Hasta La Creative!

Nicole Kidman frolics around in some fields, giggles a lot and just generally looks happy and healthy in her first ad campaign for Swisse Wellness, Australia's No. 1 multivitamin brand. And this isn't just some act. "During the shoot, which took place at the historic Terrara House Estate on the Australian New South Wales south coast, Ms. Kidman surprised the crew by diving into the Pacific Ocean for a spontaneous early morning swim at Seven Mile Beach," the brand tells us. "She drove a pickup truck around the rural estate and enjoyed fresh fruit and vegetables from the garden." See, truth in advertising! The spot, the first of four, was done by Melbourne-based ad agency Noisy Beast, which is said to be planning to open an office in Chicago this year to handle U.S. marketing for the Swisse brand. The shoot was styled by a fellow Australian Oscar winner of Kidman's, costume designer Lizzy Gardiner, and directed by U.S. photographer and filmmaker John Urbano. "I joined Swisse because I wanted to help bring awareness to the importance of living a healthy lifestyle in a busy, often stressful world," said Kidman, who signed up as the brand's global ambassador last year. "I love feeling healthy and fit."

Mr. T guest-stars as a living pun in this Crispin Porter + Boguksy ad for Old Navy Best Tees, which are more stylish and durable than their previous ones. That's not a huge accomplishment, but whatever, it's their ad. (T also appeared in a two-minute Old Navy infomercial last year with Anna Faris.) I enjoyed the quiet irony of putting Mr. T on a plane, when B.A. Baracus was scared to death of them, but it's a little hard for the audience to accept that he can just kick the bathroom door down in a post-9/11 world. No T-shirt in the world can get you out of that kind of trouble.

CREDITS
Client: Old Navy
Agency: Crispin Porter + Bogusky
Partner/Worldwide Chief Creative Officer: Rob Reilly
Executive Creative Director: Jason Gaboriau
Creative Director: Robin Fitzgerald
Creative Director: Cameron Harris
Associate Creative Directors: Alexandra Sann, Mike Kohlbecker
Sr. Copywriter: Dafna Garber
Copywriter: Chelsea O'Brien
Art Director: Mary Dauterman
Director of Video Production: Chad Hopenwasser
Executive Integrated Producer (Music): Bill Meadows
Executive Integrated Producer: Deb Drumm
Junior Integrated Producer: Jackie Maloney
Executive Business Affairs Manager: Amy Jacobsen
Business Affairs Manager: Michelle McKinney
Production Company & City: Smuggler, Hollywood, CA
Director: Randy Krallman
Assistant Directors: Jey Wada, Erin Stern
Executive Producers/Partners: Patrick Milling Smith, Brian Carmody
Executive Producer/COO: Lisa Rich
Executive Producers: Allison Kunzman, Laura Thoel
Head of Production: Andrew Colón
Producer: Paula Cohen
Director of Photography: Bryan Newman
Editorial Company & City: Cut + Run, Santa Monica, CA
Head of Production/Senior Producer: Christie Price
Executive Producer: Carr Schilling
Editor: Frank Effron
Assistant Editors: Heather Bartholomae, Brooke Rupe
Visual Effects Company & City: Method Studios, Santa Monica, CA
Executive Producer: Robert Owens
Producer: Colin Clarry
Set Supervisor: Rob Hodgson
VFX Supervisors: Jason Schugardt, Michael Sean Foley
Lead Composer: Kelly Bumbarger
Graphics & Animation Company & City: Buck, Los Angeles, CA
Executive Creative Director: Ryan Honey
Executive Producer: Maurie Enochson
Sr. Producer: Nick Terzich
Associate Producer: Ashley Hsieh
Art Director: Jenny Ko
Designer: Sean Dekkers
Animator: TJ Socho
Music Company & City: Search Party, Portland, OR
Executive Producer: Sara Matarazzo
Producer: Chris Funk
Composer: Terence Bernardo
Sound Design & City: Machine Head, Santa Monica, CA
Sound Designer: Stephen Dewey
Producer: Patty Chow Dewey
Telecine & City: Company 3, Santa Monica, CA
President/Colorist: Stefan Sonnenfeld
Executive Producer: Rhubie Jovanov
Partner/Managing Director: Steve Erich
EGroup Account Director: Danielle Whalen
Account Director: Kate Higgins
Content Management Supervisor: Laura Likos
Content Supervisors: Jessica Francis, Kendra Schaaf
Content Manager: Alex Kirk, Michelle Forbush
Group Director, Planning: Lindsey Allison
Cognitive Anthropologists: Jennifer Hruska, Tiffany Ahern

Now that Tiger Woods has regained the top ranking on the pro golf tour, Nike is celebrating its star endorser's comeback with an online ad emblazoned with one of Woods's favorite soundbites, "Winning takes care of everything," along with the word "Victory" next to the company's swoosh logo. The ad has stoked the flames of controversy in social media, with some claiming it sends a bad message in light of Woods's marital infidelities that surfaced a few years back, costing him some endorsement deals, tarnishing his image and threatening to derail his career—not to mention crushing the marriage in question.

There are hundreds of press reports about the ad and countless tweets and comments, all manner of Internet chatter, folks expressing opinions pro and con. Much of the coverage has focused on what impact the ad will have on Nike's brand. That's a fair question, but as anyone who's followed marketing for more than 10 minutes should realize, it's answered almost as soon as it's asked. This is a blip that quickly stirs passions but has no lasting effect. By next week it will be all but forgotten. Nike and Tiger will carry on. (They been here before, of course, when Nike released that rather peculiar Tiger ad following the scandal.)

