Sexuality and Cross dressing

I found an article on the web site self help magazine called The Real Truth about Crossdressing

http://www.selfhelpmagazine.com/article/node/1218

“More than likely not. As Dr. William Stayton, Head of the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Human Sexuality and himself a therapist for crossdressers, reported “People associate crossdressing with effeminacy and being gay and the fact is most of them are not gay. They are very definitely heterosexual. “In fact one of the most difficult areas for crossdressers was how to deal with the women with whom they wanted to be involved.”

When I think of men dressed as women, I think of drag queens, which is often an act that is associated with gay clubs

http://starsmedia.ign.com/stars/image/article/838/838351/denise-bryson-20071128001847791-000.jpg

http://www.dragqueen.org.uk/drag%20queen.jpg

This is a transsexual and on the right is a crossdressing drag queen

Cross dressing

I’d like to look more in to cross dressing and the way it’s perceived.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-dressing

“The term cross-dressing denotes an action or behaviour without attributing or proposing causes for that behaviour. Some people automatically connect cross-dressing behaviour to transgender identity or sexual, fetishist, and homosexual behaviour, but the term cross-dressing itself does not imply any motives. However, referring to a person as a cross-dresser suggests that their cross-dressing behaviour is habitual and may be taken to mean that the person identifies as transgendered. The term cross-dresser should therefore be used with care to avoid causing misunderstanding or offense.”
But the bounty advert doesn’t make me think that the two men dressed as women are homosexual

Music Hall

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_hallhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_hall

After I did a Wikipedia search on ‘Carry on’ films I discovered a relationship between ‘Carry on’ humour and the humour of the comedy in music hall. Personally I have not heard the term music hall so the first thing I did was perform a Wikipedia search to help me understand. From what I found music hall features a lot acting out of stereotypical characters in full costume, a lot of the humour is smutty and slapstick, and cross dressing but leaning more towards pantomime than drag. A name that came up was Vesta Tilley.

http://www.womenofbrighton.co.uk/vestatilley.htm

“Vesta Tilley was that almost forgotten artiste – a Male Impersonator. She played soldiers, sailors, bellhops, policemen – young men in sporting clothes, boaters and stiff collars, complete morning kit with fancy waistcoat, and full white tie and tails evening dress with top hat, gloves and cane. And more. She played Principal Boy in pantomime – having a fondness for Dick Whittington – she sang, she danced, she trod the boards for 50 years.”
The Bounty  ‘Carry on cleaning’ advert farther relates to music hall and Vesta Tilley, as the two main characters Audrey and Brenda are clearly played by men, Brenda and Audrey also remind me of the ugly sisters in the pantomime Cinderella which I have seen a number of time seen a child. The two sister’s are traditionally played by men and unlike drag queens, pantomime dames often play their characters more girlie then sexy.

Custard Pies

Custard pies are seen through out the advert. One of the famous films featuring custard pie throwing is The Battle of the Century

There are many custard pies being thrown and there even features a man slipping over with pies in his hand similar to what happens in Carry on Loving and the Bounty advert, it is clear that the Laurel and Hardy film The Battle of the Century has been a source of inspiration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieing

‘Pieing is the act of throwing a pie at a person’
Pie throwing in a clear theme through out the advert, I think it’s so key because Bounty is a kitchen roll that is used to clean up spills, although they are shown to be cleaning up liquids, perhaps there is a lot of solid and cream like mess so that the viewer thinks that Bounty will work on mess like that too, perhaps only Bounty will be used to clean up at the end of the pie fight?

Slap Stick

There is a lot of action in the Bounty advert it feels very energetic, to me it fits the description of slapstick humour.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O999-slapstick.html

“slap·stick  / ˈslapˌstik/ • n. comedy based on deliberately clumsy actions and humorously embarrassing events: [as  adj.] Slapstick humour.”
Slapstick comedy consists of people performing dramatic actions such as getting hit, or falling over, the Bounty advert several Slapstick moments a cur one being when the waiter slips on the used wet tissues and falls which sends the cake he was holding, fly in to the face of Kenneth Williams.
I consider slapstick to be a basic form of humour, there is not a lot of thinking involved you just watch and laugh.

http://www.newslite.tv/2008/08/01/the-worlds-oldest-fart-joke-an.html

‘Researchers have found what is thought to be the earliest joke – but maybe you had to be there to find it funny.
“Something which has never occurred since time immemorial – a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap.”’ -1900 BC

The world’s oldest joke seems to be Slapstick, farting is a basic action that many people find funny, I think Bounty chose slapstick so that the audience can watch and find it humorous without a lot of thinking.

Carry On

The first obvious theme is the ‘Carry on films’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry_On_(film_series)
‘Carry on films’ are a series of British comedy films made between 1958 – 1974. The humour of a typical ‘Carry on’ generally features slap stick, smutty innuendos, and situations and periods that heavily require the use of costumes. Although much of the films humour is about sex and sexuality, the films remain family friendly. Merging together the film ‘carry on loving’ with Audrey and Brenda and the bounty kitchen roll is what made the bounty advert.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2151/2479991602_a4ebfc66cf.jpg

This is a poster for the film carry on loving (1970), which sets the scene for the bounty advert

The subject: Bounty Advert Carry on cleaning

This is the subject. There are many key themes with in the Advert such as ‘carry on’ films, cross dressing and the roles of gender I’d like to explore these deeper.

http://www.rushes.co.uk/?#/148

Product: Bounty
Title: ‘carry on cleaning
Agency: publicis
Agency producer: Clare Young
Agency creatives: Stephen Glenn & Noel Shareman
Production Co: Plunge Films
Director: Simon Delaney
Producer: Mandy Boyter
Editor: Piers @ Cut & Run
Post facility: Rushes
Telecine: Adrian Seery
VFX: Paul Hannaford (lead Flame) and Adam Watson
Combustion: Joe Dymond
Rushes Producer: Sonia Ralton

The team ‘Publicis’ made the advert by making a set to replicate the one in the film I believe is called ‘carry on loving’ instead of using a blue screen, by using a set they recreated the lighting of the film. Body doubles were also used for some of the bodies of the original actors such as Sid James so that the characters Audrey and Brenda can interact with them.