What are the 4A’s? A new video produced by the trade group seeks to answer that question by asking the proverbial “man on the street”–
and that street is Madison Avenue, naturally.
In the video, made to introduce the trade group as an honoree at last week’s International Radio & Television Society Foundation awards dinner, a roving reporter asks “passers by” if they know what “four As” stands for. The most interesting response: “Arkansas Association of Amorous Adults.” Another bystander (shown here), played by adman Jerry Della Femina, is flummoxed. “That’s why I never made it in this business, because I could never put four As together,” he says.
In the video’s punchline, a “stranger” in a trenchcoat, portrayed by 4A’s president Burtch Drake, answers, “Aren’t they the trade association that recently decided to accept advertisers into their membership?” The line is a none-too-subtle reference to the group’s flap with another of the evening’s honorees, the Association of National Advertisers, over the latter’s decision to admit the top 25 agencies. “That guy looks familiar,” the interviewer notes.
–Justin Dini
Spelling Test
