The Reoccurring Prop Newspaper

ToNIC

Well-Known Member
Wow... that is something I never heard of before :)

http://www.slashfilm.com/2010/06/04/lol-the-reoccurring-prop-newspaper/

If you watch enough television shows and movies, then you might even start to notice that a bunch of the same props are used over and over again. I first noticed this with a magazine prop in various television shows including Married With Children, which featured a gum advertisement on the back cover. Someone on Reddit recently put together a compilation of photos from various television shows, commercials and movies, showing how one newspaper prop gets around and is reused, and reused again.
I don’t know the story behind this prop newspaper, but I assume it was created as a royalty free prop for television shows. Somewhere along the line, the prop became a reoccurring gag between propmasters. Something like how sound designers reuse the Wilhem Scream in every movie. Check out some examples after the jump.

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I got wind of this today when the following pic was published on The Daily What with the caption "Ed O’Neill desperately needs something new to read." :lol

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The original archive of these seems to be this one. This might make a good project for the Paper Props section; imaging being able to recreate one prop from so many different films and shows!
 
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A bunch of new info has come to light..
Brow Beat has learned that the prop comes from a small newspaper prop company called the Earl Hays Press in Sun Valley, Calif. Started in 1915, Earl Hays is one of the oldest newspaper prop companies, and the paper in question was first printed in the 1960s (note the top-hat ad on the lower left), then offered as a "period paper," better suited for Mad Men (where it has not appeared) than Scrubs (where it has). The screenshots don't actually reveal the same prop—just various printings of the same file. The front is blank and can be customized, but the inside and back page are always identical. In fact, in No Country for Old Men, when Tommy Lee Jones is reading a paper at a diner, the section in his hands is the same as the one sitting on the table, suggesting that the prop master bought two copies to make the paper look fuller, but made the mistake of leaving the stock spread facing up.
source
 
I always noticed the gum add on the back of most of the magazines on Married With Children, I always assumed it was paid advertising from the Wrigley...
 

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