In memory of Mel Smith: Wispa ads from the 80s
Comedian, writer and director Mel Smith, who was best known for his roles in Not the Nine O’clock News and Alas Smith and Jones died yesterday of a heart attack, aged 60.
Smith featured in early ads for Cadbury’s Wispa in the 1980s, alongside Griff Rhys Jones, his sparring partner on Alas Smith and Jones, as well as Peter Cook.
The ads, created by Gold Greenlees Trott, appear more like sketches where the Wispa is the main character, as opposed to a promotion.
In 1996, following the launch of Wispa Gold, Jones starred in an ad for the product, also created by Gold Greenlees Trott, which used footage from the old ad to show him talking to his younger self.