Ellen Feiss recalls her brief celebrity

In 2002, Ellen Feiss, then just 14 years old, was briefly the “it” girl of advertising, the star of an Errol Morris “Switchers” spot for Apple in which she drowsily (or stonedly, some thought) mourned the loss of a school essay eaten by a PC. (She was friends with Morris’s son, and they were short on interviewees that day.) Feiss dropped out of sight soon after but resurfaced this year in a French short film called Bed and Breakfast. In a new audio interview with TheFlux.tv, Feiss explains what happened in between. She says that projects with the Farrelly brothers and MTV never worked out. (She was too young, and her school didn’t want MTV cameras around, respectively.) She also explains why she declined to appear on Letterman and Leno. Remarkably, it was because she figured she was a flash in the pan, and didn’t want to overhype herself. Asked by the interviewer about the Apple spot, she says, “How many times do you think I’ve been asked to do the beeps?”

—Posted by Tim Nudd

September 22, 2006 | Permalink