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December 11, 2008
Another reason to socialize.
In September of 1992, a film-school colleague and I set out to the high desert with a miniscule crew and four non-actor friends to shoot a commercial for Rhino Records. None of us had ever made a commercial before, but my hot girlfriend had arranged us a chance to get paid (barely) to do what we loved, and the result would allegedly appear at the beginning of Rhino's home video releases.
Little did those four friends realize that for the next sixteen-plus years (and counting), they'd get phone calls from friends and family who'd just seen them say strange things on the TV screen before Plan 9 From Outer Space came on. They've also been known to get recognized in public.
And little did I realize that all that time would go by before I would again see Rhonda Jones, whose hypnotic incantation of Rhino's 800 number has lured uncounted late-night drunks to order Attack of the Killer Tomatoes in the Special Collector's Edition DVD box set. Rhonda looks great (I should have snapped a photo last night, where is my mind?), and it occurred to me that it just might be time to re-gather the original actors and shoot a 17th Anniversary version of the spot; it seems like the Rhino thing to do.
Here's the original, "An Ode To Rhino":
