WHERE SUCCESSFUL ADVERTISING MEETS LGBT EQUALITY

Nextel Communications, George Lopez

Members:

Featuring TV host George Lopez, this campaign for Virginia-based Fortune 300 company Nextel is part of a celebrity campaign that also features Eric McCormack of "Will & Grace," film actor Rob Lowe and Kristin Davis of "Sex & the City."

The campaign is supposed to feature "true-to-life scenarios from their personal and business lives" according to a press release. The spots employ a split screen to illustrate each celebrity's life with and without the Nextel phone simultaneously.

In this spot, Lopez calls his daughter because he needs his car back. In one screen, he is forced to drive her pink VW Beetle with a license plate that reads "Boycrazy." He pulls up to a stoplight, where a car full of guys pull up next to him and give him the eye and he turns away.

Through its ad agency, Mullen Advertising, Nextel declined an interview about its commercial, saying it did not intend gay innuendo, but offers a written statement: "The humorous effect in the George Lopez spot comes from his embarrassment at being stuck in his daughter's outrageous car? Her pink bug with the license plate is typical for a teenage girl, but embarrassingly out of place for a middle aged, successful guy with his image to consider."

They left out the part about his concern for being "Boycrazy." This ad plays on the tension of his being stereotyped as gay by casual bystanders.

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