Cliff Freeman, advertising guy.
Among his credits: “Where’s the beef?”
In 1984, Wendy’s was looking to differentiate its burger, the modestly named Single, from McDonald’s Big Mac and Burger King’s Whopper. Research found that the Wendy’s Single patty was larger than the patties of the Big Mac and Whopper.
Working with the director Joe Sedelmaier, Mr. Freeman created separate commercials, one with three old women and one with three old men, scrutinizing the fluffy hamburger bun before seeing the tiny patty inside. The breakout version was the one with the women, specifically the squawky octogenarian Clara Peller, who demands to know where the beef is.
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Mr. Freeman was still at Dancer Fitzgerald a year later when he wrote another popular Wendy’s commercial, which promoted the chain’s breadth of food choices by parodying the lack of choices in Soviet society. In a faux Russian fashion show, a heavyset woman struts on a runway, modeling the same shapeless dress for day wear, evening wear (accessorized with a flashlight) and swimwear (with a beach ball).
Mr. Freeman said it was his favorite ad, in part because of the response.
“The entire Russian government protested it,” he told The Wall Street Journal in 2003. “How much more reaction can you get than that?”
I know it is advertising, and I know my sense of humor is sometimes lowbrow, but I think that’s one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen on television. (I’m also a sucker for jokes about Communism.)
He also did commercials for Little Caesars, Outpost.com, and Fox Sports.