The Showtime series Penny Dreadful lumps lots of different classic horror characters into one horrible potpourri (like lots of other works do these days), and one of the characters we see again is Dorian Gray, from the Oscar Wilde novel. Well, seeing the beginning of the most recent episode of Penny Dreadful (I think it’s Episode 4) made me think of the sacrament of penance, or confession as it’s commonly known, and how it forgives one of sins, and what that might do to Dorian Gray’s portrait.
As we all know, Dorian Gray does not physically age and suffers no visible cosmetic corruption due to his sinful behavior, but his painted portrait ages and is visibly horribly corrupted by his cruelty and hedonistic lifestyle. But that’s because his sins weigh heavily upon him, as he does not seek absolution. But were he to go to church and to confession, maybe he could find salvation, and then perhaps his portrait could be brought back to looking like a normal portrait of him again. And so, it seems to me that this idea might make for a fun ad for the Catholic Church to try to lure cynics and/or hedonists back to the flock.
So here’s how an ad using this idea might work:
We see Dorian Gray at some hedonistic party (a tame one, for the TV version: just some drinking and drug use and some superficial sexual attraction stuff going on around him), and he’s bored and feeling empty. So he goes home, and we can see something is bothering him. He goes to look at his portrait, and it is distorted with sin and corruption, which concerns him. He looks troubled and pensive when he looks out of his window to see the cross on the top of a church steeple, and he gets an idea. And so we see Dorian Gray going into a nearly Catholic church, and he goes to confession. As he leaves the church, he looks as if a great weight has been lifted from his shoulders. Then we see him back at home, and he looks upon his portrait, and it looks normal again, showing he has been forgiven.
(BTW: I’m not Catholic, but I went to Catholic school, and I think this would work well as an outreach for the Church to people who may have been Catholic but left the Church and are now getting to the age where they’re looking for more spirituality and peace-of-mind. This is merely the presentation of an advertising concept, and not an attempt at proselytizing. This ad might work well for all Christian sects, but since confession is more of an overt act, and indeed a sacrament, in the Catholic Church, I thought it would work best for them.)
