The Products in Morgan Spurlock’s “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold”

Since Morgan Spurlock’s documentary was a response, in part, to product
placement on Heroes, we talked to Hayden Panettiere’s publicist about whether the
actress would pose with Spurlock for a photo evoking John Lennon and Yoko Ono. Her
publicist was interested, but we backed off because Spurlock is 40 and Panettiere is
21.

In Spurlock’s movie, he interviews consumer advocate and Al Gore slayer Ralph
Nader. “For heaven’s sake,” Nader says, “if you’re going to sell out, you ought to be
paid. I was supposed to be paid with a shoe, but that didn’t fit. You’ve got to find
someone who can use a size 12 narrow.”

Spurlock refused to be photographed with brand logos in his mouth, an homage to
the poster of his most successful documentary. When he asked if he could get a cut of
our advertising revenues for this story, we declined.

Hyatt paid to be part of Spurlock’s movie, including an ad that ran within the
film. One coauthor of this piece checked into a hotel to get some peaceful writing time
away from his family. And since Hyatt didn’t buy an ad in this story, we’ll tell you
that it was a…