy-Award winning director Danny Boyle’s team does not want to “dumb down” Ralston’s experience.

I am not a fan of bloody movies, but how can I be a James Franco fan if I don’t watch his potential Best Picture winning film? I’ll let you know how bad the scene gets, but all I’ll have to do is come home to see this face as my laptop screensaver to feel grounded and alright.




Side Note (I hope this doesn’t count for the word count…): Roger Ebert thinks that “We could do it too. Oh yes, we could.”

EDIT: Going through the list of Best Pictures before the Oscars last month, I finally watched 127 Hours! And it was amazing! I promised myself I wouldn’t close my eyes but it was honestly a reflex that I had no control over. I watched probably 95% of the amputation scene and it did not make me faint. However, I was watching this movie on a 52″ TV screen. If I was to experience this film in a theatre with stellar surround sound…boy, I might have had to go on a conveniently timed washroom break. Anyway, PLEASE WATCH THE FILM. James Franco, however disappointing his acting was as host of the Oscars, is perfectly casted as Aron Ralston. (March, 2011)