Maca-Ray-Na
In a month like the last one, which involved copious amounts of travel, last-minute planning, up-to-the-minute preparing, and general preoccupation, I sort of lost track of pop culture. It happens from time to time, the waxing and waning of the distance between me and the mainstream.
So here's what I want to know: at what point exactly did Rachael Ray successfully execute her plans for world media domination? I've got nothing against her in particular, and remember seeing commercials for her Food Network shows when watching other stuff, but now she's on network television, staring out at me from every section of the bookstore, and receives more raw exposure in my grocery store than most major brands. Flipped on the tv today to see Oprah stopping by for a slice of Pizzo (which I imagine is the Oprah-visit version of pizza), and it seemed a lot like O was just trying to keep up.
So tell me true, teh Internets, why is all my culture belong to Ray all of a sudden?
Comments
Jeff seems to have a personal beef with Ray, but I think she's sort of a nice, happy figure. The other thing is that--like Oprah--Rachel Ray looks a lot like "us" (meaning regular women). She's gained weight, she's short, she's cute without being a supermodel. I'm all for promoting a woman like that, especially when most faces staring out at me tend to be Angelina Jolie and Kate Moss and the like. Rachel Ray seems like the kind of girl who isn't a beauty robot! Long like RR!
Posted by: jenny | January 3, 2007 10:14 AM
My beef is that she can't cook. I miss Mario! Jamie Oliver! The real cooks on the food network. They should rename it the "marketing" network. After all, they fired Mario b/c he isn't "marketable" the way Ray is. He's not "cute without being a supermodel."
Posted by: jeff | January 3, 2007 10:19 AM
I think some of her food is okay-- I actually have one of her cookbooks. But my biggest problem with her is she has all these weird hand and face gestures. Try watching her show without the sound on sometime and you'll see what I mean.
Posted by: Steven D. Krause | January 3, 2007 8:07 PM
ya gotta love her upstate ny accent.
Posted by: the onanist | January 3, 2007 11:08 PM
Since when are fruit roll-up sammiches considered cooking? To answer Collin's question I first became aware of her last summer when I discovered that EVERYONE knew who she was but me. It must one of those ninja viral marketing things all the kids are talking about . . . Happy New Year Collin
Posted by: Dean | January 4, 2007 11:51 AM
Actually, Ray's sudden uber-visibility seems to be largely because of Oprah. She was annointed by The Great One via multiple appearances on her show, and the rest, as they say, is history. (I'm pretty sure Oprah is a producer of Ray's talk show, too.)
Posted by: Lance | January 4, 2007 8:45 PM
Did they fire Mario? Wasn't he on Iron Chef America for a while? From the few I watched, his bag of tricks seemed a little limited, but still...
Posted by: collin | January 5, 2007 1:30 AM
The only show they let Mario do now is Iron Chef America. The Molto Mario show was great - where he cooked for his buddies.
Posted by: jeff | January 5, 2007 1:23 PM