Original campaign (1986–1989)
The campaign, created by Jim Bennedict[2] and Peter Coutroulis, was created for Southern California McDonald's franchisees by Los Angeles advertising firm Davis, Johnson, Mogul & Colombatto, for a budget of around US$500,000 1986. Looking to increase the dinner business, the agency was inspired by the song "Mack the Knife" by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, made famous in the United States by Bobby Darin in 1959. The agency listened to different versions of it before opting to create an original version with new lyrics. After deciding not to feature real people, the designers settled on an anthropomorphic crooner moon on a man's body with 1950s-style sunglasses, playing a grand piano atop either a floating cloud or a giant version of the namesake Big Mac sandwich. The song and style were designed to appeal to baby boomers as a revival of 1950s-style music in popular culture, and to garner a "cult-like" following akin to Max Headroom.[3]
From 1986 to 1987, the campaign expanded to other cities on the American West Coast. McDonald's said that the campaign had "great success", while trade magazine Nation's Restaurant News announced that it had contributed to increases of over 10% in dinnertime business at some Californian restaurants. A crowd of 1,500 attended the visit of a costumed character to a Los Angeles McDonald's. With concerns that he was too typical of the West Coast, in February 1987, it was decided that the character would feature on national advertisements, which aired that September. He attracted a crowd of 1,000 in Boca Raton, Florida. A September 1987 survey by Ad Watch found that the number of consumers who recalled McDonald's advertising before any other doubled from the previous month, and was higher than any company since the New Coke launch in 1985.[3]
Doug Jones performed Mac Tonight for 27 out of the 29 commercials from 1986 to 1997.[4] In 2013, he recalled "that's when my career took a turn that I was not expecting. I didn't know that was a career option."[5] Mac Tonight's voice was provided by Brock Walsh.[6] Director Peter Coutroulis, who had won a Clio Award for a previous campaign for Borax, pitched several advertisements which did not air, including a "Spielberg-like" production inspired by E.T., in which two astronomers watch Mac Tonight drive his Cadillac through the sky.[3]
In 1989, Bobby Darin's son Dodd Mitchell Darin alleged that the song infringed upon his father's trademark without prior permission. Darin filed both a lawsuit and an injunction for the song to be removed from both TV and radio ads.[7] As a response to the lawsuit, McDonald's stopped airing the advertisements.
"They thought that I had co-opted his father’s singing style, and they filed suit for infringement of likeness. Specifically, my vocalization was apparently the issue. To me though, Bobby Darin wasn’t the imprint on that song. I was more influenced by guys like Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles and Louis Armstrong — Louis Armstrong was known for this song, too.
That brought the gravy train to a grinding halt. I do think, though, that this lawsuit coincided with the downturn of Mac Tonight ads as effective marketing anyway. I think McDonald’s looked at it like, 'Do we really want to fuck with this? Isn’t it easier to just cut and run from the whole thing?' So that’s what they did. It’s cool, though. It’s a business. I get it.
I think they tried to change the song for a bit, but it just didn’t work. Mac was done soon after that.[8]"
In 1996, Mac Tonight appeared in an ad that aired only on the West Coast.[8] Between 1997 and 1998, McDonald's sponsored NASCAR Hall of Famer Bill Elliott with Mac Tonight featured on his car.[9] In 2016, the Mac Tonight theme was McDonald's driver Jamie McMurray's Chip Ganassi Racing No. 1 Chevrolet SS throwback scheme for Darlington Raceway's Southern 500.[10]
Southeast Asia (2006–2010)
In 2006, McDonald's brought back the character in territories throughout Southeast Asia such as in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, and China. The Asian-exclusive campaign featured an animated Mac Tonight dancing atop a McDonald's restaurant while singing and playing a saxophone.[11] These ads were made by Liquid Animation.[12]
The "Mac Tonight Mad Dash" competition was hosted on July 24, 2007, and broadcast in the Philippines, where 24 pairs of contestants had to race to visit McDonald's locations to solve puzzles.[13]
