Spokespeople

The latest Siri ads starring John Malkovich have debuted, and they’re a departure from the previous Zooey Deschanel/Samuel L. Jackson clips. Actually, all three are pretty different from one another.

Here, Malkovich is doing his Malkovichian thing, giving Siri the word “life” to respond to and laughing at one of the phone’s non-jokes. As The Huffington Post notes, the previous ads have generated “scorn and derision” as well as a lot of talk. It’s likely the new ones will as well.

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Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

Primatologist and conservationist Jane Goodall is serving as the spokesperson for Disneynature’s new film Chimpanzee, which follows the story of Oscar and his chimp family in the African forest.

Goodall appeared on the red carpet for the movie’s premiere in Orlando on Friday, and has been making the rounds with the media, including a stop at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Clip after the jump.

Profits from the movie’s opening week will go to the Jane Goodall Institute. Other Disneynature films include Earth and Oceans. Each of the film’s has been accompanied by a charitable donation. The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that The Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund has made a total of $20 million in donations. Seriously, how can you resist that little face?

The movie opens this Friday, which is just before Earth Day on Sunday, April 22.

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Since her debut in 2010, we’ve gotten to know T-Mobile’s spokeswoman Carly Foulkes as the effervescent, pink-wearing promoter of T-Mobile goodness. For the latest ads, T-Mobile has turned her into a biker chick, doing away with the floaty dresses and putting her in a leather outfit and helmet.

T-Mobile’s SVP of brand, advertising, and comms tells Mashable that the ad is meant to convey the company’s status as a “challenger brand.”

“The makeover from the girl-next-door to an edgier, more tech-savvy and spirited Carly is synonymous with the evolution of the T-Mobile brand,” he says.

Jezebel, who isn’t a fan of the Foulkes to begin with, isn’t buying it.

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So often these days, we hear stories about people taking to the Internet against this or that issue and exacting change. In that regard, it’s a “man bites dog” story when that script doesn’t play out.

A group called One Million Moms tried to mobilize supporters against JC Penney and its decision to hire openly gay and very popular talk show host Ellen DeGeneres as a spokesperson. Despite numerous appeals from the group, JC Penney decided to stick with DeGeneres. Moreover, people actually went online to congratulate JC Penney and speak against the group, calling them “bullies” and “haters.” This the same week that California struck down its ban on gay marriage and Washington made same-sex marriage legal. We like this a lot.

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While the rest of the nation was going on about all the celebrities in the Super Bowl ads they were watching, viewers in Nebraska (and seemingly only those in North Platte) got a special low-budget Will Ferrell ad for Old Milwaukee beer.

The clip is nothing like the multi-million-dollar ads from last night. It certainly didn’t make it to any lists of top brands for the evening. (Networked Insights says Doritos, Budweiser, and Coke were tops by share of voice.) In fact, Ferrell doesn’t even get to say anything before the ad cuts off.

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This morning, we had a link to the story about David Beckham’s Super Bowl underwear ad for H&M. Now we have video.

Beckham collaborated with H&M on a line of underwear, which will be launched with a smoking clip of the international soccer superstar doing his best D’Angelo impersonation.

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Sam Waterston (duh-duh!!!) had been the spokesperson for TD Ameritrade since 2003. Now the company has a new spokesvoice with the very hot Matt Damon. You can hear his work in the new ad above. The company calls Damon’s voice one of the most “recognizable” in the world, but honestly, if I didn’t know it was him, I probably wouldn’t have been able to guess.

[via Reuters]

Charlie B. did a whole of lot talking with an open mike last week, but what we heard was mostly par for course from the new Weight Watchers spokesperson.

Less than a month ago, we reported on Weight Watchers’ attempts to reach men with Barkley added as a new face for the brand. He’s on the website homepage with the line “Lose Like a Man” and gives a testimonial in a short clip where he praises the Weight Watchers system.

Last week during a basketball game that he was announcing, he had an off-the-cuff conversation with his announcer colleagues that he didn’t realize was being livestreamed on NBA.tv (clip above). In his comments, he says, “I thought this was the greatest scam going—getting paid for watching sports—this Weight Watchers thing is a bigger scam.” Ack.

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Charles Barkley lost 27 pounds with Weight Watchers!

Get used to hearing that because Barkley, former NBA player and current announcer, has signed on as the new spokesperson for Weight Watchers’ “Lose Like a Man” campaign. The company scored a mention on People.com, ESPN.com, and a number of other publications today.

“Anyone who gains 100 pounds, they’re just a lazy a–,” USA Today quotes him saying. Barkeley gained that weight after retiring from basketball in 2000. You don’t hear that too often in women’s health and fitness magazines.

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J. Lo a.k.a. “Jenny from the Block” apparently has no desire to go down that road again. In the Fiat ad (no, not her performance at the AMAs) it’s not actually Jennifer Lopez who’s driving down the gritty streets of the Bronx in her jaunty little car, but a body double. Lopez, in fact, never left L.A.

“And how does Fiat fit with her brand anyway? It seems like a bad match from the start. Two sad, tired brands past their prime that need publicity desperately. Yawn,” PRNewser contributor Celeste Altus says. Very true Celeste. On top of that, it means the ad is a big, fat lie.

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