TV

JB Smoove Hosts World’s Best Commercials Special

Celebrate advertising's cream of the crop with this one-hour special highlighting the best commercials of 2012    

Credit: NBC

Stand-up star JB Smoove can’t “curb his enthusiasm” as host of The CLIOS: World’s Best Commercials

Curb Your Enthusiasm’s JB Smoove Hosts The CLIOS: World’s Best Commercials

If there’s one thing Mad Men has taught us, it’s that the advertising industry has harnessed some of the most clever, creative minds on the planet to sell us stuff we don’t need. Not only was this true on Madison Avenue during the 1960s, but it’s still going on right now all over the world. 

For proof, check out The CLIOS: World’s Best Commercials, a one-hour special that compiles award-winning TV commercials that are highly effective advertising vehicles but can also be seen as little works of art in their own right. 

Comedian JB Smoove (best known as Larry David’s hilarious houseguest Leon Black on Curb Your Enthusiasm) serves as host, presenting more than 50 of the year’s top commercials from countries including the U.S., Australia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Argentina and Finland. 

Big-time Celebrities Show Up in World’s Best Commercials

Viewers will also recognize a number of familiar faces — and, in some cases, familiar voices. Although many actors are loathe to be seen as sell-outs by shilling in North American TV commercials, they’re more than happy to appear in commercials that will air outside the U.S., which allows them to build up their bank accounts while maintaining the illusion that they’re retaining their artistic integrity here at home.

As a result, the highlighted commercials feature such actors as Kevin Bacon, Will Arnett and Jason Bateman, and sports figures such as NBA greats Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird. 

As always, comedy figures heavily in the winning commercials, which include the world’s most talented goldfish, an office worker with an unhealthy obsession with swords and a family who extol the virtues of their new minivan — by rapping. 

JB Smoove’s star is on the rise in the world of comedy, and he’s a natural at keeping things moving with his unique brand of between-commercials banter in what promises to be an entertaining and funny hour. 

One word of warning, however: don’t be surprised if the next time you watch TV, you find yourself actually watching the commercials instead of fast-forwarding past them.

The CLIOS: World’s Best Commercials airs Wednesday, July 25 at 8 pm on NBC.

Originally published in TVW. For daily programming updates and on-screen Entertainment news, subscribe to the free TVW e-newsletters, or purchase a subscription to the weekly magazine.