So I’m sitting here eating my lunch in front of MSNBC when I hear the familiar voice of Andrea Martin during a pharmaceutical commercial depicting a class reunion.
This is slightly troubling in itself, because Andrea Martin is one of the most talented and funny women in TV history. She should have her own comedy show, not voice work in an ad for some bladder control drug. (For those too young to remember, Ms. Martin was one of the stars of SCTV, the funniest television show ever. I have one friend who, to this day, busts up at the mere mention of “Mrs. Falbo.”)
I would really love to have seen how the ad agency presented this idea in meetings.
What’s funnier is former SCTVer Catherine O’Hara played a woman in the Christopher Guest movie “A Mighty Wind” who is a former folk singer now married to a man who sells bladder control devices and she ends up entertaining singing songs about incontinence at industry trade shows. Reality imitating art or the other way around?
Well, prior to the class reunion, the water balloons (maybe the same community, maybe different friend cliques) were shown going to the mall; on vacation in what seemed to be Italy (they went to an art museum, rode a tour bus, and one romantic couple canoodled on a gondola down the canal); and more recently, some went to a spa. The guy who did the art design for the Enablex spa commercial has a website, and explained that the official “mascot” or “alpha balloon” is an orange one named Grace. She’s the one who got two friends to commit to a spa day with her. The detail in that ad spot is amazing. I particularly like that Grace gets cucumber circles put on her eyes to reduce puffiness, and that in the yoga class, the balloons move in unison. There’s even a shot of the shower room. Three balloons, modestly hidden by shower stall doors, but still. We know they’re naked.
I absolutely adore the Enablex balloons. Their animation just kills me, and the colors are so sweet, and there’s so much humor in the story lines, Full disclosure — I take Vesicare, Enablex’s competitor, but the pipe people who represent Vesicare don’t do anything for me. Pastel balloons all the way.