This launch commercial in the famous, long-lasting Got Milk? campaign presents the scenario of a nerdy expert on Alexander Hamilton who gets the chance to compete for a radio quiz jackpot. Unfortunately, a lack of milk – which he urgently needs to wash down a sandwich he is eating – prevents the expert from being able to speak the words clearly to answer a question asking who shot Hamilton. (The answer being, as you all know, Aaron Burr, who shot his fellow US Founding Father Hamilton in a duel.)
Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco
Creative Direction: Jeff Goodby, Rich Silverstein
Art Direction: Erich Joiner
Copywriter: Scott Burns, Chuck McBride
Director: Michael Bay
"For about 10 years, the campaign was a who’s who of popular culture. Everyone wanted to be in an ad. Everyone was in an ad. And it did more to increase the sales of milk than any other campaign in history."
- Rich Levy, Chief Creative Officer, Klick Health
It’s a clever and engaging script but what makes the film really sparkle is that the humor is delivered with a super-tight film edit, camera angles and soundtrack that all build the melodramatic intensity. For that, we must doff our hats to the emerging star director Michael Bay, who has since gone on to a vast body of high-impact films and TV. But perhaps he has never been as good as when he made this … or at least, never as subtle in the handling of film craft.
As advertising, it gave a great start to one of the great campaigns, which moved away from preaching about the health-giving qualities of milk to focus on how life can go seriously off-course without it.
