The biggest story from this year's Academy Awards was that Leonardo DiCaprio finally got his Oscar, but a close runner-up were the Girl Scouts. Host Chris Rock brought in a green-clad troop of girls to solicit cookie sales from Hollywood elite in the audience, and stars from Tina Fey to Christian Bale took the bait. Rock claimed on-air that the Scouts brought in more than $65,000, but according to the gossip hounds at TMZ, it's not quite shaking out as expected.
A mother of one of the scouts from Inglewood, California's Troop 5215 says they haven't seen a dime of the supposed $65,000 and claims "the Academy isn't returning calls," according to TMZ. While the troop only actually raised $2,500 from cookie sales, the rest was to be donated by the Academy (something that both the Girl Scouts of America and the Academy confirmed). TMZ also reports that because of nonprofit rules, the troop would only actually get to keep $1,000, so it's not about the money; "[the mother's] bigger concern is her scouts are getting used in a public relations lie." Perhaps some bad publicity for the Academy will get them to cough up the dough?
In the meantime, even if they haven't seen a fat check from the Academy, another troop mother, Linda Dunn, told Entertainment Weekly that the publicity they gained was invaluable, saying, "That was a wonderful thing [Chris Rock] did." Other Girl Scout troops are already capitalizing; one New York troop came up with a marketing strategy that used Leo DiCaprio's likeness to hawk their cookies with this amazing sign:
Be like Leo. Help girls change the world: bit.ly/1OmL0Tp
Posted by Girl Scout Cookies on Monday, March 7, 2016