Here’s a fun last-minute scrap in Campaign 2010. B.J. Lawson, the Republican candidate against North Carolina Democratic Rep. David Price, ran a TV ad that featured a voiceover that sounded like Morgan Freeman. Then the campaign said it was Morgan Freeman — and then Morgan Freeman, who has in the past supported Democratic candidates such as President Obama, made it quite clear that it wasn’t him.
Freeman’s press agents sent Ben Smith a statement: “These people are lying. I have never recorded any campaign ads for B.J. Lawson and I do not support his candidacy. And, no one who represents me ever has ever authorized the use of my name, voice or any other likeness in support of Mr. Lawson or his candidacy.”
The Lawson campaign said that they were “tricked” — that the ad company they contracted with promised them Morgan Freeman. Lawson campaign spokesman Martin Avila told CNN: “We’re apologizing to Congressman Price, to the voters, and most of all to Morgan Freeman because this is not the campaign we wanted to run, and not the campaign we have run.”
Meanwhile, the media company, California-based M.E.I., is denying that they ever lied to the Lawson camp. The Associated Press reports: “MEI’s statement says it discussed with Lawson’s campaign that Freeman was a Democrat and would probably never do an endorsement for a Republican candidate.”
The Lawson campaign has taken the ad down — but someone else re-uploaded it to YouTube. Here it is:
The timbre and cadence of the impersonator are pretty good, but both qualities slip at certain points. Also, the pitch isn’t quite low enough. Overall, this is a decent Morgan Freeman impression — but not the real thing.
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