Who's Hawking What? Trivia Quiz

Answer: GEICO

It's 2016 and actor/rapper Ice-T sits outside in a yard where kids are selling lemonade. As people walk by they all comment "Ice-T"? The kids reply, "lemonade". Finally, Ice-T gets annoyed and looks up from his newspaper and says to a passer-by "Lemonade - read the sign!" The product here, as you might NOT imagine, is GEICO Insurance.

The tie-in, though somewhat obscure is "Ice-T at a lemonade stand, surprising; what's not surprising is the money you can save by using GEICO". I guess this is how Ice-T (Tracy Lauren Marrow) relaxes when he's not NYPD Detective Fin Tutuola on "Law and Order: SVU".

Answer: Paul Masson Wine

Orson Welles (1915-1985) was considered a "wunderkind" and innovator in the field of motion pictures. He was an actor, producer, writer and director (long before Woody Allen and Warren Beatty). He worked in radio ("War of the Worlds"), on stage and in films.

His 1941 movie "Citizen Kane" is considered a classic. How sad it is that younger people may only remember this remarkable man for his gray beard, his large size and his deep voice pitching Paul Masson California wine. The tag line in 1979 was "We will sell no wine before its time."

Answer: Priceline

Kaley Cuoco, from TV shows like "Charmed", "8 Simple Rules" and "The Big Bang Theory", is playing William Shatner's daughter? That's the premise of the 2013 Priceline commercial which lets us know that the "Priceline Negotiator" left his daughter at a monastery twenty years earlier so she could learn the art of deal making. Was the training successful? Do you care? In the Priceline commercials she is billed as "the next generation of negotiators".

Answer: Lincoln

Actor Matthew McConaughey has changed from a simple 'rom-com' hunk into a serious and distinguished Oscar-winning performer for "Dallas Buyers Club" (2013). He was also nominated for an Emmy for "True Detective", a show which began airing in 2014. It is no wonder that the Lincoln Motor Company sought him out as a spokesperson, and speak he did.

However, his ramblings were so annoying and unproductive that the company decided the new commercials would continue to use McConaughey, but the spokesman would not speak.

He just appears and allows the product to do the talking.

Answer: Calvin Klein

Anyone still remember a 12-year-old Brooke Shields who appeared in the 1978 Louis Malle film "Pretty Baby" where she played a child prostitute? Hard to believe, isn't it? She went on to star in the movie "Blue Lagoon", attended Princeton University, starred in a TV sitcom "Suddenly Susan" from 1996 to 2000, and was even married to former tennis star Andre Agassi for a time.

But in between all of this, Brooke was also a model and appeared in ads in 1981 for Calvin Klein jeans, where she told us that "Nothing gets between me and my Calvins."

Answer: Hertz

Before the Ford Bronco, while O.J. Simpson was still a famous pro football star in 1975, he told us to "Let Hertz put you in the driver's seat." Hertz, founded in 1918, is the largest car rental company in the United States. Actually, the Hertz slogan, "Hertz puts you in the driver's seat", was first used in 1959.

It was Hertz who started the trend of using Black athletes to promote their brand, and in one ad, Simpson is seen running through an airport over and around obstacles when he says: "Hertz, the super-star in rent a car".

Answer: Arby's

In 2016, a commercial for the fast food chain Arby's began appearing on TV with an unseen deep voice saying "We have the meats." The voice sounded so familiar to me that I had to check it out. Was it James Earl Jones, no? It is, in fact, the action movie star Ving Rhames! Rhames has appeared in movies like "Pulp Fiction" and "Mission Impossible", but his greatest moment was, perhaps, at the 1998 Golden Globe Awards when he won for the HBO miniseries "Don King: Only in America". Through tears, this 'tough guy' gave his award away to one of his opponents, Jack Lemmon. What a moment!

