The Most Scandalous (Mis)Uses of Dead Celebrities to Push Product

1. Chris Farley for DirectTV

When it comes to putting famous deceased people in ads, DirectTV is the most active offender. They first annoyed viewers in 2008 by featuring 'Poltergeist's Heather O'Rourke in a commercial (she died of complications from Crohn's disease in 1987) and recently pissed fans off when they resurrected Chris Farley (who died of a drug overdose in 1997) to banter with David Spade in a scene from 'Tommy Boy,' splicing in shots of Spade pitching for the company. Since the ruckus, the career-challenged Spade has defended his choice to do the ad, saying he was celebrating how much fun he and Farley had making the film. Perhaps the lesson is: celebrities who died tragically aren't very funny. (The Farley DirectTV clip has since spawned a parody ad starring Heath Ledger, JFK and Jesus Christ.)



2. Fred Astaire for Dirt Devil

Two Dirt Devil commercials really started the raising-the-dead-to-push-your-product trend. They first debuted at the 1997 Super Bowl, and feature Fred Astaire in scenes from classic musicals Royal Wedding and Easter Parade, only this time he's dancing with a Broom Vac and an Ultra Hand Vac. Though it was his widow who sold the rights to his image, Astaire's daughter said she was "saddened that after his wonderful career, he was sold to the devil." Take that, step-mother. Apparently though, the public loved it. Post-Super Bowl it was found to have more "viewer recall" than ads featuring live celebs. It appears that when it comes to marketability, breathing is not a prerequisite.



3. Audrey Hepburn for The Gap

Take one of the most elegant and refined movie stars that ever graced the silver screen, add mass-produced khakis and jeans, and you've got a match made in ad-exec heaven. The movie scene in this commercial is from 'Funny Face,' one of Hepburn's most iconic films. She leaps from celluloid onto a beige background and cuts a rug as AC/DC's 'Back In Black' thumps in the background. The Gap has often used jaunty song and dance numbers in their ads, and also commonly reproduces the airbrushed faces of Hollywood celebs oh-so-casually lounging in their boot-cuts or white shirts. But this was the first time they took a bona fide screen legend from beyond the grave and made her a shill for their crummy, made-in-China threads. Breakfast at Denny's, perhaps?



4. Kurt Cobain for Guitar Hero

If you were to compile a list of wildly successful superstars who seemed to detest the trappings of fame and commercialism, Nirvana's Kurt Cobain would be at the top. So it came as a shock to some when it was announced that his image and songs would be used in Guitar Hero (and Band Hero). But things got even more crazy once it was revealed that once you mastered the Nirvana tracks, Cobain's avatar could be used to play any song, be it The Spice Girls 'Wannabe' or Poison's 'Every Rose Has Its Thorn'. The s--t hit the fan, and former bandmates Dave Grohl and Krist Novaselic publicly expressed their dismay. Even Courtney Love began a Twitter campaign asserting that she never signed off on the avatar and that "...Kurt would despise this game let alone the avatar". But Activision says they obtained the legal clearance to use the image, so it looks like Kurt will be singing 'YMCA' for all eternity.



5. John Lennon for Rock Band

Video game karaoke phenom Rock Band recently released their Beatles package, complete with 45 songs and the option of buying consoles that look like the band's original instruments. Though obviously Lennon and George Harrison weren't able to sign off on this enterprise (being dead and all), at least you can only play Beatles tunes. And Yoko Ono has said she thinks her late husband would have loved the game. Fair enough. But it's not the game that is off-putting so much as the commercial to promote it. To the strains of 'Come Together', the band crosses Abbey Road along with a gaggle of young video game enthusiasts. At one point Lennon looks into the camera appearing as if he's on a mushroom trip. Would Lennon really want to be starring in an ad that's making a really big company even more money? I imagine not.



6. Steve McQueen for Ford

Of all the cars they could have chosen, Ford sticks Steve McQueen in an ugly-ass Puma for their recreation of his famous 'Bullitt' car chase sequence. This ad was followed up by a commercial for the Ford Mustang (arguably a better choice, as the real Bullitt car was a 1968 Mustang GT). But Ford drops the ball with a lame plotline. Some poor schmuck hops in his tractor to create a racetrack in his corn field (a la 'Field of Dreams'). McQueen steps out of the rows, take the keys to his Mustang and inexplicably starts driving around and around. For one of the coolest men to ever appear on screen (and a real-life race car enthusiast), this just doesn't cut it.



7. Gene Kelly for Volkswagen

In what appears to be a nod to the Astaire Dirt Devil ad, that other famous song-and-dance man gets the CGI treatment. In this case, however, it's not what he's dancing with, but how he's dancing that gets messed with. The clip starts off with a scene from Kelly's flawless 'Singin' In The Rain' dance sequence. Then suddenly, Kelly is popping, locking and breakdancing like a fedora-wearing 'So You Think You Can Dance' contestant. I must admit, there is something sort of awesome about seeing this legendary hoofer bust a move, and the computer-generated trickery is pulled off expertly. But, of course, Kelly ends up next to a gleaming VW Golf and gives the car an admiring once-over. Gag.



8. Sid Vicious, Joe Strummer, Joey Ramone and Kurt Cobain for Doc Martens

Doc Marten boots have long been associated with punk rock, mostly because punk rockers tend to wear them. But in 2007, that connection was exploited with embarrassing results. UK ad agency Saatchi and Saatchi released hysterical print ads featuring dead rockers Sid Vicious, Kurt Cobain, Joe Strummer and Joey Ramone wearing Docs up in heaven, dressed in togas and perched on clouds. The ads caused a stir (with Courtney Love up in arms as usual) and Saatchi and Saatchi were fired by Doc Martens as a result. The agency hadn't gotten clearance to use the images, but they pointed out that in the UK, images of dead people can be used without permission. Ouch.



9. John Wayne for Coors Light

I'm not up on my John Wayne history, but I gather he was something of a hard-ass. So why exactly the purveyors of the weakest beer in America thought it was a good match is a mystery to me. But then again, these ads were wildly popular, and helped make the Silver Bullet the powerhouse brand it is today. In the clip, the Duke spends an inordinate amount of time hanging out with a couple of beer-swilling boneheads (one of which is a pre-'Jackass' Johnny Knoxville).



10. Martin Luther King, Jr. for Alacatel

Now, some of you might be saying, come on, so a dead entertainer is used in an advertisement, who cares? Entertainers sell their image all the time, they made a lot of money when they were alive by looking beautiful and perfect and more human than human. But imagine the pitch meeting when someone suggested resurrecting Martin Luther King, Jr. for a TV ad. In 2001, Alcatel (a French telecommunication company) created a commercial featuring King giving his famous "I Have A Dream" speech, this time to an empty mall instead of a huge crowd. Then the words: "Before you can inspire, before you can touch, you must first connect. And the company that connects more of the world is Alcatel, a leader in communication networks." How about Mandela for laundry detergent? Or Ghandi for car wax? The possibilities are endless.

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