That’s a fun, cross-generational matchup with two charismatic stars (plus Darnell Appling, who also appeared in Challengers). They illustrate the brand’s playful side and work to broaden its appeal.

Zendaya launched a partnership with the Swiss sportswear company last month. Federer’s retired, so no more Wimbledon titles for him. (Surely, eight’s enough.)

Though Rog still hits London occasionally—with Amazon footing the bill.

Anne Hathaway’s got a best actress Oscar on her mantle. Roger Federer ranks among the greatest tennis players ever, with a record eight Wimbledon wins on his resume.

This pair packs serious star wattage. So, it’s no surprise they get peeved at the shoddy treatment they receive at the hands of Switzerland’s tourism board in a funny, effective film from Wirz BBDO.

Titled “No One Upstages the Grand Tour of Switzerland,” the two-minute spot opens in a screening room. Anne and Roger ostensibly view a new tourism campaign, and they’re displeased with the results.

That’s because the ad-within-an-ad (not a real commercial, obvs) only shows the celebs in panoramic long shots. We’re talking very long shots, in some cases filmed from miles away, focusing on the nation’s majestic landscape and scenic beauty. The endorsers appear as specks far below.

Anne: Can you see anything?
Roger: I’m not sure.
Anne: We look like ants.

A flaky French director insists, “We have a masterpiece on our hands,” as the grousing continues.

Anne: I just feel like, you can’t…
Roger: …see us.
Anne: Yeah, that.

Jokes fly about glaciers, parkour and Federer’s abs. Anne complains in Swiss-German. (“Chum jetzt!”). In an inspired bit, Roger turns to a seemingly random American who sits nearby, scarfing down snacks, for some clarity.

Roger: Tony, you knew about this?
Tony: I knew the Furka Pass was beautiful. But not that beautiful!

Meet Tony Godsick, Federer’s real-life manager, whose sublimely slovenly schtick nearly steals the show. But not quite. Because “No One Upstages the Grand Tour of Switzerland.” (So Monty Python-esque. You almost expect a red-cassocked Michael Palin to storm in. Ah well, wrong country anyway.)

You can actually book a Grand Tour, by the way. It’s a suggested 1,020-mile road-trip that covers 22 lakes, five alpine passes and 13 UNESCO World Heritage sites. Here’s a Roger-bot’s take on sights and attractions folks might enjoy. (We can trust him—he’s Swiss!)

The spot, directed by Bryan Buckley—who’s work includes Monster’s iconic “What I Grow Up”—makes its point in winning style. Anne and Roger deliver big laughs as they tout Switzerland’s natural wonders and stir up wanderlust for travel-starved folks who’ve spent much of 2020 and 2021 locked down or curtailing vacations.

Roger returns from last year’s campaign, “No Drama,” in which he memorably failed to convince Robert DeNiro to join him in promoting Swiss tourism. (In the new spot, Anne name-checks “Bob” early on.)

Deservedly hailed as one of the best travel ads in recently memory, “No Drama” drew more than 100 million views across all platforms. So far, “No One Upstages” seems on a similar trajectory, approaching 40 million peeps on YouTube in less than two weeks.

Wirz felt “some pressure, to be honest,” in following up “No Drama,” agency co-CEO and creative lead Livio Dainese tells Muse. “But we love the challenge, don’t we?”

“Roger was a bit intimidated in the beginning by the skills of Anne. But she made him feel very comfortable. With Anne, you immediately see why she won an Oscar. Every take was spot on. She varied her lines with a precision and ease that sometimes made me forget I was on the set to work and not to watch.”