Answer: Polaroid

While Mariette Hartley was never a 'big star', she was very recognizable. Mariette was born in 1940 and began appearing on television shows in the early 1960s, e.g., "Ben Casey", "Peyton Place" and "Star Trek". In the 1970s, she showed up on "The Bob Newhart Show", "Gunsmoke", "Columbo" and many more. Finally, in 1983, she got her own starring vehicle opposite Bill Bixby on the comedy program "Goodnight, Beantown" (1983-1984). Continuing on for the next 30 years, in 2016 she was featured in the indie drama "Three Days in August".

In between, in 1983, she and James Garner played a married couple showing off the new Polaroid Sun camera.

Answer: Nationwide Insurance

Even while he was still playing professional football, Peyton Manning found time to be spokesperson for quite a few products. Among them, MasterCard, Sprint and, of course, Papa John's Pizza. But the commercial that keeps me humming is the one for Nationwide Insurance, "Nationwide is on your side." In 2014, Peyton takes the Nationwide tune and applies it to his everyday life while singing (among other things) "Chicken parm you taste so good."

Answer: Depends

The sweet "girl-next-door" actress, June Allyson (1917-2006) starred in many films in her long career, including the 1949 version of Louisa May Alcott's "Little Women" and "The Glenn Miller Story" in 1953. She was born in the Bronx as Ella Geisman and had an eighteen year marriage to actor Dick Powell.

As she got older, roles got scarcer. She became a widow and turned to alcohol for solace. But June managed to turn her life around and became spokeswoman for Depends undergarments 'for bladder control protection'.

In 1989, she advised us to "Get back into life with Depends."

Answer: Isuzu

You may remember David Leisure as Charley Dietz, Dr. Harry Weston's neighbor on "Empty Nest" from 1988 to 1995. From 1986 to 1990, and again from 1999 to 2001, Leisure played Joe Isuzu, the liar, trying to sell Isuzu cars and trucks. How successful were the commercials? Have you heard of them lately? They left the U.S. market and went back to operations in Japan. David has not been inactive since; in 2009 he was on the soap opera "The Young and the Restless" and, the following year, he got a role as a D.A. on "Days of Our Lives". Real trivia note: he was the 'First Krishna' in the 1980 comedy "Airplane!".

Answer: Mr. Coffee

In the early 1970s, Vincent Marotta created Mr. Coffee, a machine that made coffee at home. It was a brand new product but it was beginning to catch on. What they needed was a familiar, respected spokesperson to put it over in a big way. Somehow, in 1978, Marotta was able to meet with the shy Joe DiMaggio and talk him into pitching the product.

In the ad, Joe simply said "Mr. Coffee with 'coffee saver' brews delicious coffee fast and it saves coffee too". Simple, straight-forward, honest salesmanship...anyone remember that?

Answer: Quaker Oats

Thick mustachioed Wilfred Brimley is an actor who has been in films like "The China Syndrome", "The Natural" and "Cocoon". He was also one of the stars of the TV show "Our House" from 1986 to 1988. In 2010, he was in Liberty Medical commercials discussing his diabetes. But, way before that, in 1988, he appeared in a Quaker Oats commercial sitting around the dining room table at breakfast with his 'family'.

It is here that he presents us with the slogan: "Quaker Oats, it's the right thing to do".

Answer: Hanes

Former basketball superstar Michael Jordan has been spokesman for a great many products, e.g., Gatorade, McDonald's ads with Larry Bird, and Nike. In 2006, after his second retirement, Michael started appearing on Hanes clothing ads, particularly for Hanes T-shirts.

He didn't really speak so much as knowingly watch people with other t-shirt brands being driven crazy by the tags. The message: "Go tagless". "Hanes comfort, it's a beautiful thing."

Answer: Jello

While no sponsor is looking for an endorsement from Bill Cosby anymore, he was once a big TV star who was the primary spokesman for Jello and Jello Pudding Pops, among many other products, e.g., Coke, Del Monte and Ford. In fact, as late as 2011, Cosby won the 'President's Award for Contributions to Advertising' from the Advertising Hall of Fame. "There's always room for Jello", even if you can't say the same for Bill Cosby.