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Bike to work, skip the burger, switch to solar—there are plenty of everyday changes that could begin to chip away at global warming. But at what point does the intensifying crisis seem far too massive for mere mortals to tackle?
And how is any of this funny?
A startup called Plonts, makers of fermented faux cheese, found a way to inject some humor into the weighty subject, hiring actress-comedian Kate Berlant to lead its first marketing campaign, a surreal and twisted take on the Sisyphean myth.
The 60-second spot, from creative studio Easy Pete’s, also jabs unsubtly at corporate greenwashing while challenging the traditional ad norms in the plant-based category. Plus, it has laser beams, infomercial flair and murderous cheddar.
“It’s never fun to think about civilization crumbling,” said Zach Tavel, co-founder of Easy Pete’s and the ad’s director. “But we were considering this existential burden we all feel and wondering if it was something we could collectively laugh about.”
For inspiration, creatives pulled from Greek mythology, which Tavel called “the original absurdist comedies.”
In the hero spot, Berlant’s character is a stand-in for the all-powerful Zeus, looming large over Sisyphus and gleefully breaking the fourth wall.
Berlant’s long-suffering costar, meanwhile, pushes a massive wheel of Plonts cheese up an ancient-looking mountain, “symbolizing the futility in believing that adopting a plant-based diet will save the planet,” she says in the video.
The team used old-school techniques like miniatures and models, with an assist from London-based animation studio Blinkink, to illustrate the unofficial tagline, “melting cheese for a melting planet.”