Well, celebrities need to pay for those second or third vacation homes. And gas prices aren't getting any cheaper. In the past week or so there seems to have been a slight uptick in ads featuring some pretty well known names, so we've rounded up them here to help close off your week.
First up, Kiefer Sutherland takes some time out to jump into a spot for, unbelievably, Axe Body Spray. Perhaps even more unbelievably, is that the ad the mostly ditches the neanderthal tenor of most of the douche spray's usual ads, for something with an actual bit of story (though there is a rather gratuitous boob shot early on). The one minute ad is a tiny short film of sorts, with Sutherland pining after the high school sweetheart that never was, Susan Glenn (we've all had a Susan Glenn), and of course, if he could do it over, he would've bathed himself in Axe. And man, has Sutherland's voice always been that ruggedly awesome? He sounds like a whiskey soaked Alec Baldwin. [EW]
Over in the U.K., David Tennant has teamed up with Richard Branson for a series of spots for Virgin's Tivo service. These ads have been rolling out since April across the pond and…they're ok. As a personality, Branson has long used up his fifteen minutes of fame, and his presence these in ads don't help. Tennant is gamely playing along, and he sells his enthusiasm well enough, but that weird hand motion stuff he does at the end of each spot for the Virgin logo and to swipe the sales text across the screen is…weird. Is there a touch screen element to this that we're not aware of? It just feels unnatural…but not as unnatural as Branson's hay bale of hair. [The Inspiration Room]
Do you know what Airtime is? Yeah, we didn't know either, but the emerging tech company has dropped a pretty entertaining little 2 minute and 40 second riff that explains it all pretty well. Ian Plaff, who works at ad agency Portal A, takes the role of Buckley Rivington, a snooty sort who explains what this ChatRoulette-style service — which lets you talk with people you do know, while letting you randomly talk to strangers too — is all about. Along the way he gets some help from guests like MC Hammer, Kurt Russell, Gary Vaynerchuk and Ronnie Lott. Not bad at all. [AdRants]
Finally, Julia Roberts lends her voice, which evokes intelligence and comfort, to narrate an ad for Nationwide Insurance. It's another one of those insurance ads that tries to convey that they are the ones who actually care about you, but Nationwide's claim is bolstered by the knowledge that they don't have any shareholders to answer to, and thus they can put customers first. See if you're convinced below. [Adrants]
