Kendall Jenner in the infamous Pepsi ad.
While people are still puzzling over the misguided commercial Pepsi released last week, at least one person involved was willing to talk about how they got involved in the advertising snafu. No, it’s not Kendall Jenner.
An anonymous extra who spoke to People revealed that most of the actors were from Thailand and other countries outside of the United States, and so didn’t necessarily pick up on the symbolism and imagery used in the ad. (The commercial was filmed in Thailand.)
People’s source, a Bangkok-based actor, said, “I don’t live in the U.S.A. Maybe if I lived there and knew the [issues] before then, maybe I would feel bad … But I didn’t know anything, so I don’t feel bad.”
People added:
“People say things to me like, ‘Why am I in the commercial?’ and say that it is really offensive,” he says. “It’s like, I was just doing my job. They asked me to be in the commercial.” He also adds that Pepsi officials discussed the direction for the ad with him beforehand, and he understood it to depict a message of “unity.”
“The commercial had hip-hop dancers and we were all together as humans,” he says. “I think they tried to show the meaning that people from every country can be together. That’s what I had understood, but maybe now I’m misunderstanding.”