CREDITS

Switzerland Tourism:
Martin Nydegger – CEO
André Hefti – Chief Marketing Officer
Martin Pally – Head of Campaigns
Daniela Chiani – Campaign Manager
Pascal Bloch – Visual Concept Manager
Oliver Nyffeler – Head Productions
Dominic Stöcklin – Head of Media
Natalie Schönbächler – Marketing Distribution Manager
Monica Danuser – Campaign Manager
Felix Pal – Storyteller
Stephanie Ackermann – Trainee, Marketing
Marie Jaquet – Social Media Content Manager
Monika Häfliger – Social Media Content Manager

Wirz:
Creative Team:
Livio Dainese
Alain Eicher
Johannes Raggio
Luigi Vitiello
Artur Faria
Jannic Mascello
Björn Bippus
Adrian Busse

Erasmo Palomba – Agency Producer
Kathrin Jesse, Julia Ewers – Strategy
Cosima Lang, Laura Saner – Storyline
Petra Dreyfus, Ria Breitenmoser, Nico Keramaris – Consulting
Thomas Peller, Yussef Serrat, Corinne Räber, Oliver Fäs – Media Realization

Stories:
Bryan Buckley – Director
Gary Shaw – Camera
Yves Bollag, Matt Buels – Executive Producers
Anna Fueter, Matthew Lefebvre – Producers
Florian Nussbaumer, Hannah Stone – Line Producers
Cabin Editing Co. – Offline Edit
Beacon Street Studio – Music
Rascal Post – Online Postproduction
Lennart Ritscher, Visualeyes International Artists – Photographer
Harvest Digital, Hamburg – Photo Post

Sir Mary:
Fabian Habisreutinger – Partner, Strategy Director Media & Data
Vanessa Habisreutinger – Partner, Director Marketing Technology
Katharina Günther – Senior Media Consultant)
Marion Nicolaus – Head of Media Operations & Intelligence
Eticus Rozas – AdTechnology & Programmatic Manager
Maurizio Rugghia – Founder, Managing Partner

Punk priestess Patti Smith serves as a brand poet for RIMOWA luggage, versifying about the transcendent lure of travel in ads with kindred spirits LeBron James, Rihanna and Roger Federer.

All four A-listers appear in the anthem film below, with Smith, a longtime RIMOWA customer, reciting her poem “Never Still,” composed expressly for the campaign.

That’s a long way from Patti’s raw, erotically charged Carter-era stylings. But her acclaimed books and raucous albums belong to a bygone day. In the :90, she journeys from her coastal retreat to Manhattan. She passes One Fifth Ave., where she posed for the iconic Horses LP cover, and Electric Lady Studios, which birthed generations of sounds that shaped the popular culture.

At 74, Smith has clearly mellowed—but she can’t be selling out, because that concept doesn’t exist anymore. It’s lost in the mist, stranded on an island back in 1979. Besides, even aging, ageless rebels need luggage sometimes. Might as well pick something stylish to transport those toothbrushes, tank tops and copies of On the Road.

It’s notable that RIMOWA and creative partner Anomaly Berlin put Patti at the center of the campaign, and her participation has generated considerable attention. She’s in basically every media headline (see above!), upstaging her mega-famous co-stars for the most part. That speaks volumes about the power of Smith’s enduring legacy, forged pre-internet and nurtured with unflinching artistry and integrity. (Indeed, her personal story dovetails with the campaign’s theme, “No one builds a legacy by standing still.”)

“Patti is the one voice with the authenticity and gravitas to truly bridge that gap and help us usher in the next chapter of travel,” Anomaly creative director Sebastian Lyman tells Muse. “She embodies the ceaseless spirit in all of us. Travel has always shaped her work and her perspective. She’s seen it all, everywhere, and yet she still has this relentless hunger to experience more, to create more.”

Smith and the other subjects get solo spots, too. Rhianna’s contemplative take, set in the desert and directed by the singer herself, feels particularly on-point.

The stuff’s classy and a tad pretentious, like the German luggage maker’s luxe bags themselves. A world away from predictable celebrity travelogues, the work packs breakthrough potential.

