Martin Short puts in so little effort in his latest ad venture, it’s actually effective.
The star of “Only Murders in the Building” doesn’t care about this gig, and it shows. In the spot for the Canadian fintech brand Wealthsimple, Short acts like a diva as he barely spouts out one very wrong line on a commercial shoot set.
In the spot by agency Preacher, Short walks on to the set, flubs the one line he has, then is physically carried off by his assistant to a helicopter, which flies him roughly 50 yards to his car. The ridiculousness is meant to show that online money management platform Wealthsimple works much harder for your money than Short did for that commercial.
“Martin Short’s Short Day at Work,” launched during the Canadian Football League’s championship game, the Grey Cup, which took place in Short’s hometown of Hamilton, Ontario.
“We want Canadians to know that Wealthsimple understands how difficult it can be to build personal wealth in today’s tough economic climate. We offer a robust suite of financial tools from trading and investing to spending and saving that makes sure their money works as hard as they do. And there’s nobody better than the iconic Canadian actor, comedian and writer Martin Short to share this message across generations,” said Rubina Singh, chief marketing officer at Wealthsimple.
This marks the first campaign for Wealthsimple in almost two years, and the first in collaboration with an outside agency. All prior advertising in Canada and the U.S., including a 2017 Super Bowl spot “Mad World” was created in-house.
The current campaign will run in Canadian markets nationally across major broadcast, including Hockey Night in Canada and SNL, connected TV, digital properties and paid social.
“We’re all working harder than ever to keep ahead, which makes it that much more annoying when our money is sleeping on the job. Instead of playing it on the nose and featuring people who work hard, it seemed more interesting to do the exact opposite. Cue Martin Short, who was gracious enough to help us create the world’s most obnoxiously lazy spokesperson.” said Zach Watkins, creative director at Preacher.
Founded in 2014, Wealthsimple was one of the first platforms to find market traction with young, high-earning investors looking for more tech-forward investment tools. To date, the company has amassed three million clients across Canada and manages over $20 billion in assets.