The WB’s Hilary Duff Island Birthday Bash tonight at 8PM will celebrate the star’s birthday in an hour long special. Duff turns 16 and already has a number one CD, has been in movies and stared in a television show. She’s also making the rounds in the advertising world appearing in ads for Hasbro’s VideoNow personal video player and has a promotional agreement with Visa for a pre-paid Visa card in her likeness. If that weren’t enough, she also has her own clothing line called Stuff. Stuff by Duff. Cute.
Duff may gain a level of pop stardom similar to or bigger than Britney Spears has today. Watching how she achieves that stardom though will be interesting. Spears as well as Christina Aguilera both took turns down the dirty road as part of their trip to fame. As hot as it would surely be, it’s difficult to picture Duff in a Chistina Aguilera-like ‘Dirty’ video. But she’s still a kid and hasn’t reached the point that all kids do when they have to make that “I’m an adult now” statement. What she does when she makes that statement will have a great affect on the future of her career branding her in a way that will be hard to change.
Hasbro and Visa have made smart choices in casting Duff for their tween-focused products cashing in on the hottie’s stardom and aligning her appropriately with age-relevant products. In two or three years time though, one wonders if will be seen in sexed-up commercials like the Beyonce spot for Pepsi in which a mechanic can’t even get a word out of his mouth because he is so taken with Beyonce’s booty. At this point, Duff’s sex appeal is too wholesome for that. A few years ago so was Britney Spears’ sex appeal yet that dramatically changed and it’s now common place to see Spears ripping her clothes off every time she’s on stage. Duff will have to choose her road very carefully.
More stories on Duff here.
