Go on, get up, get out! You know you’re walking on air when it’s Throwback Thursday!
And I’ve fallen in love with comments and praise!
Before I begin this week’s trip into the archives, I wanted to share some “viewer mail” I received from a reader just recently. He messaged the blog’s Facebook account with a word of thanks, as it had some personal nostalgia.
Hi Allison. I want to thank you for finding this commercial. I am the actor in it. I looked everywhere, even contacted the company but no luck. Where did you find it? You can add detective to your resume.
The commercial in question was the Francesco Rinaldi commercial from 1988 (original article: Ciao, #ThrowbackThursday Rinaldi!) featuring Kaye Ballard as Caterina Ballotta as the mother-in-law who is unhappy with her daughter-in-law Martha’s pasta sauce.
The comment came from the “son” in the commercial, who gets the “Dead Italian Grandmother Revenge” for saying Francesco Rinaldi Spaghetti Sauce is better than Grandmother’s sauce.
The actor in the commercial is Thomas Forgione, and he’s a New Jersey native. And apparently he is cursed for life by his Dead Italian Grandmother. Because dropping a whole tomato on one’s head from above is a curse when you’re Italian.
I informed Thomas that the commercial itself came from a WPIX block in the late 1980s, a local institution of growing up in the tri-state New York/New Jersey/Connecticut area in the 1970s and 1980s. He thanked me for the find, and helping him rediscover his acting role!
All in a day’s work, friends.
A big thank you to Thomas for your comment and praise, and thank you for giving us this amazing performance! I’m always out to uncover those hidden little gems anywhere I can!
Anyway, on to Throwback Thursday and this week’s dip into the archives!
This week, we’re in 1998, and the theme is gettin’ dressy! Today, we’re getting ourselves dressed up in style, catchy music, and comfy shoes.
Do you remember the Big Band/Swing craze of the late 1990s and early 2000s? I do! The style transcended popular music in the late 1990s, and carried over into the commercials we watched too. Today’s commercial is one I was looking for in my collection for awhile now, worthy of being featured. I feared it either lost or a hallucination. Thankfully, it fell into neither category. It was part of a larger commercial block in a previous Throwback Thursday, but I’ve always liked the catchiness of the commercial, with its vibrant image and oh-so-1990s trendy shoes. Those chunky heels are everything late 1990s, and we all owned shoes like this. I know I did!
It’s the funkiest fifteen seconds you’ll watch all week!
Established in 1987 in Edison, New Jersey, Aerosoles focused itself on designing and manufacturing trendy, high-end women’s shoes that obtained the perfect balance of affordability and comfort. But by the fall of 2017, citing the ever-changing market and consumer tastes, the company filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy, resulting in closures of seventy-four retail stores nearly all of its brick-and-mortar locations, and instead focusing on e-commerce and its international an wholesale businesses.
As of this writing, Aerosoles are still manufactured, still catering to women, and having plenty styles to fall in love with.
This commercial, a fast fifteen seconds in length, capitalized on the trend of swing music in the 1990s. The trend had found its way back in 1989, creating a fad of “neo swing,” and had reached its peak by 1998. Clubs in California offered lessons and sets for jazz bands. Bands and music were featured in mid-1990s films. Commercials like Aerosoles “Fall In Love” were one of several marketing campaigns to take on the trend at the time. The Gap, Guinness, Aerosoles, even Buick’s year-end sales for 1998 mentioning swing. 1998 was the year for it, and after that, well, the trend wasn’t getting roses from admirers anymore.
And soon enough, chunky late 1990s-early 2000s shoes became a product of the same time period.
And for a brief time, both trends were worth “falling in love” over!
We’re sticking with 1998 – and swing as a marketing strategy – with tomorrow’s commercial from the archives.
You’re gonna fall in love with this one too!
But until then, have a great Throwback Thursday!