Indie Stars & Starlets Turn Selling Out Into a Fine Art

(HMG) – Ah, the art and the romance, –the excitement and the risk, of starring in an indie film! Luke Wilson, brother of big-time and sometimes-indie actor Owen Wilson, –has starred in plenty of indie movies, and deep thinkers. Notoriously known for schlock horror gem Vacancy (2007), and the movie all our pseudo-intellectual friends forced us to watch, The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Wilson is now making a name for himself… by acting in commercials for AT&T.

Not to be outdone, are indie film starlets Ellen Page (Hard Candy, Juno) advertising for Cisco, and Zooey Deschanel (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Tin Man) for Cotton Inc.. Ellen Page recently lost a lot of fans for backing out of the indie werewolf flick, Jack and Diane, –she claimed that it was too controversial to risk her career in. These indie actors and actresses are only a few among many to jump into commercialism and away from independent films. Slate reports:

“…disquietude is occasioned less by the nature of the sellout than by the identity of the perpetrator. My editor has always claimed she’s not fazed when celebrities hawk products. But then a pair of indie sweethearts showed up in ad campaigns this fall—Ellen Page for Cisco; Zooey Deschanel for Cotton Inc.—and suddenly my editor started wringing her hands. “It’s a whole different breed of people selling out,” she fretted in an e-mail. “Those on the upward rather than the downward trajectory.” She felt vaguely embarrassed for these starlets. And she wondered: What could they have to gain?

Well, money, of course. For not much work. But let’s set that aside. Madison Avenue’s filthy lucre is always there for the taking. The question is whether these up-and-comers were wise to grab it.”

On the bright side, this is opening doors to a lot of new indie actors and actresses who will eventually lead the way for others, and leave the sell-outs in the dust. ..Not that Luke Wilson isn’t still a total cutie, of course, if just a teeny bit misguided!