WHERE SUCCESSFUL ADVERTISING MEETS LGBT EQUALITY

Pfizer, Fashion Victims

Members:

Various models walk down the runway at a fashion show as their pictures are snapped by the press, who are sitting around them.

One model (who looks like a drag queen) walks by an audience member who for some reason is holding a cat. The model then sneezes, spewing a volume of fluid onto the runway. Models behind her begin slipping on it, falling flat on the floor as a couple of fey men watch with smiles.

Before she leaves the runway, the model has one more sneeze, shooting a spray onto a shirtless muscleman in the audience -- but he is protected by his fruit basket hat and sunglasses.

At the end, the British announcer says to the sneezing model, "Bless you, love."

Reactine is a prescription allergy medication, branded as Zyrtec in the U.S.

This commercial appears as a mix of camp and burlesque on gays and the fashion community. There is an element of laughing at the drag-queen looking model and the obviously gay onlookers, as well as with them.

User Comments
Andrea James
Hmm. So hard to tell these days, but the model didn’t seem like she was transgendered to me.

Anonymous
I don't find it very funny. It's missing intelligence. The stereotype wins out here.

Anonymous
This is not a drag queen at all, it is a female model and I am sure it was intended to be percieved as an overdone woman, not a drag queen...I worked on this spot. The audience members were obviously gay stereotypical characters and I, personally, thought they were unrealistic and not very funny.

Sean Martin
I gotta agree with "anonymous" -- it's not terribly funny and, if anything, it's a little on the pathetic side. I sometimes wonder who at the ad agencies comes up with this sort of nonsense, because it sure doesn't make me want to buy the product.