Yesterday a large portion of the world tuned into Super Bowl LIX. Many may have been cheering for one team or the other, but just as many were likely just there for the commercials. Super Bowl commercials have become as big a deal as the game itself, and this year was no exception, but one of the more surprising ads came late in the game, as it featured Harrison Ford.
While A-list celebrities in TV commercials is a very common practice, Harrison Ford doesn’t do a lot of ads, at least not in the United States, so hearing his voice, and then seeing his face, was honestly one of the more shocking moments of the night for me. I wasn’t the only one who was surprised to see Ford in a car commercial. It turns out the people who made the ad were a bit shocked too, because it almost didn’t happen.
Jeep’s Super Bowl Ad Was Almost Very Different, and Harrison Ford Wasn’t Interested
The Jeep ad was the work of Francois Oliver who has worked on multiple Super Bowl ads over the course of his career. He tells Variety that he was asked to put together an ad for Jeep only a few weeks ago, and with the shortened timeline, and the fact that it wasn’t clearing Fox even had space for another ad. Jeep has used celebrities for Super Bowl ads before, so they wanted one again. This led Oliver to use an ad concept that’d already put together.
The original ad was much more humorous. He didn’t think Ford, the newest addition to the MCU, was the right person for the ad but the idea had been brought to the actor and he had agreed to take a meeting. But the first conference call didn’t even include Ford. Instead, one of Ford’s talent reps was there to tell the team that he wasn’t interested. The rep reportedly said…
He’s not an advertising guy. He doesn’t do this thing. He doesn’t need the money. He doesn’t have time. And so, this is not happening.
It turns out it’s actually a good thing that Oliver didn’t think Ford was right for the original idea, as he’d already been working on a backup.
A Change In Tone Convinced Harrison Ford To Sign On
Francois Oliver had a secondary idea. Because he hadn’t thought Ford was right for the comedy ad anyway, he’d been putting together a new idea, something that had Ford sharing his wisdom and that dealt with concepts of freedom and adventure that were connected to the Jeep brand.
Olivier says that he pitched the phrase “choose what makes you happy” and it completely changed the mood of the conversation. Ford agreed to do the ad. You can check out the end result below.
It’s a solid ad, and certainly one that fits the mold of Harrison Ford that we all know. It’s got some strong concepts that aren’t directly connected to selling Jeeps, but it’s likely that people watching will consider the vehicles a bit more.