Sunday, October 19, 2008

Tommy Lee Jones will be very disappointed if you don't drink BOSS coffee.

I think the list of US celebrities who sell out to hock products in Japan is fairly well documented. Highlights include Cameron Diaz (she used to be plastered all over the SoftBank store where we got Jenn's cell phone), Brad Pitt, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Nicholas Cage, to name a few. Do a quick search on YouTube... they are all pretty funny.

But this celebrity sellout has a more direct impact on our daily existence in Tokyo -
Tommy Lee Jones. Besides having won an Academy Award for The Fugitive, he's also known as one of those crusty types who treats acting as an art. Which makes me think these guys must have driven a dumptruck full of money to his house down there in San Saba County, Texas.

My walk from the Roppongi Metro Station to our apartment proceeds something like this
...





It reminds me of the Apple commercial from the early 80's with Big Brother staring down from above. It's been there a couple of weeks now, and it's still kind of creepy. Funnier still is to see his face plastered on a vending machine (iced coffee is big here... probably a separate discussion), something you would never see back home:

A little internet research revealed that there is an ad campaign backing this up. There are twelve commercials in all, but my favorites are here and here. He's an alien sent to earth to report back on life in Japan (yes, he was in a movie kind of like that).

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