Movie stars like Ryan Reynolds are trying increasingly offbeat stunts to reach the fragmented Generation Z audience, Disney's marketing chief says.
These stunts range from appearing in K-pop videos to cooking chimichangas with celebrity chefs.
The giant Hollywood studio is enjoying a blockbuster summer, with the irreverent superhero movie "Deadpool and Wolverine" becoming the latest film to top $1 billion at the global box office this weekend.
Speaking at Disney's D23 fan convention, Chief Brand Officer Asad Ayaz attributed much of that success to stars Reynolds and Hugh Jackman pushing the boundaries of traditional marketing.
The A-listers appeared in the image for the "Chk Chk Book" music video with Korean pop sensation Stray Kids and starred in a YouTube cooking competition with Gordon Ramsay and his 22-year-old daughter.
They also attended a European Championship football match in Germany, a chicken shop in London (for a popular online comedy series) and got wet at a water balloon festival.
"We've been very lucky and fortunate to have talent who are willing to do things that sometimes actors don't want to do, like doing things with character," Ayaz told AFP.
In recent years, it has been particularly difficult for Hollywood and movie theaters to reach members of Generation Z, who are between the ages of 12 and 27. This trend is causing alarm in the industry.
But unusual gimmicks are "percolating" with young viewers, who are paying more attention to their phones, social media, YouTube influencers and video game ads than traditional TV commercials or movie trailers, Ayaz said.
Much of the focus is on generating offbeat content that spreads quickly online.
A heavily suggestive popcorn bucket for the film, supposedly "designed" by Reynolds' innuendo-loving character Deadpool, aimed to - and succeeded in - becoming a huge worldwide topic.
Reynolds and Jackman also filmed a message ahead of the film warning cinema-goers to switch off their mobile phones - in the image of their witty superheroes.
"Turn your phone off in silence," Jackman's aggressive Wolverine rants in an expletive-filled threat to the camera that has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times on YouTube.
"That was an example of us creating unique content with Ryan and Hugh," Ayaz explained. | BGNES
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