Schwarzenegger watches image

SACRAMENTO -- Arnold Schwarzenegger's Hollywood persona helped him land a leading part in politics, and the California governor has been flexing some of his famous muscle to control how his image is used offscreen.

Schwarzenegger has stopped the sale of a bobblehead doll depicting him toting a machine gun while wearing a gray business suit, because, his lawyer said, the product infringed on the action hero's image. But the doll's creator said he was making a political statement by contrasting the violence the movie star commits in films with his advocacy for families and children as a Republican governor.

While it is common for celebrities to control the commercial use and merchandising of their names and likenesses, Schwarzenegger's dual roles as actor and politician have intertwined, legal specialists say, and could help define the line between commercial exploitation and political speech, particularly for other celebrities who follow Schwarzenegger into public office.

"Celebrities should realize that once they enter politics, their lives are open books -- as long as their identities aren't used to endorse a sleazy product or used for false product endorsements," said J. Thomas McCarthy, a law professor at the University of San Francisco and one of the country's leading scholars on the "rights of publicity," the legal doctrine that allows people to control the use of their names and images.

Schwarzenegger is arguably the biggest Hollywood star to build a second career in politics. Not even Ronald Reagan or Clint Eastwood, two other movie actors who won public office, ever matched Schwarzenegger's wattage at the movies and in merchandising. Reagan as "the Gipper" and Eastwood as "Dirty Harry" did not have the same commercial lure as Schwarzenegger as the "Terminator."

"A lot of politicians have been in the entertainment field prior to getting elected, but I don't think anyone had the star power of Schwarzenegger," said Larry Krug, public relations director of American Political Items Collectors, a nationwide group of hobbyists based in Derwood, Md.

The first actor to make a jump into national politics is widely thought to have been George Murphy, a Broadway song-and-dance man who later moved to Hollywood to make movies. He chaired the California Republican Party, and in 1964 was elected to the US Senate.

More recently, "Law and Order" star Fred D. Thompson dabbled in acting before serving eight years in the Senate representing Tennessee. Fred Grandy, Gopher on television's "Love Boat," represented an Iowa district in the US House, from 1987 to 1995. Sonny Bono, the singer and actor, became mayor of Palm Springs, Calif., before winning election to Congress in 1994.

None, however, had made it as big as Schwarzenegger , whose battle over the bobblehead suggests that he is still seeking to control his image, perhaps not only for political reasons, but also for its value.

"He's applying the standards of a Hollywood celebrity in his new role as California governor. I think it's entirely misplaced. There's been a long history of caricature and satire in the history of politics," said Tyler Ochoa, a law professor at Santa Clara University who specializes in publicity rights.

As one of the most valuable commodities in Hollywood, "Schwarzenegger has much more at stake, much more than Reagan ever had," said Daniel Klerman, a law professor at the University of Southern California. "But sometimes, politicians use rights of publicity for the wrong reasons. They want to suppress criticism."

That is the contention of John Edgell, a Democratic lobbyist in Washington who came up with the idea for the gun-toting doll. "The bobblehead was satirical. That I put a gun in his hands, that was political speech," he said.

Edgell said his creation was intended to portray Schwarzenegger's "duplicity in portraying himself as pro-family values and pro-children," while obviously "aware of the destructive nature of his films."

In exchange for disarming the gun-toting bobblehead, which sold for $19.99 over the Internet and at the gift shop in California's Capitol in Sacramento, Schwarzenegger will allow the company to create a new doll of him, without a gun. In the works is a Schwarzenegger bobblehead wearing pink lipstick, high heels, and a dress to lampoon the governor's use of the term "girlie man" as a political insult aimed at Democratic adversaries. The manufacturer, Ohio Discount Merchandise Inc., which sells bobbleheads of other elected officials, also agreed to share a substantial portion of proceeds with Schwarzenegger's afterschool charity.

Edgell said he does not like the settlement. Proceeds of the sales were supposed to benefit a cancer charity, he said. So, he has launched a website, governorgirlieman.com, where he plans to directly market the new Schwarzenegger bobblehead.

"I'm driving home the point that Schwarzenegger shouldn't be the only politician immune from satire," Edgell said.

In his letter to the bobblehead manufacturer, Martin Singer, a lawyer for Schwarzenegger's company, called the gun-toting doll "an unauthorized commercial exploitation of Mr. Schwarzenegger's name, photograph, and likeness."