Who IS that guy?

March 28, 2018 5:09 PM

Please help resolve a long-running question/dispute in my family: who is the lead actor in this Cathay Pacific ad? (YouTube link)

As part of our family agreement not to “contaminate” results here, I cannot give you any guesses or research leads we have. I will say that the debate is over whether this is an actor we recognize from other work.

posted by alligatorpear to Grab Bag (18 answers total)

Would googling "Benedict Cumberbatch" or "Chris O'Dowd" or "Bradley Cooper" + "Cathay Pacific" settle this? Surely if he's recognizable from other work, that would come up with a hit.
posted by Beardman at 5:19 PM on March 28, 2018

Best answer: If no one can answer this, you can definitely get it if you sign up for one of these sites - they both list the ad - AdForum, Colorbus.

He's frustratingly familiar, I agree. Not anyone Beardman listed though.
posted by AFABulous at 5:25 PM on March 28, 2018

Best answer: To save anyone else the search, this page contains a ton of information about this ad campaign, including the agency (McCann), the director (Jonty Toosey), and production company (Great Guns). Unfortunately, there doesn't appear to be any info on that page regarding the actors in the campaign.
posted by mhum at 5:27 PM on March 28, 2018

There are emails for the some of the production company at the bottom of this article, as well as a ton of information that *isn't* the actor's name.
posted by sagc at 5:28 PM on March 28, 2018

Best answer: Oh yes, it's the famous Everyman WhiteGuy. He's sorta like Jason Sudeikis, sorta like John Krasinski pre-muscles, a skinnier Chris O'Dowd, not as conventionally handsome as Rob Lowe, could be the younger, slimmer brother of one Marvel's leading men named Chris. In short, I don't think he's anybody we've seen before. He's a guy trying to make it in acting who booked a great commercial job.
posted by BlahLaLa at 5:44 PM on March 28, 2018 [17 favorites]

He's got a little Mike Rowe in him.
posted by rhizome at 6:06 PM on March 28, 2018

I'm pretty good with faces and I do not recognize this dude at all. I feel comfortable saying that I personally have never seen him in anything before.

BlahLaLa hits on all the close calls. Good looking white guys are fairly interchangeable.
posted by phunniemee at 7:01 PM on March 28, 2018 [4 favorites]

I agree, not famous, looks like Chris O'Dowd and Ralph Fiennes fused in a lab mishap. "Road Warrior" was cast by Belinda Norcliffe Casting.
posted by Iris Gambol at 7:07 PM on March 28, 2018

I play this game a lot with my husband and I’m pretty good at it. (Hallmark channel, anyone?). This guy doesn’t ring any bells but he does remind me of Noah Wylie and a little bit of Dane Cook.
posted by jraz at 7:58 PM on March 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

There is, of course, the possibility that he is not an actor, but an actual frequent customer recruited for the ad.
posted by Short End Of A Wishbone at 12:10 AM on March 29, 2018

He looks very familiar. I'm going to guess he is on/ was on some BBCTV/ITV program. He has that look.
posted by james33 at 5:45 AM on March 29, 2018

When I first saw him I thought of Bradley Cooper. But after watching more he looks like a generic good looking white guy.
posted by tman99 at 6:14 AM on March 29, 2018

"Mr. Harrison"
posted by mdrew at 7:15 AM on March 29, 2018

Best answer: Chris O'Dowd?
posted by orrnyereg at 7:20 AM on March 29, 2018

A lesser known Hemsworth? James Van Der Beek after a really good spa day?

But seriously, that's a good-looking guy with a nice smile who isn't Hollywood famous as far as I can tell.
posted by Squeak Attack at 7:44 AM on March 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Reading a bit more, I think there are probably good reasons to suspect that that actor is not a "name" actor (e.g.: someone you've seen and known before from a movie or TV show). First, the article that sagc links to goes into some depth about not just this particular commercial but around all three of the commercials that make up Cathay Pacific's "Life Well Travelled" campaign and does not mention any of the actors in it by name. Second, that article does mention how in one of those other commercials, they cast an actual family to play the role of a family, so it seems that they're definitely not trying to tie this campaign to any particular celebrity spokesperson. So, if that guy in the "Road Warrior" commercial really was, say, Chris O'Dowd or James Van Der Beek or Jon Krasinski or whoever, then we'd have to accept that somehow: 1) they cast a famous actor but did not use his fame in the promotion of this campaign, and 2) they only used him in one out of the three commercials in the campaign. If I had to bet, I'd bet on an essentially unknown commercial actor.
posted by mhum at 12:49 PM on March 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Best answer: O'Dowd, Krasinski, Van Der Beek and Coldplay's Chris Martin had a baby and it's that guy. Holy crap, what a perfect amalgamation of Everyman. Agreed that he's most likely an unknown hired specifically for his universality.
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 2:37 PM on March 29, 2018

Response by poster: Thank you all! You have made everyone feel vindicated: me for confirming that it’s someone unknown and making all the same arguments I did about why, and my husband for naming several times who he thought it was (Chris O’Dowd). Now no one feels ridiculous.
posted by alligatorpear at 5:17 AM on March 30, 2018