Wax imitations of famous faces fire up Hollywood
At Madame Tussauds in Hollywood, a wax figure of Angelina Jolie, right, stands next to a photo of a competitor’s wax figure of her. Credit: Los Angeles Times
Dissing Angelina Jolie normally isn't the best way to get ahead in Hollywood. But tough times call for tough tactics in the war of Los Angeles' wax museums.
Madame Tussauds, which considers itself the ne plus ultra of wax artistry -- with the $25 ticket price to match -- is trying to best its cheaper competitor, the Hollywood Wax Museum, with a new marketing blitz stressing the defects in its rival's paraffin starlets, singers and comics.
In a wax version of a cola taste test, Madame Tussauds plans to let visitors decide whose figures most closely resemble their glamorous living counterparts. Madame Tussauds has begun placing a celebrity replica in its lobby alongside a life-size cutout photo of the same figure snapped at the Hollywood Wax Museum. First up was Jolie.
The message: Our Angie is hot. Theirs is not.
"I personally think we are better than the Hollywood Wax Museum," said Colin Thomas, general manager of Madame Tussauds, which opened its $60-million attraction in a prime location next to Grauman's Chinese Theatre in 2009.
Tej Sundher, whose grandfather opened the Hollywood Wax Museum a block away in 1965, says he isn't fazed by Madame Tussauds' sniping. He said his tickets, priced at $15.95, offer visitors good value for their money. And while he admits his museum doesn't have the cachet of his internationally famous rival, he said his wax figures can hold their own.
"I'll compare my Hugh Hefner with their Hugh Hefner any day," he said, pointing to his museum's wax depiction of the Playboy founder dressed in a satin bathrobe and stretched out on a bed.
Thomas of Madame Tussauds said figures there, created by a team of professionals in London, are clearly superior. But, he said, surveys have shown that the attraction is losing customers who assume the two museums are either the same or very similar.
"This is about our brand," Thomas said. "We don't want people being confused."
