BODYMORE MURDERLATTE

Dominic West, AKA Jimmy McNulty, is currently promoting a brand of unremarkable mid-market coffee by reading a book. Spurious. The tagline is "For a more seductive coffe break" - evidence that Kraft Food are aiming this one right between the tiny, piggy eyes of menopausal, book-clubbing laydeez everywhere. Hunky Dominic with his clean shirt and Etonian vowels is seranading our womenfolk.

Watching the ad is hard for me on two fronts. Firstly, as a man, I feel simultaneously threatened by West's smoldering masculinity and sickened by his smarmy, kickable face. Secondly, as a fan of The Wire, this as is akin to walking in on your best friend fellating a Labrador. As soon as I pressed 'play' on the video I felt like I should have been backing out of that tastefully lit, oak wood study as quietly as possible.

Jimmy's reading a book called The Wake. It's just been published so really this is an advert for two products. I hate that Jimmy was complicit in this. If he was back on Westside, Rawls would have his ass for something like this. However, if we are going to be forced to watch actors reading extracts from books to sell products here are a few that I could get behind:



The actor Steven Seagal
Reads from Shoot to Kill: Cops Who Have Used Deadly Force
To flog Rolex watches
Seagal would make a good reader. He has a pleasant squint and in his old age he has become quite the gentleman-scholar. I chose Shoot To Kill because, as an acting officer in the New Orleans Police Department (true) Seagal knows a thing or two about deadly force. Also, Seagal's limited acting skills would not be a problem as, according to the most positive review on Amazon, "most of the stories are not very exciting".

The product link is an obvious one. Watches are worn on the wrist, and who knows more about wrists than Seagal? The print ad could say something like "The last thing Steven sees before he breaks your arm in five places is your watch. Give him something nice to look at."

The actor Chris Latta
Reads from Living the Dream: My Story by Chantelle Houghton
To flog Sheba cat food
If you don't know who Chris Latta is don't panic - you're probably a normal person. Latta, who died a while ago, was the greatest children's cartoon voice-over artist of his generation and the mere invocation of his name is enough to send certain corners of the internet into a paroxysm of orgasmic abandon. Remember how every cartoon in the 80s had at least one character who sounded out of their fucking mind? That was Latta. Lord Darkstorm from Visionaries, Starscream from Transformers, Cobra Commander from GI Joe. The list goes on. Listen to him turn it up to 11 at about the one-minute mark in this.

Just to make his CV even more bullet-proof, Latta chose to make his big-screen debut in what is perhaps the 20th century's most well-regarded film; Roadhouse. He has just one line - but it's a great line, about "touching my girlfriend's tits". If Latta hadn't died in mysterious circumstances in 1994 I think it's safe to say he would be sitting on top of Oscar Mountain at this point.

I've got Latta reading from the only text that can match the violence of the man's voice pound-for-pound. Chantelle Houghton's autobiography as it stands is a completely extraneous blip in the stagnant waters of 21st century pop culture. Read by a man alternating between five different kinds of "evil voice" however, it becomes genre-defining. If it's advertising cat food then it's even better.

The actors Kevin Bacon and Dylan Baker
Reading from Lolita by Vladmir Nabokov
To flog Zovirax coldsore cream

Two of modern cinema's most accomplished on-screen paedophiles join forces to read Nabokov's earth-shaking treatise on sexy children. If you've winced your way through Todd Solondz's Happiness you'll know that Baker has significant "peder-acting" ability. Bacon too, has shown in The Woodsman, that he knows how to kiddie-fiddle it up on film.

Ideally Kevin Bacon would be sitting on Baker's lap, playing with his friend's hair as they take turns reading from a tatty, yellowed paperback. Then occasionally they break off from the text to whisper in each others ears and giggle nervously. As the advert is for cold sore medication both men would have to be clearly suffering from severe oral herpes. When not reading one could apply cream to the others' blisters and open sores.