History Main / Japandering

* Joey from ''Series/{{Friends}}'' is at one point a mid-level daytime SoapOpera star and ends up doing this from an advert for Ichiban Lipstick for Men. The advert is very much a WeirdJapaneseThing: Joey is wearing bright blue lipstick while bright blue animation and dancing schoolgirls interject a number of flash cuts. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2CQTnYcFGg You watch it, you can't un-watch it]].

* Creator/ConanOBrien parodies the concept in a 2009 SuperBowlSpecial [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlmjslPjmek for Bud Light]]. His agent promises him the ad will air "only in Sweden." Later, Conan sees it playing on [[Franks2000InchTV the big screen]] at [[UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity Times Square]] and says to his cab driver "It wasn't me."

* Creator/ConanOBrien parodies the concept in a 2009 SuperBowlSpecial [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlmjslPjmek for Bud Light]].

* Creator/RickAstley, better known for his songs "Never Gonna Give You Up" which became a MemeticMutation craze in the Internet, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgRolIY44vs&ab_channel=TatiIshihara shilled]] for Mitsuya Cider in Japan.

* The series of ads promoting Suntory Whiskey (immortalized in the film ''Film/LostInTranslation'', seen below) used various Western celebrities, including Creator/SeanConnery, Creator/FrancisFordCoppola, Creator/KeanuReeves and several others extolling the virtues of foreign whiskey while mugging for the camera and making complete fools of themselves. Coppola didn't drink whiskey, but he did the Suntory ads with his idol Creator/AkiraKurosawa in order to add additional star power to the commercials and help secure funding for Kurosawa's film ''Film/{{Kagamusha}}'', which Copolla co-produced.

* The series of ads promoting Suntory Whiskey (immortalized in the film ''Film/LostInTranslation'', seen below) used various Western celebrities, including Creator/SeanConnery, Creator/FrancisFordCoppola, Creator/KeanuReeves and several others extolling the virtues of foreign whiskey while mugging for the camera and making complete fools of themselves.

A celebrity may be willing to do certain things because [[MoneyDearBoy of money]], but they'll also have a set of standards for what they'll do. You may think it's reasonable that they have their principles, but you forgot that most successful celebrities sold their principles and sense of shame bundled with their soul and 92-year-old grandmother [[DealWithTheDevil in a package deal]] [[AtTheCrossroads made at a crossroads to a]] [[ManOfWealthAndTaste gentleman of considerable wealth and taste]].

* Creator/JackieChan seems to be doing this in the United States these days.

* Creator/ChrisEvans becomes [[https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/showbiz/chikaminute/778294/is-evans-is-this-telco-s-newest-endorser/story/ an endorser]] for the Philippines telecommunications company, Smart Communications, where he is first shown in a commercial promoting their campaign, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEF4AUXZnWY "Live Smarter for a Better World"]].

* During the 1990s and early 2000s, Creator/LennyHenry featured in a series of adverts for New Zealand butter, in-character as the Series/{{Chef}}. Here's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJfTW50AS9I one of them]] on WebSite/YouTube.

* A series of ads featuring Creator/PaulNewman for the Nissan Skyline became so iconic within Japan that the 1982-85 models (chassis code R30) are still referred to as the "Newman Skyline" to distingush them from earlier and later styles.

* Tennis legend John McEnroe appeared in a 2007 [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdk5gfVvOUQ Telstra advert]] exclaiming one of his trademark phrases.

* GordonJackson of Series/TheProfessionals fame promoted [[https://youtu.be/Er5nhkaS2hk?t=59 life insurance in Australia]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jikr3AQ0RKo cars in NZ]] in the late 1980s.

* During the 1990s and early 2000s, Creator/LennyHenry featured in a series of adverts for New Zealand butter, in-character as the Series/{{Chef}}. Here's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJfTW50AS9I one of them]] on YouTube.

[[folder:Literature]]
* Done in-universe in ''Literature/ThankYouForSmoking''. Celebrities are perfectly willing to shill for cigarettes in overseas markets, just not at home where they've got a reputation to maintain.
[[/folder]]

[[AC:South East Asia]]

* Creator/BruceWillis has done many Japan-only commercials, ranging from the odd (a subdued performance as the husband of a Japanese woman while they admire a Subaru Outback) to the truly insane (the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jR0jdtanubk&feature=related Eneos Service Station]] commercials, which...have to be seen to be believed).

If it ends up on [=YouTube=], it quickly becomes an OldShame, which is why many have it written into their contracts that they can't have it be spread around. Because it is all too easy for these commercials to be leaked onto the Internet nowadays, this is likely on its way to becoming a DiscreditedTrope, if it isn't already. The term itself is a portmanteau of "Japan" and "Pandering".

* In one episode of ''Series/{{Leverage}}'', part of Elliot's cover as a successful baseball player is a (fake) Japanese energy drink commercial that Hardison whipped together.

* American doo-wop revival/a capella group 14 Karat Soul practically made a second career out of this trope, appearing in Japanese spots for Suntory whiskey, among other products.

* Creator/BenAffleck did a L'Oreal ad in the UK that featured the line, "Here comes the SCIENCE!", which got discovered by Website/{{Fark}} and became the TropeNamer (well it defined the form) for HereComesTheScience.

* Public radio star [[Radio/APrairieHomeCompanion Garrison Keillor]] is the voice of Honda in the UK. The ads themselves are dignified (in one ad, however, he cheers on the English football team ahead of a World Cup), but a US endorsement would lose credibility with the anti-commercial fanbase of public radio, and his Lake Wobegon material concentrates on the U.S. rivalry between Ford and Chevrolet.

* Humiliating as it may be to Americans, actors in other countries may consider us to be their "Japan". When the Polaroid SX-70 camera first came out, Creator/LaurenceOlivier made a series of very classy commercials, with the condition that they not be shown in his native U.K.