Hasta La Creative!

Hill Holliday, Boston tapped Leslie Mann (Knocked Up, This Is 40, Freaks and Geeks) to voice the inner musings of a jaded mom in their latest campaign for LG appliances.

Mann voices the internal monologue of a character Adweek described as “a cross between FX’s Louie and Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler.” While that may be a slight exaggeration — the character is far more in line with Mann’s roles in Knocked Up and This Is 40 — the spots are certainly far more cynical than anything we’ve come to expect from appliance ads aimed at women, and in fact play off those happy family conventions.

In the most edgy, and, not coincidentally, most successful of these spots, Mann’s character notes that her new LG washing machine is very fast. But what’s a good quality in a washing machine is not necessarily a good quality in a husband, as the character suggestively muses. It’s this kind of honesty and portrayal of a less-than-perfect reality that makes the campaign stand out. Other spots in the campaign trade in the sexual innuendo for goofiness, and while none of them are quite as entertaining as “Too Fast” the approach still feels like a welcome departure from typical daytime TV fare, thanks largely to Mann’s comedic timing. Stick around for credits and “Hot Cookies” after the jump. continued…

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Carnival Cruise Lines is launching a new 25 million dollar campaign, “Moments That Matter,” with agency Arnold Worldwide. The fall campaign will extend across broadcast, radio, digital and direct mail from September through December. For the first spot in this campaign, Carnival sourced material directly from their customers through social media.

The :60 spot, “24 Hours Onboard” features content chosen from over 30,000 pictures and videos submitted by past guests on Carnival’s cruises, including one dude who publicly proposed on a Carnival Cruise (yikes). “24 Hours Onboard,” which will debut on major network primetime Monday, September 23rd, appeals to viewers’ sentimentality, and employing pictures and videos sourced directly from past customers adds a personal element that could help convince viewers to book their next vacation with Carnival. As Arnold Executive Creative Director Pete Johnson puts it, “We found those looking to book a cruise are much more likely to listen to recommendations from previous cruisers.” So filling a commercial with vacation memories from enthusiastic fans of Carnival makes a lot of sense.

This isn’t a spot that will blow anyone away with its creativity or execution, but it doesn’t have to. It appeals to the type of people who line their walls with photos from family vacations, or, in other words, Carnival’s target audience. continued…

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