by Thinus Ferreira
You see the glam, you see the gowns, but an insider secret is that doing red carpet coverage of basically any South African awards show or big event is a groan-inducing slog of stress, resentment and irritation for the bulk of the media - trying to cover something where there often aren't any rules, even less apparent organisation, and very little information.
Take it from someone who for over 20 years has covered this often banal endeavour where trot-out-hot celebrities appear in front of step-and-repeats and then walk the red carpet but with little actual thought or organisation that went into it.
The glamour you see on TV, in photos and on social media feeds is very often not at all the experience in the stress pit behind the velvet rope.
While frustrated media always arrives and tries the best we can do under uncertain and chaotic circumstances, it very often spills over and becomes visible in an inferior look and media output: A bunched-up carpet, different media desperately trying to get a few seconds with whoever, media left clueless as to who people are, too many people walking the carpet at once and a complete lack of physical space and timing.
From the Metro FM Awards, to the SAFTAs, the SAMAs, the MAMAs, the AMVCAs and MVCAs and the flurry of launches for various film and TV projects, South Africa just doesn't get the red carpet management right. And I see it happen time after time.
This is because of a lack of investment in money (for proper PR), time in setting up the physical carpet, a lack and absence of mapping and organising and planning it out, as well as a lack of communication and information to media before it starts and during it becoming a live carpet.
Wednesday's 2024 Earthshot Prize Awards green carpet management and media care in Cape Town showed that it is possible to do it right.
It is possible to get red carpet management basically perfect in this country with money, adequate effort, as well as proper planning and proper communication to the press and influencers, both beforehand and while it's happening.
When we look to, and at, the Oscars and Emmys and American red carpets and try to duplicate that in South Africa, the failure to get the same end result is very clearly because organisers don't want to properly invest in the PR, time and communication it requires.
They want the cake to look perfect but don't want to invest in the required ingredients, don't want to buy all the ingredients and they don't want to do put in the required time to bake it. The result: Another out-the-oven flop.
While not without its stress, Wednesday's evening green carpet was largely a stress-free breeze.
It's because its execution in reality started long ago, and on Wednesday already started for the media in the afternoon.
Earthshot Prize Awards international PR people and organisers, Kensington Palace's PR machine, together with South Africa's MultiChoice PR and corporate communications, in addition to two South African PR companies Total Exposure and WritersBloc, started long ago to put together and pour over every single detail of how Wednesday's green carpet would "flow" and play out minute by minute.
And therefore flow it did.
After picking up accreditation, media had to arrive the afternoon in the media room where we got a briefing of exactly how the carpet would run - very detailed, very organised, and communicated clearly.
Then it was off to the races and demarcated velvet rope spaces. We knew exactly, beforehand, who all would be walking the carpet and roughly even what order.
Every person who walked the green carpet had a handler with them from the beginning to the end.
Celebrities and dignitaries were "paced", so they would basically wait somewhere out of sight and only start their carpet stroll when there wasn't some apparent clash with someone else also being interviewed close-by.
Little digital clocks above us showed the time. Great spotlights illuminated the carpet from every angle.
PR people constantly hovered and communicated audibly and in-person, for instance: "So and so is next", "there will be three photo opportunities on the carpet - they will do 3-5-3".
This is shorthand carpet lingo meaning that at three designated points along the carpet, the celebs will pose standing as three people, then standing as five people, then standing as three people, and then moving on.
Meanwhile, phones quietly beeped with precision updates on Whatsapp groups, for instance: "2 minute warning: Finalists are walking out".
Messages would appear: "Heidi Klum is on the carpet", "ETA: 5-8 minutes to print/online/digital" and "Heidi Klum approaching print and digital".
So it went for everything - a well-set up, extremely well-run machine.
South African award shows don't have the money and don't want to spend the money on setting up and managing their red carpets properly.
We don't want to pay PR people to devote time to red carpet management before it happens, to map out how it will happen.
But the 2024 Earthshot Prize Awards green carpet showed how much better the end product is and can be (done in South Africa!) if stakeholders doing award shows are willing to put in the money and work to essentially "will" it into excellence.
Hopefully our local awards shows and eventing circuit looks, listens and learns.
