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- Categories:Gender, Commercial
- (C) 1968 or 69, Magic, Comedy
Description
(Editor's Note: this has already been added to the list) The 7Up people created a diet soda called "Like" in 1963, and later
renamed it "Diet 7Up" in 1970. Shortly on the heels of the first
Virginia Slims cigarettes ad campaign in 1968, they apparently
wanted to corner a similar market in soda pop. Somewhere between
1968-1969 they made several television ads all featuring the same
30-second jingle, that went like this: LIKE is the o-nly / The
first and o-nly / Soft drink just for girls. / Da da da something
something something / Da da da something something something / LIKE
is the something something something / Juuust fooor giiiiiirls. (3
lines about the pleasure of its refreshing flavor.) While the
jingle played, some actors would perform a silent film pantomime,
with one or more women enjoying drinking Like as the jingle ends.
For example, I remember one where a man is trying to open a bottle
of Like, but he cannot remove the cap; a woman comes along, easily
gets the cap off, and takes the bottle for herself to drink. But I
also remember this one commercial... It begins with a tough-faced,
unshaven Beau-Geste-like French Foreign Legionnaire in a ragged
uniform (torn white pants, dark jacket, and the white cap with a
linen neck cloth) and a gorgeous woman alongside him in a torn
designer dress staggering across the vast sands of a cruel desert
with the blazing sun beating down upon them. Suddenly, at the top
of a dune they see a cooler full of bottles of Like soda. The woman
seems to claim the entire cooler for herself. She begins drinking
the Like, while the parched man desperately begs for one from her;
but she gestures "No, you can't have any" and pushes him away.
Apparently she would rather her companion die of thirst than drink
Like soda. As the jingle progresses, the camera does a close-up of
her enjoying a refreshing bottle of Like. Then she lowers her
bottle and looks off-camera. Her face quickly registers "OH NO!"
with sadness and horror. The camera cuts back to a close-up of the
Legionnaire's grisly face, he has somehow acquired a bottle of the
forbidden beverage, and we see him as he is thirstily finishing it
off. When the jingle reaches "Juuust fooor giiirls," he lowers his
empty bottle, and now his face is aghast with shock and dismay. The
camera pans far back to take in the entire scene on the sand dune.
Now the Legionnaire is no longer wearing torn white pants, but is
instead dressed in a knee-length white skirt with the same uniform.
As the commercial ends, the Legionnaire waves her arms, in a "What
the ...?" gesture, as the woman mimes despair at having lost her
love interest. (Otherwise, the Legionnaire looks exactly the same
-- ugly face, beard stubble; short hair; no figure, thick, hairy
legs and all. LOL! But the looks on his/her own face, the look on
the beautiful companion's face and the lyrics of the jingle all
point to this as a gender transformation and not merely a change of
clothing.) ---------- Many thanks to Fictitious Name and Suddenly Feels Old at
Fictionmania for their help!
originally posted by Ronald Coleman on 2003-02-27, no edits, entryid=3805
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