A hunger for unhealthy merchandise

I haven’t mana­ged to see „High School Musi­cal 3“ yet (but I pro­mi­se, I will).

Nevert­hel­ess I want to call your atten­ti­on to an inter­view NPR con­duc­ted with Ken­ny Orte­ga, direc­tor of the „High School Musi­cal“ movies.

Con­fron­ted with the ques­ti­on what he’s thin­king about all this „High School Musi­cal“ fran­chise (back­packs, bedclo­thes, key fobs, under­wear, you name it …), he repli­ed with a long, thoughtful sigh befo­re he said:

Well, you know, that’s a tough one for me, you know. Tho­se are the folks that give us the money to make the movies. And I would just say that it’s, you know, the par­ents just have to like … be the ones in char­ge. Disney’s gon­na put out wha­te­ver they can put out. There’s a hun­ger for the mer­chan­di­se, but I also think that, you know, at a cer­tain point, it would be unhe­alt­hy to allow too much of it into an individual’s life.

I think his approach might have annoy­ed Dis­ney as well as many par­ents, who have to explain to their child­ren why they can’t have the HSM lunch box as well. But his approach seems pret­ty honest to me.