Air New Zealand, Betty White present Safety Old School Style

10 October 2013

Air New Zealand and Betty White present Safety Old School Style

Air New Zealand has teamed up with America’s sweetheart of comedy Betty White and a cast of golden oldies for the airline’s latest in-flight safety video which launches today.

Safety Old School Style is the airline’s first safety video filmed outside of New Zealand and is set at the fictional ‘Second Wind Retirement Resort’ in the United States. It features the former Golden Girls star and multiple Emmy Award winner with fellow residents living life to the full.

American actor Gavin MacLeod, famous for his role as Captain Stubing on TV’s ‘The Love Boat’ and as Betty’s former co-star on the ‘Mary Tyler Moore Show’, makes a cameo appearance while a cast of fun-loving retirees, including actor Jimmy Weldon, aka the voice of Yakky Doodle duck in the ‘Yogi Bear Show’, take audiences through the safety briefing.

Betty White says she had been exploring opportunities to work with Air New Zealand for some time.

“Air New Zealand has a global reputation for creating unique in-flight safety videos. When the opportunity came up to be involved in this project, I couldn’t say no. We had a lot of fun on set and I think we’ve shown that it doesn’t matter what age you are, it’s important to live life to the full,” says Betty.

Air New Zealand Head of Global Brand Development Jodi Williams says Betty White is the ideal partner for the airline’s latest safety video offering.

“Air New Zealand’s brand is all about liberating from the ordinary and our safety videos have proven a great way to showcase our unique personality to audiences of all ages around the world. In Betty we found the perfect partner - she is renowned for being a little bit cheeky and with a career spanning 74 years, who better to learn survival tips from than the award-winning show business veteran?

“As a small airline at the bottom of the world, we have to think outside the square when it comes to driving brand awareness and conveying important safety messages to our millions of customers. Partnering with influencers like Betty has proven an effective way of doing this,” says Ms Williams.

Past Air New Zealand safety video hits have included the Hobbit-themed ‘An Unexpected Briefing’, ‘Fit to Fly’ starring fitness guru Richard Simmons and more recently ‘The Bear Essentials’ featuring renowned television adventurer Bear Grylls.

Collectively the airline’s safety videos have clocked up more than 25 million views online and have featured in coverage by global media outlets, such as CNN, BBC and the New York Times.

To celebrate the launch of Safety Old School Style Air New Zealand is giving online viewers the chance to win the trip of a lifetime to either Palm Springs, California or Queenstown in New Zealand’s South Island, including a raft of activities. To enter, viewers need to share their story of how they are living life to the full at www.airnewzealand.com/safetyoldschool

View Safety Old School Style at www.airnewzealand.com/safetyoldschool

Additional high resolution photography and videos are available to download from www.airnewzealand.com/safetyoldschool

Betty White biography
Betty White is America’s sweetheart.

Born January 17, 1922, in Oak Park, Illinois, Betty White has been in show business for 74 years, appearing in sitcoms, on game shows, and, most recently and famously, as guest host on ‘Saturday Night Live’.

Regarded as a television pioneer for being one of the first women in television to have creative control in front of and behind the camera, Betty has gone on to win six Emmys (five for acting) and receive 20 Emmy nominations over her career. In May 2010, Betty became the oldest person to guest-host ‘Saturday Night Live’, for which she received a Primetime Emmy Award. She also won a Grammy Award in 2012 for the audio recording of her book ‘If You Ask Me (And Of Course You Won’t)’.

Betty got her start working as an assistant at a local television station. In the early 50s, she launched her first television series, ‘Life with Elizabeth’, and became one of the first female producers in Hollywood.

Betty’s career received an enormous boost from her next television series, ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’. Playing man-hungry Sue Ann Nivens, Betty showed audiences that behind her sweet smile lay a sharp wit. Betty won two Emmy Awards for her work on the series.

After this time, Betty guest starred in a number of TV shows before landing the biggest hit of her career on ‘The Golden Girls’. The show looked at the lives of four, elderly, female friends and landed among the top-ranked shows during its seven seasons on air. It won numerous awards, including another Emmy for White.

After ‘The Golden Girls’ went off air in 1992, Betty continued to appear as a guest star on numerous television series. She played herself on ‘The John Larroquette Show’ in 1996, which earned her another Emmy Award-win. Betty enjoyed recurring roles on ‘Boston Legal’ and the soap opera ‘The Bold and the Beautiful’. She also had a supporting role in the 2009 romantic comedy ‘The Proposal’.

Betty’s career took off again in 2010 when she appeared in a Snickers chocolate bar advertisement during that year’s Super Bowl.

Thanks largely to a Facebook campaign, in May 2010 Betty became the oldest person to host ‘Saturday Night Live’. She was initially reluctant to do the show, explaining to ‘Newsweek’ that it “was the scariest thing I’ve ever done. It was really funny stuff, but it was a challenge.”

In the same year, Betty returned to series television with a role on the sitcom ‘Hot in Cleveland’ for which she has won two consecutive Screen Actors Guild Awards. In addition to her work on this series she also hosts ‘Betty White’s Off Their Rockers’. The hidden camera show features a mature set of merry pranksters who play jokes on younger generations. Betty has picked up two Emmy Award nominations for her work on the show.

Due to her legacy and continued success within the entertainment industry, The American Comedy Awards, The Screen Actor Guild and the British Academy of Film and Television Arts have all awarded Betty with lifetime achievement awards recognising her contribution to television.

In 2013, the Guinness World Records also awarded Betty with having the longest television career for a female entertainer.

ENDS

© Scoop Media