Mama Nature is be-yooo-diful

The video above is an ad from Keep New Zealand Beautiful (KNZB) , an organisation whose purpose is pretty self-evident in their name, with a special emphasis on ending littering (similar to Keep America Beautiful). The ad is part of a series of ads designed to get Kiwis to stop littering. It’s also among the most over-the-top ads we’ve had in awhile.

The ad stars New Zealand-born Samoan actor David Fane as Mama Nature. He’s been in far too many rolls to list in this post, but I’ve seen most of them. All of the spots created can be viewed on KNZB’s site on the resouces page (scroll down to “Mama Nature Resources”).

An article in the New Zealand Herald explains the purpose of the ads:

Mama Nature was developed by KNZB to encourage Kiwis to do the right thing with their litter including disposing of it in the bin, taking litter home when a bin isn't available and picking up litter they come across.

This ad does that, obviously, but clearly not everyone gets it. Someone who must really fun at parties left a comment on YouTube:

Beyodiful is as bad as spelling congraDulations. Kids these days are already failing at reading and writing so why keep showing them ways how to not spell? The real spelling is under that, sure, but since the wrong spelling is above that and bold then guess what the kids are going to look at first and ignore the other?

To which someone correctly replied (without pointing out the mispelling in the comment they were replying to):

You're missing the point. The spelling reflects the kiwi accent—that's how 'beautiful' is pronounced here. Writing it out as 'Be-yooo-diful' is a nod to drag culture and Mama Nature. Seeing it spelt that way in print will make everyone say it the way she's done in the video, which is just clever marketing. The organisation is still called Keep New Zealand Beautiful and that spelling won't change, so no one's corrupting the kids here.

Apparently humour really doesn’t translate.

I like this ad and its quirky New Zealand humour. I don’t know if these ads will make Kiwis more conscientious about putting litter in the bin, but I it’ll certainly make them say “be-yooo-diful”, and that at least creates a chance for the larger message sink in. Anyway, that’s what Mama Nature hopes.

And, you never want to disappoint your Mama!