In a larger and more intriguing sense, the story is a microcosm of the state and price of fame in the digital media landscape. If you start winning in the public eye and achieve some notoriety, you'd better take care and be on your guard about everything, because legions are eagerly watching and waiting and we'll pounce at the slightest provocation. This says a lot less about Woods, Lance Armstrong or other tarnished icons than it does about the rest of us, who live vicariously to varying degrees through such "heroes and villains." Most of us will never experience the life-changing thrill ride of winning and losing on a grand scale, because for whatever reason, we can't commit our whole beings to daunting tasks, athletic or otherwise, and fight through the pain, injury and public pressure to victory. Hell, most of us will never truly win or lose at anything.

So, we cheer on Woods, Armstrong and the rest when they triumph, and weep at their defeats. We damn them when they fall from grace and welcome them back with accolades and big-bucks sponsorships when they've reformed enough for our liking.

In this way, such imbalanced relationships become symbiotic and reciprocal. Tiger and Lance play out high-def dramas with, at times, their careers and livelihoods on the line. We play along on our sofas, remotes in hand, flipping among our thousand channels. Social media intensifies and personalizes the experience. We become actors in their story—mostly in our own minds, of course, but in increasingly more palpable ways than ever before—as commentators and commenters, bloggers, tweeters and pinners. Our input flickers across PC desktops and smartphone screens, shared in real time with thousands, maybe millions, all eager to feel more deeply and understand—if only briefly, and through the exploits of others—what words like winning and everything really mean.

Advertising has been obsessed lately with scaring the crap out of people. So here, for your Friday enjoyment, is a more benign prank. Target, which is the exclusive retail partner for the release of Justin Timberlake's new album, got 20 of the pop star's biggest fans together for a commercial shoot. They thought they would just be singing a Timberlake song for the ad. They didn't realize the great and powerful JT himself would actually be there. Check out the spot below, and a behind-the-scenes video after the jump. All the reactions are genuine. Decent work by Deutsch in Los Angeles—though to be honest, the bar for this kind of thing was set by David Beckham and Adidas last summer. If you don't leave someone sobbing tears of joy, maybe you haven't gone far enough.

It's a hit! Pete Rose mistakes a recliner for a couch and pretends to eat pastry in these awesomely awkward, sublimely stilted low-budget commercials for Muenchens Furniture in Cincinnati. There's so much to savor: Pete's plaid pajama bottoms … his "I love baseball" T-shirt with a baseball representing the heart … the hat that makes him look like somebody's confused grandpa … Pete's 40-years-younger Playboy-model fiancée, Kiana Kim, overemoting in the last seconds of her 15 minutes of fame now that their TLC reality show, Hits & Mrs., is fading to black. "Wow, we'll take it all!" they cry at one point in the furniture showroom, displaying the same greedy attitude that led Pete to gamble on sports as a player and manager and get banned from baseball for life. I'd wager he still "smells like a man," as he did in his mid-'70s Aqua Velva commercials, and I'm betting his status as the all-time leader in base hits, celebrated in this Wheaties spot, stands for decades to come. Charlie Hustle may be barred from Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame, but the Advertising Hall of Fame should welcome him with open arms. Via With Leather.

I see dead people. In commercials. Eating Galaxy chocolate bars. Well, just one corpse, actually. It's Audrey Hepburn, 20 years dead but still cute as a button and seamlessly integrated into the advertising action thanks to modern technology. This British spot, approved by the actress's sons, finds Hepburn on holiday in Italy, tempted from her tour bus (not AC/DC's tour bus, thankfully) by a pretty boy driving a fancy convertible. When Audrey accepts the ride, she coyly sits in the back seat. Classy! The visuals are impressive, a big improvement on Dead Astaire's hot steppin' for Dirt Devil back in 1997. Of course, some find the trend ghoulish. Frankly, I'm surprised it's generating this much interest. It's been done to … well, death. Everyone from John Wayne to Albert Einstein, Marilyn Monroe, John Lennon and Kurt Cobain have been resurrected for ads. And Clint Eastwood for Chrysler … close enough! Check out Hepburn's 2006 Gap spot after the jump.

Miracle Whip is spreadable, and so is the Kraft brand's superlative, spot-on send-up of "We Are the World"-style social-benefit music videos, which is approaching 250,000 YouTube views in about two weeks. This new installment of the condiment's "Keep an open mouth" campaign, launched last year by mcgarrybowen, finds a delicious assortment of mostly-has-been C-listers (Z-list in Don Dokken's case) belting out a heartfelt anthem that begins: "In this world there's lots of turkey, but also a lot of fear. People making up their minds, before the facts are clear. And when it's time to make a sandwich, ugly judgment rears its head. If it's tangy, creamy, different, chances are it won't get spread." The inspired silliness succeeds because the performers poke fun at their public personas while, against all odds, actually sounding great together. Wynonna asserts, "Some say country is too twangy, and its lyrics aren't too smart," and the Village People lament, "Disco's good for dancing, but not considered art." Lance Bass tears up, and Tiffany tears it up on vocals—her pipes almost steal the show, though Susan Boyle shines on the infectious "Open your mind, open your mouth" refrain. The spot's respectful of their faded celebrity, and everyone's in on the joke, so we're laughing with them instead of at them. As for past Miracle Whip booster Lady Gaga, she's still too big a star for such shenanigans—but given fame's fleeting nature, I'm sure her turn will come.