In the battle over the longest-running role in ad industry Captain Kirk has put the smackdown on Fat Albert.
They are two men you rarely see in the same room together let alone the same TV spot, but William Shatner and Bill Cosby recently battled it out for top banana of television commercials.
Shatner just celebrated his 10th anniversary with the online travel company Priceline.com and has now eclipsed Cosby (who remarkably was up for the same role) as longest running pitchman for a name brand company. Priceline execs say the former Captain Kirk beat out the former Cliff Huxtable because he was more “futuristic,” and because “anyone holding a credit card aged 18 to 95 had heard of William Shatner and knew who he was.”
Shatner has come a long with the company. You’ll recall his first TV spots included performing pop hits like “Bust a Move” in a low-key lounge-lizard style. The televised ads soon became a cult hit and were regularly mocked on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.” The notoriety propelled Priceline from a virtually unknown brand to a top-tier company with “extremely high brand awareness,” according to the marketing folks at Priceline.
But, the online travel company wasn’t the only one whose popularity rose thanks to the ad campaign; Shatner also gained renewed recognition that eventually led to a role on ABC’s “The Practice,” which segued to a role on the spin-off, “Boston Legal.”
So far the 76-year-old Shatner has played the role of Priceline spokesman for far longer than the four years he spent as Captain Kirk on the original “Star Trek” series, and he says he’s doesn’t intend to stop anytime soon.
In the new Priceline spots, Shatner plays “The Negotiator,” a superhero summoned when a customer needs help.
Off screen Dane Cook also made his way into the record books just as 2007 was ending. The comedian broke a Laugh Factory endurance record set less than a month ago by Dave Chappelle.
Cook told jokes at the Sunset Strip comedy club for 7 hours, beating the record Chappelle set at 6 hours and 12 minutes in early December.
Patrons who came in on a Tuesday night stayed until nearly 7 a.m. the next day to watch Cook break the record. And they were rewarded for their loyalty, reports say at one point Cook sent out for food to keep the audience fed and happy.
The laugh-a-thon all started last April when Cook set a record with his act lasting 3 hours and 50 minutes, breaking a mark set by Richard Pryor in 1980 of 2 hours and 41 minutes. Chappelle then broke Cook’s record later that month, and then broke his own record in December.