Thrilling Tales: Hallmark and the Selling of Sentiment

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4 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 12 February 2021

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

For more than a century, Hallmark has been a tightly-held, Midwestern business that’s mastered the art of turning feelings into revenue. But recently, it has run into trouble when it’s tried so hard to be inoffensive, it ends up offending. Can Hallmark succeed in an era when emotions might be getting too big to fit in an envelope? Podcast production by Jess Miller and Cleo Levin. Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Dear Prudence and Slow Burn. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Music
0:10.0	Lad Brooks Live, the new way to win thousands of free tickets to electrifying live events.
0:19.0	Sign up at ladbrookslive.co.uk
0:22.0	18 plus UK max 1 account per individual
0:25.0	Enter free draws to win event tickets from designated list
0:28.0	to win per week restrictions and TNC's apply.
0:30.0	Nobody ever asked me about something like Hallmark I do this all day.
0:34.0	All they ever want me to come and talk about is the end of the world.
0:36.0	I'm like, I would really much rather talk about Hallmark.
0:40.0	Tressie McMillan-Cotton is a sociologist.
0:43.0	She mostly studies serious stuff.
0:45.0	But when it comes to Hallmark movies, she has a weak spot.
0:48.0	Well, I of course have an entire notebook full of Hallmark movie ideas.
0:54.0	I mean, if I'm gonna sit there and watch them.
0:57.0	I'm gonna rewrite them.
1:02.0	There's a large fan base out there, people like Tressie, who love to watch Hallmark movies.
1:07.0	Maybe a little ironically, or maybe with sincerity.
1:10.0	Or maybe sometimes a little bit of both.
1:13.0	One of the things that Hallmark does give me is, of course, I get to turn my brain off.
1:19.0	Hallmark has made hundreds of these movies, and it cranks out a few dozen more each holiday season.
1:25.0	With every passing year, the Hallmark Movie Universe, as Tressie calls it,
1:29.0	seems to get more cultural traction.
	...

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