The “Lori said it would rain!” umbrella

Canada AM’s Jeff Hutcheson shoots a promo with the umbrella

Just after shooting the last Montreal special episode of Canada AM, showing off Gregory Charles at his Vintage theatre in the Old Port, Jeff Hutcheson shot a promo outside for CTV Montreal. It was kinda lame, a fake telephone conversation whose contents I don’t even remember, but had to do with the weather. But the punchline was Hutcheson opening up a CTV News umbrella and turning it around to reveal the words you see above: “Lori said it would rain!”

He shot a bunch of takes of the promo, and had trouble locking the umbrella open each time. Eventually, as they were doing extra takes to fine-tune various points of the bit, it broke:

CTV Lori umbrella broken

I guess we have it, the producer said to a laugh. They didn’t have a back-up umbrella.

I was fascinated by this umbrella. Was it a one-off? Are there piles of them in a promotion office somewhere? Can you buy one?

Louis Douville, CTV Montreal’s general manager, said they’d ordered about a dozen of them. But my query apparently made him think about “wider distribution, maybe even as contest giveaways.”

He also said I could have one. But blasted journalistic ethics mean I have to turn him down. (I don’t keep swag of non-trivial value unless it’s given away to the general population or was acquired in a non-journalistic context from someone who doesn’t know I’m a journalist.)

I like the idea of popular but local references like this. And I’m sure people would be interested in owning an umbrella like this. But I wonder how many.

My blog’s readers are obviously not a representative sample of the population, but definitely a good cross-section of hard-core fans. (Do local TV stations have those?)

So I put the question to you: Would you buy this umbrella? Or would you enjoy winning one in a contest? Or is it just a bit too cheesy for you to be seen walking around in the rain with?

UPDATE (July 6): Here’s the promo ad Hutcheson was shooting:

It’s just as cheesy as I had thought it would be.

10 thoughts on “The “Lori said it would rain!” umbrella

    1. Fagstein Post author

      Where can we see this promo?

      That’s a good question. I never saw the finished product myself and have no idea what they did with it.

      Reply
  1. Media Man

    Well since I don’t mind the odd fluffy promo items and since it’s not a loud item in terms of bright colors, I can unequivocally say that I want one. Maybe I should call some contacts on Papineau avenue..

    Reply
  2. illmaticp

    Fagstein, I would love to get my hands on a “Lori said it would rain” umbrella. To bad it doesn’t have her face on it, LOL!!!

    If you have any info on how to get one, please let me know.

    Thank you

    Reply
  3. Lorne

    I would like to have this umbrella, of course I would first make sure that the OQLF says it is legal to have the umbrella with only English on it in Quebec.

    Reply
  4. Charlie

    It’d be a neat promo item.
    A box of mini-umbrellas or those umbrella-hats would be cool at a street fest, should there be a chance of rain that day.

    Reply
  5. Just Me

    Would it have to be approved by the OLF before it went on sale, and if it were, it’d be banned because there aren’t any French words on it…

    Reply

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