What happens when you blur the line between advertising and entertainment? In the case of "Brisk Machete," a minute-long stop-motion video in which Danny Trejo reprises the role he played in Robert Rodriguez's Machete on behalf of Lipton Brisk iced tea, something very funny indeed.
[eventbug id="sxsw2011"]On Monday afternoon at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, I'll be talking about how it went down with Trejo, Rodriguez, Jamal Henderson of PepsiCo and Ian Kovalik of Mekanism.
The "Brisk Machete" video (above), which first appeared on YouTube in late December, kicked off a campaign for Brisk iced tea -- a brand that last advertised in a stop-motion campaign 10 years ago. Last summer, with sales already rising dramatically, the brand managers at PepsiCo kicked things up a notch. They went to Mekanism, a San Francisco creative agency well known for its animation work, with the idea of reviving the stop-motion campaign.
Henderson had just been to the downtown Los Angeles premiere of Machete, where he saw Trejo ride up on his chopper at the head of low-rider procession. So when Mekanism suggested a Machete take-off to launch the Brisk campaign, it seemed like serendipity.
Trejo was game, and Rodriguez gave the project his blessing. But as Trejo eventually discovered, there are responsibilities that come with being a spokesLatinsuperhero. The other day he was outside a 7-11 in the California's San Fernando Valley when a little girl walked by with her mom. When the girl realized he was drinking a Pepsi, she did a double-take and said in her best gravelly voice, "That's not Brisk, baby!"
Frank Rose is the author of The Art of Immersion, just published by Norton. The panel "Creativity, Celebrity, and Brand Strategy: A Brisk Discussion of Ozzy and Machete" takes place at SXSW Interactive at 4:30 p.m. Monday on the PepsiCo Plugged-In Stage at the Austin Convention Center.
See Also:- NSFW Video: Robert Rodriguez and Danny Trejo Slice Into Machete
