I’ve been listening to Oh Miriam! on Audible, narrated by the legend herself, Miriam Margolyes. I love her. She makes me laugh and I admire her unfiltered honesty. She’s just like me when I’m drunk.
I was listening to a chapter about her 80s voiceover work in ads and porn (very funny, btw). Brits of a certain age, did you know she was the voice of the tea-loving chimp in PG Tips? AND the sultry Cadbury’s Caramel Bunny?
Naturally, I fell down a YouTube rabbit hole (I know, I know), marvelling at 80s ad brilliance. Margolye’s foxy West Country rabbit flogging us chocolate. Tea-hawking primates. Metalic Martians selling dehydrated potato (Smash – mmmm). And my childhood fave: Carling Black Label. Yep, my favourite ad as a kid was for South African lager. The 80s … weird and a bit wrong.
But credit where it’s due – Carling Black Label ads had it all: storytelling, humour, big budgets, and it all led to the pub. Brilliant.
There is no real point to this ramble, except to say that when future humans/martians look back at 20th-century marketing, it’s likely they’ll all get a tad nostalgic and teary-eyed for the sheer, glorious silliness of advertising. I know I did.
#ads #80s #MiriamMargolyes #advertising #creative #film #TV #books #CarlingBlackLabel
Marie White 