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Ad makers make mischief
Posted on Fri, Sep. 03, 2004
Susan Ager
Detroit Free Press
Men, you already know that a drug like this will let you finally fire that football through the tire hanging from the tree in your yard.
You know it will put you and your wife side by side in bathtubs overlooking the sea, and who knows what next.
You know it's used by 81-year-old Bob Dole, who failed three times to win the White House.
Now there's a crisp new message that's hot or wrong, depending on your point of view.
Viagra, the original
performance booster, has been trounced by newcomers Levitra
(the tire ad) and Cialis (the bathtub
ad).
So Viagra's new $100 million ad campaign is playful and direct. One of a number of nice-looking, middle-aged guys grins proudly, a twinkle in his eye, beneath the headline: "Get back to mischief."
Behind him, Viagra's blue logo protrudes from his head like devilish horns.
At first I laughed. "How clever!" I said.
Then I thought about it.
Let's consider the word "mischief."
Into my mind pops Dennis the Menace (1959-1963 on TV, 1950 to today on comic pages). Dennis is nobody's favorite kid on the block. But because he's a cute little guy, we began to associate "mischief" with playful antics that do harm, but innocently.
The dictionary, however, is not so forgiving. Merriam-Webster calls mischief "a specific injury or damage . . . a cause or source of harm, evil or irritation . . . action that annoys or irritates."
S.I. Hayakawa wrote much the same thing in his excellent book "Choose the Right Word" (HarperCollins, 1994). The late Hayakawa was a U.S. senator, a university president, a man who loved nuances of language.
He wrote that "mischievous," when applied to an adult, "suggests a manner or action that is more troublesome than playful, more harmful than teasing."
Also: Most of the time, a person gets into mischief. But that's too obvious. Viagra's ad writers instead coined a new phrase that a) is the opposite of "Get back to work" and b) returns a man to his youth.
Yet what men might define as Dennis the Menace mischief, women
might see with dictionary eyes: Annoying. Irritating. Troublesome.
So you're ready, pal, but what about me?
Mischief can be annoying that way. Or this way: Again? I thought we were done.
Or another way:
When I think about men and mischief, I remember Hillary Clinton in the days after Bill finally admitted he'd made a little mischief with Miss Lewinsky.
I remember the wife of the governor of New Jersey, who stood beside him at a news conference last month when he revealed he'd had an affair with a man.
I think of the wives and children of Kobe Bryant, Strom Thurmond and Jesse Jackson and televangelists Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart. I'm reminded of the gorgeous girlfriend of actor Hugh Grant, who got into mischief with a prostitute then got arrested. Scott Peterson got into mischief, too, and look where his wife ended up.
True, women get into mischief, too. But they don't call it that and instead of smirking and winking they tend to agonize, before and after, and come away unsatisfied.
I'm all for sexual satisfaction. Viagra and its cousins can sometimes help.
But cads need no more encouragement toward selfish antics. And men in love who wish for a little mischief in their well-worn beds might try this with their familiar partners:
Get back in touch. source :-http://www.tallahassee.com | 
