Hunter S. Thompson’s Edgy 1990s Commercial for Apple’s Macintosh Computer: A Meditation on Power

Con­trary to what the past decade’s TV com­mer­cials may indi­cate, Apple’s adver­tis­ing hasn’t always been so tepid and gener­ic. Before the era of the much-lam­pooned “I’m a Mac and I’m a PC” com­mer­cials, which starred Justin Long as the chilled out Apple com­put­er and John Hodg­man as the shame­ful­ly square PC, the com­pa­ny cul­ti­vat­ed an icon­o­clas­tic image. Who could for­get the rad­i­cal 1984 com­mer­cial where Apple slammed 1980s con­for­mi­ty, or the “Think Dif­fer­ent” cam­paign, where Jobs waxed lyri­cal about the “crazy ones, mis­fits, rebels and rule break­ers?” No sur­prise, then, that Apple decid­ed to bur­nish its rebel cre­den­tials by hir­ing none oth­er than the father of gonzo jour­nal­ism to star in one of its TV spots.

Above, you can view Hunter S. Thompson’s brief “Pow­er is” Apple com­mer­cial. The ad seems to date to some point in the 1990s; at least, that’s what the whirl­wind of cuts, odd­ly angled shots, shaky cam­er­a­work, and edgy gui­tar riffs seem to sug­gest. The commercial’s premise appears to be that Thomp­son both knows what pow­er is, and how to use it to stick it to The Man.

Pre­sum­ably, sim­ply hav­ing Thomp­son in the ad gave Apple enough coun­ter­cul­tur­al cachet, since he nev­er men­tions either the com­pa­ny or its prod­uct. This may have been the result of pre­vi­ous griev­ances: accord­ing to leg­end, the jour­nal­ist had received a Mac from the edi­tors of the San Fran­cis­co Exam­in­er in the mid-1980s, in hopes that the gad­get would help him trans­mit his peren­ni­al­ly late copy to the paper on time. Despite its many fea­tures, how­ev­er, the Mac couldn’t stand up to Thompson’s tem­per (he was known to lose his cool when deal­ing with elec­tron­ics). In a fit of rage, Thomp­son blew the machine to smithereens with his shot­gun, and sent the remains to his edi­tors. Pow­er, indeed.

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via Kottke.org

Ilia Blin­d­er­man is a Mon­tre­al-based cul­ture and sci­ence writer. Fol­low him at @iliablinderman, or read more of his writ­ing at the Huff­in­g­ton Post.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Hunter S. Thompson’s Har­row­ing, Chem­i­cal-Filled Dai­ly Rou­tine

Hunter S. Thomp­son Calls Tech Sup­port, Unleash­es a Tirade Full of Fear and Loathing (NSFW)

John­ny Depp Reads Let­ters from Hunter S. Thomp­son (NSFW)

Hunter S. Thomp­son Remem­bers Jim­my Carter’s Cap­ti­vat­ing Bob Dylan Speech (1974)