Presenting one of the most audacious and ambitious car commercials ever produced, the famed Chevrolet Castle Rock spot of 1964. Watch this.
In 1964, Chevrolet was the world’s most popular car brand, with more total volume than the rest of the General Motors divisions combined—and a marketing budget to match. By way of advertising, there was nothing the company couldn’t afford to do. Truly, the sky was the limit. The bigger the idea, the better. Take for example the amazing Castle Rock commercial, in which a ’64 Impala convertible was perched atop Castleton Tower, 2,000 feet above the landscape near Moab, Utah.
Conceived by Campbell-Ewald, Chevy’s longtime ad agency, the stunt was executed by the Alexander Film Company, a veteran Colorado Springs production outfit. The Impala was essentially a mockup, flown to the site in three pieces in the sling of a twin-rotor helicopter and assembled in place for the aerial footage. The brave young model was Shirley Rumsey, who wore a safety harness under her elegant gown, while a technician crouched out of sight holding her ankles. In ad lore, it’s said that the helicopter was unable to retrieve them promptly due to high winds, and the two were stranded up there for several hours. Yikes. There’s no business like show business.
For all the tremendous cost and effort, the commercial was aired but briefly. A 1966 print ad in Life magazine revisited the stunt, and Chevrolet restaged the commercial in 1973 as a sort of retrospective. In the original 1964 version, voice of Chevrolet Joel Aldred proclaims, “In a class of its own, it stands alone,” while the camera circles the breathtaking scene. Indeed. Now watch this.
What an interesting piece of advertising history. I wonder if Chevrolet Division of General Motors assigned and affixed a serial number plate to the A-pillar of the left door jamb of the red “mock-up” 1964 Impala Chevrolet convertible. I doubt we will ever know. Thanks to Mac’s Motor City Garage for this post.
Home Run MCG !!
It’s posts like this and the Executive Briefings that keep me coming back.
As I recall, that ad won a bunch of awards. Alexander Film did a lot of TV advertisements for GM. They got their start in videos making short ads to be run in movie theaters. They were also responsible for the “Let’s all go to the snackbar” vid’s we all watched as kids before the movies started. But the original reason they opened shop in Colorado Springs was to manufacture airplanes. The Alexander Eaglerock was a very successful airplane in the 1920’s & 30’s.
If I were the model, I’d being more comfortable if I knew I wasn’t sitting in something hastily patched together on a narrow and windy mountain top. And what of the assemblers? She just had to sit there, they had to manhandle a coupe of big pieces into place and make it look like a complete car.
It’s not even a very inspiring commercial, just zooming in and out of a long shot. Perhaps because it was so hard to photograph without blowing the girl off the top of the car. The red sort of blends in with the mountain and it is probably worse with the B&W tv that most of us had.
Fisher body? I have never quite understood this. Is Fisher a different company assembling the cars or just a GM assembly plant?
The same with GM engines, I have heard of McKinnon plant, reputedly in 1970 the most powerfull 300hp 350s. Does anyone know?
And this add really does nothing for me,, it is WHY. Chevys belong on roads, or at least places they can drive the cars too.