Pfizer's Commercial With Martha Stewart Spoofs This Classic Ad Campaign
Over the years, domestic diva Martha Stewart has lent her famous face to ads for everything from Maybelline mascara to Skechers sneakers, but in January 2023, she gave new life to an ad campaign aimed at saving lives by starring in a Pfizer commercial that spoofs a classic ad campaign.
The commercial, titled "Unwelcome Guest," features Stewart, 82, sharpening a katana while standing at her kitchen counter. "You know that unwelcome guest everyone wishes would just leave already?" she asks menacingly. "That's COVID-19." She then tells viewers she got the updated booster shot to help protect her against the Omicron variant and makes short work of a pineapple top with her katana before showing off a blue Band-Aid on her shoulder. "Got it?" she asks coyly as a "got booster?" tagline in familiar all-lowercase white font flashes on-screen. Of course, this is a nod to the iconic got milk? commercials that have been running since the early 1990s.
Martha Stewart once appeared on a got milk? poster too
In 1993, advertising agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners dreamed up an ad campaign for the California Milk Processor Board to get consumers to drink more milk. The resulting posters, mostly shot by celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz, became a part of pop culture history, with Saveur even calling got milk? "one of the greatest ad campaigns of all time" in 2022.
It's hard to disagree considering the original format ran for more than 20 years and starred a long list of popular celebrities. From the onset, 1990s A-listers such as Harrison Ford, Britney Spears, Dennis Rodman, Sarah Michelle Gellar, a "Friends"-era Jennifer Aniston and Lisa Kudrow, popular pop singer brothers Hanson, and even Kermit the Frog were tapped to don milk mustaches.
In 1997, at the height of her "Martha Stewart Living" TV show fame, Martha Stewart also appeared on a got milk? poster, posing with her arm around a cow while rocking a white upper lip. In 2008, she "got milk" once again, sporting another milk mustache for a campaign focused on staying active and eating "right," which naturally included drinking three glasses of low-fat or fat-free milk every day.