You can tell that advertising is truly successful when you’re thinking about a product without even realizing you’re thinking about it. Like when you hum the Pepto-Bismol theme while doing the dishes or robotically enunciate the “better ingredients, better pizza” slogan as you open the Papa John’s app (a pizza chain with a mean gluten-free crust option). Maybe it’s not the catchphrase you remember, but the advertisement itself. We can still remember these ’90s beer ads for a reason. Yet, when it comes to this vintage commercial, both the catchphrase and the ad itself are memorable, even if we can’t always place the product at the center.
This now-iconic Alka-Seltzer commercial premiered in 1969 and featured an Italian couple in the kitchen trying a plate of fresh spaghetti and meatballs. But the catch is that the commercial is a commercial within a commercial. The actor does repeated takes, exclaiming, “Mamma Mia! That’s a spicy meatball!” while a director repeatedly yells out instructions. It’s not until the very end that the audience sees the main actor, played by Jack Somack, pop Alka-Seltzer in a glass of water to assist with his (presumable) heartburn from those very spicy meatballs. The catchphrase took on a life of its own, standing the test of time and marking a huge leap in the way brands produced narrative-style commercials.
The catchphrase that transcended time was an Alka-Seltzer ad
You’ve probably heard “That’s a spicy meatball” more times in pop culture than you’ve ever noticed, as the reference is sneakily added to everything from commercials to television shows to video games. The 1994 comedy “The Mask,” starring Jim Carrey, features a scene where the main character consumes several sticks of dynamite and remarks, “That’s a spicy meatball,” in a mock Italian accent. In a Season 5 episode of “The Office” titled “Heavy Competition,” Steve Carrell’s Michael Scott eats a slice of pizza from an envelope and exclaims the same in a similarly joking Italian accent. There’s even a nod to the catchphrase in the “Dead Rising” video game, where an Italian restaurant is named “That’s A Spicy Meatball.”
Alka-Seltzer’s 1969 commercial was the brand’s first venture outside of gimmicky cartoon-style commercials, though it didn’t perform very well with audiences. The director of the commercial, Howard Zieff, was a film director who made the commercial feel less like it was advertising a product and more like it was telling a story. Audiences didn’t understand, thinking the commercial was advertising Italian foods, so Alka-Seltzer’s sales actually decreased after the commercial aired. The brand eventually pulled the commercial from rotation in favor of more traditional advertising, but the catchphrase simply stuck.
