The problem
with turning to famous faces and outspoken media stars to help promote yourself
in Cannes is
that such slebs are not always easy to control.

And so it
was with this year’s roll-call of improbable celebrities attending the seminars
and lunches in the Croisette.

The Black Eyed Peas’ Will.i.am
put his own indelible stamp on proceedings when he declared “advertising is
yesterday”.

I’m not sure if Intel, or its agency McCann, were quite ready to discuss the nuances
of the debate, but he did raise some interesting points about the role brand
ambassadors play in today’s world.

“So
what we are all experiencing is a big major shift,” he said. “What ad agencies
used to do, what marketers used to do, that brands want to continue to have.
That interaction and engagement with a bunch of people. To put the brand in
front of it.”

However,
any stir the rapper caused was nothing compared to that of 70s punk rocker
Patti Smith.

One of
music’s original fire-starters, Smith showed time had not mellowed her too
much when she made an impromptu appearance in the Cannes press centre after appearing on stage
with WPP’s Grey.

In a highly
charged and, it has to be said, highly entertaining 10 minutes, the American
singer-songwriter who crashed onto the scene with her debut album Horses, had
no intention of sparing anyone’s blushes.

Asked why
she was attending the 2011 Cannes Festival of Creativity, the former
hell-raiser was precise and to the point: “I’m a free person and I’ll go anywhere
the f*ck I want.”

But Grey, home to GlaxoSmithKline, and the global multimillion pound advertising behemoth that is the Grey Healthcare Group, wouldn’t have been too impressed with what she said next.

“Of course
I think a lot of advertising’s evil,” she said. “I think especially pharmaceutical
advertising is evil. The most important thing for any advertising is truth….
People should not be seduced into getting drugs and pharmaceuticals they don’t
need through advertising.”

Ouch.

Smith went
on to complain about the media’s obsession with all things celebrity at the
cost of “serious, important news” – something no doubt this year’s delegates at
Cannes could identify
with.

It was left
to one of the oldest swingers in town, the Sundance Kid himself, Robert
Redford, to prove that it really didn’t have to be so painful. His speech with
Yahoo proved to be both poignant and heart-felt and managed that rare feat of
making us all feel a little better for having seen him.