And now the pitch

Samuel L. Jackson does commercials for Capital One now, in which he struts and glares and acts all Samuel L. Jackson-y. Talk about your mixed feelings. On the one hand, the “Pulp Fiction” and “Snakes on a Plane” star is likable in an abrasive, in-your-face kind of way that’s hard to put a finger on; yeah, he yells and swears a lot, but he also gives the impression that he’d have your back in a dark alley, like some loudmouthed and buffoonish Batman.

 

On the other hand ... it’s a commercial. Shouldn’t he be up on a silver screen somewhere, spit-barking profanities at a frightened sidekick while ninjas are scorched by the fiery breath of a bloated dragon? Dibs on the rights to that one, by the way. I’ll clear some space on the mantle now for that Academy Award.

 

Ten years, ago, it would have been disappointing to see Jackson in a commercial, because it would have denoted a demotion of sorts, a sad and sorry career slide into pitchman status. “Oh jeez,” we’d say, “look at the guy. He was the toast of Hollywood, an acid-tongued time bomb, and now he’s telling us how OxyClean gets the mother-bleeping tough stains out. Poor man. Let’s mail him a nice fan letter and a case of Schlitz.”

 

Except now, commercials are a star-studded affair. Joe Pesci’s done a Snicker’s commercial, for cryin’ out loud, and I’ve seen Drew Barrymore in at least one of those hair-swishing, eyelash-batting spots for anti-aging creams, made from the bone marrow of West Indian manatees. At some point, commercials became chic, a perfectly acceptable moonlighting gig for otherwise employable movie icons.

 

The question is: Why?

 

In the digital era, television ads are like Beyonce’s backup dancers – they’re flashy and in-your-face, but nobody really notices them. We record shows on fancy devices that give us suggestions on what to watch (if you liked “Dancing With the Stars,” you might like “Clog Dancing With Clem Kadiddlehopper!”), and this instantly renders commercials irrelevant. We simply hit fast-forward, zip through Doritos and Budweiser ads with the urgent speed of an Olympic sprinter, and then it’s back to “America’s Funniest Groin Injuries.” That hyper hop through flat beer and priced-to-own Ginsu knives may stick us with a subliminal image or two – a volleyball player chugging Gatorade, a cowboy wiping dust off his Wranglers – but nothing that would really captivate our attentions. If I were an advertiser, I’d have given up by now and commissioned spots that were nothing but a black screen for 30 seconds, with bright yellow letters reading “BUY BEER.” Not exactly glamorous, but at least people would see it.

 

Then there’s the Internet. Being a cheap, cable-less bastard, I figured out that if you have a laptop computer with an HDMI connection, you can just hook it up to your television and view streaming content as if it were an actual broadcast – a nice end-around that allows me to bypass expensive cable packages loaded with channels I’d never watch, like the Guys Staring at Lawns Channel, which is pretty much where TV is headed these days. There’s a surprisingly large number of current shows that are available for free on these sites; streaming providers try to monetize them by shoe-horning advertisements into where the normal commercial breaks would be, but these are easily avoided by downloading programs that eliminate ads completely. This means you don’t even have to fast-forward. Watching your favorite programs has now become as lazy as doing absolutely nothing, since, you know, you’re kinda doing absolutely nothing.

 

Yet there’s Alec Baldwin, beboppin’ about credit cards while being bull rushed by a hoard of angry Vikings. (’Cause historical figures and zero percent APR are a natural fit. Like peanut butter and walruses.)

 

It takes beaucoup dough to nail down top-shelf talent, and the only time it’s really worth it is during the Super Bowl, which draws gajillions of viewers on a global scale; there are probably stick-hut village settlements on the banks of obscure African rivers that get quarterly updates by carrier pigeon. One of the reasons so many non-football fans watch the game is because of the advertising, which, for one evening, is transformed from banal time-killer to big-budget jamboree. In this annual scenario, it makes sense for corporate product shillers to pony up bucks for glittery names, since much of the following day’s water cooler talk focuses on Tostitos, not touchdowns. So if I’m a big-wig ad man trying to get people gabbing about Nasty Zit Acne Cream, sure, I’ll open the company wallet and lock down a star. And if I’m tops in Tinseltown and I’m offered that gig, I’ll think, “Well, it is the Super Bowl. Beats whatever Nicholas Cage is doing.”

 

(This random swipe at a successful celebrity brought to you by State Farm. Like a good neighbor, etc., etc.)

 

Once the confetti’s been cleared off the field, commercials slip back into minor nuisance status, the television equivalent of a stray fruit fly. Perhaps the reason ad agencies have gotten more Hollywood is precisely because we’ve found ways around them; it’s hard to get noticed when you aren’t even seen. It’s just odd to see Stephen Colbert hawking chips, or Sally Field peddling Ensure. Usually those jobs would go to fresh-faced, vaguely generic-looking actors with medium-scale acting chops and teeth the impossible white of baby polar bears.

 

I guess there’ll always be a place for them in the middle-tier commercials, the AARPs and Cash For Golds. Unless of course Samuel L. Jackson feels like branching out, in which case only a Navy SEAL team and a swarm of tanks could stop him. Time to solidify your bleepin’ assets, fool.