• by Todd Wasserman , July 26, 2022

Here’s an unconventional pitch for MNTN, the company that bought Ryan Reynolds’ Maximum Effort Marketing last year.

The five-minute long sequence (I hesitate to call it an ad), features Reynolds interviewing Steve-O. As Reynolds says early on, how businesses use MNTN to transform their marketing “sounds like it could be pretty boring,” so he has Steve-O eat a Carolina Reaper, a pepper that has more than double the spice of the ghost pepper at its hottest.

Of course, hilarity ensues in the form of Steve-O continuing to make a sales pitch as he is obviously suffering. But Steve-O manages to make his points about MNTN and show how easy it is to buy on the platform. Periodically, he buttresses his pitch with asides like “my f—ing throat is closing!”

Reynolds then takes over the conventional pitch and then says “OK, let’s go to take 2!”

The ad is really a promotion for Reynolds himself, who seems to have his finger on how to make an effective ad in 2022. We look forward to his next effort, and hope Steve-O is recovering.