Now for the miss.... prepare yourself for a rant that involves a bunny, some sisters, and good ol Adam Sandler...
As much as I love dear Adam's movies I am going to not only pass on his upcoming spoof, but join my sisters in protest... LOUD protest. The House Bunny, which opens Aug 22nd, is about a washed up Playboy Bunny who decides to become a house mom when she gets kicked out of the mansion. She tries to get with a pretty blond sorority, who quickly rejects her and points her to an unfortunate sorority house full of even more unfortunate sisters.... and this is where I have a problem. According to the websites storyline, Shelley ends up at Zeta Alpha Zeta, aka the Zetas. HOWEVER, if you watch the preview, in turquoise, it clearly says Z TA. It happens so fast that you don't even notice the space for the E, all you really see is ZTA. Nice huh?My sorority colors and my sorority name. Agh! I know that this may seem silly and trivial to some, but the last thing the sorority needs is for incoming freshmen to think that we are the unfortunate looking, nerdy, ill mannered sisters portrayed by the film or even that greek life is how it is in the movie. Not only did Adam Sandler's company use our name, our colors, and our nickname (the Zetas), but even took one of our symbols which is a bunny. A couple of other sororities were also depicted in a nasty way like Phi Mu, who are called Phi Iota Mu in the movie. I guess they are the named villians of the plot. Nationals has made a statement regarding the release as such:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 15, 2008
INDIANAPOLIS—Zeta Tau Alpha Fraternity for women expresses dismay that Columbia
Pictures and Happy Madison Productions will release in August the feature film,
“The House Bunny.”
This movie depicts a sorority called “Zeta Alpha Zeta” and refers to its members as
“Zetas” and its facility as the “Zeta House.” The chapter house shown in the
movie has the word “ZETA” above the door in turquoise, one of the official
colors of the Zeta Tau Alpha Fraternity.
The Fraternity is the exclusive owner of the registered trademarks Zeta Tau Alpha and the Greek letters ZTA, and has been consistently using the term Zeta and
Zetas to conduct business for nearly 100 years. The Fraternity believes that the
use of “ZETA” in the film is improper and confusingly similar to ZTA. Zeta Tau
Alpha is working with legal counsel to explore its options.
“We regret that the production and distribution companies have chosen to release a movie that portrays collegiate fraternity and sorority life in an offensive and inaccurate manner,” said Zeta Tau Alpha National President Laura Ladewig Mauro.
“We have written a letter of protest to both companies but have received no response.”
Zeta Tau Alpha was founded in 1898 at the State Female Normal School (now Longwood University) in Farmville, Va., and has 148 active collegiate chapters and more than 195,000 members worldwide. A member of the National Panhellenic Conference of Greek women’s organizations, ZTA develops members’ leadership, academic and service skills and supports breast cancer education and awareness as its national philanthropy.
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