Hop in, everybody!

Bud Light is one of, if not maybe the most popular beer sold in America.  While I’m not a consumer of alcohol, I have a feeling it isn’t because it’s exactly the greatest beer out there.  One thing the boys at Anheuser Busch InBev have done very well over the past three decades, however, is advertise the living hell out of Bud Light… ensuring it is the most recognized brand name in the domestic beer market.  And they haven’t just spammed the airwaves of programming watched by the 18-34 male demographic crowd they so covet with any old spots… the ad men behind Bud Light have utilized many different clever and humorous campaigns over the years.

We’re sold on Bud Light!

One thing which has tied together pretty much every one of the Bud Light advertising themes we’ve seen since the early 90’s is that guys will go to almost any lengths to get a Bud Light, even if it involves the utterly ridiculous.  If the Mars Rover would have found Bud Light plugged in the nostril of the Martian face, you had better believe every twenty-something male in the US would have been lined up at NASA headquarters looking for a seat on the first flight to the red planet…

Even the Martian rats wouldn’t be able to keep dudes away from the Bud Light.

In 1993, Bud Light released an ad in their familiar vein that became instantly popular with viewers featuring a thirsty visitor and a sarcastic limo driver…

There are so many awesome elements in this commercial that helped make it such a big hit… primary among them being the practice of limo drivers holding signs for the people they are supposed to pick up at the airport with the passenger’s name on it.  Without a doubt, these poor drivers had to hear countless bad Dr. Galazkiewicz jokes for years after this commercial aired.  Heck, 8 years after the fact when me and my Dad were flown out to New York for my appearance on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, ABC had a limo pick us up from the airport… and there was the driver at the bottom of the escalator holding up a little sign with my name written on it!  I wanted so bad to ask the driver if he had any Bud Light in the limo…

Given the way he was driving, I’m sure he had already drank it all…

But here we also come to the first odd thing about the commercial.  There are three drivers waiting to pick up passengers, and the man decides to question only the one with the most fucked up name on his sign…

He’d have asked the other two, but Bud Light’s budget only called for two speaking actors.

Being a typical American who can’t handle a word made up mostly of little used consonants, he humorously butchers the name “Galazkiewicz” when he reads it off the card.  I’m not sure if political correctness has advanced enough after two decades to make poking fun at strange foreign names an unforgivable no-no, but then again, I don’t really care.  “Gallyweekich” still cracks my ass up.  And the man’s expression when the driver asks him if he meant that he’s Dr. Galazkiewicz  is also priceless, and an important part of what made this ad a pop culture success.  It also became a hot catch phrase in the mid 90’s.

Yes I am!!!

The driver knows damn good and well this dweeb isn’t really Dr. Galazkiewicz, and gives a sideways glance to his fellow chauffeur next to him, who seems to be enjoying the fact that his rival is dealing with the karma of loading his limo up with Bud Light in the first place.  So despite the fact that this impostor didn’t even know Dr. G was actually a doctor, the driver resigns himself to his role in this ad and takes him to the party limo.

I can play around with all the cool buttons, and yet still make sure everyone in the viewing audience can read the label on my Bud Light!

The fake Dr. G has probably never rode in anything bigger than a Yugo before, and certainly not in any vehicle that had all of the neat features a limousine had.  Crocodile Dundee spent his entire life in the Australian outback, and he wasn’t even as fascinated with our fancy gadgetry when he was taken to New York as this doucherider is with all of the buttons in the back of the limo.  He proceeds to play around with everything he can get his beer-free paw on like he were a 6 year old too big to be restrained in his car seat anymore.  Could you make it any more obvious you aren’t who you claim to be?  The limo driver knows he has totally fucked up in picking up this assclown and is probably going to get fired when the real Dr. Galazkiewicz shows up at the airport and finds out he has to take a dirty taxi to his hotel.  He’s probably planning to “accidentally” leave the back end of the limo out in an intersection with an oncoming semi right about now…

I think I’m going to dump this fool off in the middle of New Jersey.

Even when the driver finally breaks down and sarcastically asks if this is the good “doctor’s” first time in a limo, our Bud Light drinking schmuck has a great smartass reply.

In a limo this small! Now drive on, Jeeves until you come across a sexy hooker for me to share my bounty with!

Like all ads that become overnight successes, the concept behind this commercial was spun off into several other ads featuring the same goofball.  Here’s one where Dr. Galazkiewicz shows up at the Lee Family reunion…

Here’s a cute parody CBS did for the 1994 NCAA Men’s Basketball Final Four using the commercial’s two original actors and centered around Duke University’s legendary Coach Krzyzewski as the unpronounceable name…

So let’s grab our bottles of Bud Light and make a toast to the unknown, yet unforgettable Dr. Galazkiewicz… without whom this funny ad from the 90’s would have never been possible.  We hope that after 20 years, he did finally find another ride to his hotel… but if not, I hope he enjoyed spending the rest of his life at the airport like Tom Hanks did…

I’ve got food, bathrooms, escalators, and all the free groping and cavity searches I could ever want by the TSA. Why should I ever leave here?