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Ronald McDonald

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Ronald McDonald is the main symbol for McDonalds fast-food restaurant chain. According to the book Fast Food Nation (2001), 96% of school children in the United States can identify Ronald McDonald, making him the United States' most recognized fast food advertising icon. Only Santa Claus was more commonly recognized. In television commercials, the clown inhabits a fantasy world called McDonaldland, and has adventures with his friends Mr Shoe, Hamburglar, Birdie the Early Bird, and The Fry Kids. The McDonald's Corporation has also characterized Ronald McDonald as being able to speak 9,365 different languages including Mandarin, Dutch, Tagalog, and Hindi.[1] In recent years, the "childish" McDonaldland has been largely phased out, and Ronald is instead shown interacting with normal kids in their everyday lives.


Many people work full-time making appearances in the Ronald McDonald costume, visiting children in hospitals. There are also Ronald McDonald Houses, where parents can stay overnight when visiting sick children in nearby chronic care facilities. Due to the controversy over fast food, critics have likened McDonald to Joe Camel, the former mascot of Camel cigarettes [weasel words]. Since August 2003, McDonald has been officially recognized as the "Chief Happiness Officer" of the McDonald's Corporation.

Conception and creation

Two conflicting versions of Ronald McDonald's origins exist. One claims that the original character and design of Ronald McDonald, including facial design and costume (featuring "french-fry bag pockets" and "food-tray hat"), were created by Terry Teene and George Voorhees. Voorhees, a professional clown, supposedly first portrayed the character for a hired performance at a Los Angeles, California drive-in restaurant McDonald's.

Willard Scott as Ronald McDonald, from the first of three pre-recorded television advertisements to feature Ronald. Note the "food-tray hat".

The other version of Ronald McDonald's origins involves Willard Scott [2] (a local radio personality who also played Bozo the Clown on WRC-TV in Washington, D.C. from 1959 until 1962), who performed using the moniker "Ronald McDonald, the Hamburger-Happy Clown" in 1963 on three separate television spots. These were the first three television ads featuring the character, whose appearance was substantially similar to George Voorhees' prior appearance as Ronald Mcdonald (spelled with a lower-case "d") as shown in the Valley News and Green Sheet, a San Fernando Valley newspaper of the time.

Scott, who went on to become NBC-TV's "Today" show weatherman, claims to have "created Ronald McDonald" according to the following excerpt from his book Joy of Living:

"At the time, Bozo was the hottest children's show on the air. You could probably have sent Pluto the Dog or Dumbo the Elephant over and it would have been equally as successful. But I was there, and I was Bozo... There was something about the combination of hamburgers and Bozo that was irresistible to kids... That's why when Bozo went off the air a few years later, the local McDonald's people asked me to come up with a new character to take Bozo's place. So, I sat down and created Ronald McDonald."

Willard Scott's costume was in several minor ways different from Voorhees' Ronald Mcdonald version (but notably, retaining the "fast food tray" hat design) and, as Ronald, Mr. Scott's clown face was substantially the same as that of his personification of Bozo the Clown, a well-known character whose widespread syndication in early television made him the best-known clown character in the United States. Thus, his use of the character may not violate the clown code.

McDonald's does not mention Voorhees or claim that Willard Scott "created Ronald" in their statement:

"The smile known around the world," Ronald McDonald is second only to Santa Claus in terms of recognition. (According to one survey, 96% of all school kids in the United States of America recognize Ronald (stunning-stuff.com)). In his first TV appearance in 1963, the happy clown was portrayed by none other than Willard Scott."

On March 28, 2000 Henry Gonzalez, McDonald's Northeast Division President, thanked Scott for creating Ronald McDonald, during a taped tribute to Scott on the "Today" show.

Various forms of the name "Ronald McDonald" as well as costume clown face persona, etc. are registered trademarks of McDonald's. McDonald's trains performers to portray Ronald using identical mannerisms and costume, to contribute to the illusion that they are one character.

McDonald's marketing designers and stylists changed elements of the Ronald McDonald's character, persona, style, costume and clown face when they adopted the clown as a trademark, possibly in deference to "The Code", the tradition of clowns to scrupulously avoid copying other clowns' appearance or performance style.

Actors

The Thai version of Ronald McDonald, performing the "wai" gesture of greeting

At any given time, there are dozens, or possibly hundreds, of actors retained by McDonald's to appear as Ronald McDonald in restaurants and events. It is assumed, however, that the company uses only one actor at a time to play the character in national television commercials. Following is a list of such primary Ronald actors.

In other countries

  • In Thailand, Ronald McDonald does not make a handshaking gesture. Instead he has his hands in the traditional Thai "wai" greeting gesture of hands together.
  • Recently in Japan he is appearing as 'Ronelda McDonald'. With her stylish, shoulder-length, auburn hair, she has been featured in a number of Japanese advertisements along with a Japanese McDonald menu re-vamp. The image is said to be based around French actress Audrey Tatou, who enjoys great fame in Japan.
  • The regular male Ronald McDonald in Japan, however, is known as Donald McDonald, instead of Ronald.

References

  1. ^ McDonald's India: Fun Zone

[2] Schlosser, E. (2006) Chew on this: everything you don’t want to know about fast food. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co.

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