“The world doesn’t need another typical advertising anthem,” Lyman says. “We knew when we started talking to Patti that it was her voice and her words that could really express our collective hope toward getting back out there. This was a rare opportunity to co-create a true piece of art with one of the world’s greatest writers and poets.”

He continues: “The collaboration with Patti was one of the most special experiences of my life. We talked a lot about the message, our perspective on travel, and the idea of her story, which depicts the journey from the stillness of Rockaway to the bustle of NYC—a symbolic return to life. Eventually, we developed a narrative framework and general arc for what we wanted to tell the world. Then Patti went off and penned the poem that you hear in the film.”

Individual lines will appear in various locations in coming weeks, Lyman says, “from projections on the Berlin Wall to tables at Café de Flore [a classic Paris coffee house, frequented by writers and intellectuals] to wild postings in the heart of NYC.”

Here’s the full poem:

CREDITS

RIMOWA
Emelie de Vitis: Chief Marketing Officer
Tania Delamotte: Senior Marketing Manager
Yannis Henrion: Senior Global Art & Creative Manager
Samantha Garrett: Head of Global PR
Lorenzo Garizio: Creative and Content Manager
Julia Serafin: Digital Marketing & Media Manager

Anomaly
Sebastian Lyman: Creative Director
Justin Fly: Creative Director
Omar Khairy: Copywriter
Julia Saumande: Creative Project Manager
Ashley Mini: Account Manager
Elizabeth Asselin: Account Director 
Anneliese Rapp: Strategy Director
Matt Bunting: Communications Strategy Director
Belén Jerez: Business Affairs
Margit Sauk: Senior Producer
Eric Kim: Junior Producer
Simon Owen: Partner, CEO

Anthem
Karim Huu Do: Footage
Jonas Lindström: Footage
Philippe Tempelman: Footage
I AM HERE: Footage
Monika Lenczewska: Footage
Paul Ozgur: Footage
Nicolas Karakatsanis: Footage
Pat Scola: Footage
Julian Klincewicz: Footage
Eira Wyn Jones: Footage
Kevin Pham: Footage
Patrick Golan: Footage
Paul Herrmann: Footage
Moritz Matlick: Footage 
Scott Butzer @Cabin Editing: Editor
Tim Masick @Company 3: Colorist
Jamie XX: Music Composer
Wenke Kleine-Benne: Sound Design / Mix

Rihanna
Gray Sorrenti: Director / Photographer
Layla Nemejanski: Producer
Marilou Daube: Videographer
Jeremiah Shuff: Editor
Tim Masick @Company 3: Colorist
Jamie XX: Music Composer
Arc Lab Ltd: Stills Retouching

LeBron
Jonas Lindström: Footage
Philippe Tempelman: Footage
Monika Lenczewska: Footage
Pat Scola: Footage
Julian Klincewicz: Footage
Patrick Golan: Footage
Paul Herrmann: Footage
Moritz Matlick: Footage 
BWGTBLD GmbH: Production support
Iconoclast GmbH: Production support
Scott Butzer @Cabin Editing: Editor
Tim Masick @Company 3: Colorist
Jamie XX: Music Composer
Wenke Kleine-Benne: Sound Design / Mix
Hanna Moon: Photographer
GLAM Productions: Production Company
Frank Roller: Executive Producer
100Berlin Creative Retouching: Retouching

Roger
Karim Huu Do: Footage
Nicolas Karakatsanis: Footage
Julian Klincewicz: Footage
Eira Wyn Jones: Footage
Kevin Pham: Footage
Patrick Golan: Footage
Paul Herrmann: Footage
Moritz Matlick: Footage 
BWGTBLD GmbH: Production support
Iconoclast GmbH: Production support
Scott Butzer @Cabin Editing: Editor
Tim Masick @Company 3: Colorist
Jamie XX: Music Composer
Wenke Kleine-Benne: Sound Design / Mix
Hanna Moon: Photographer
WA GmbH: Production Company
Walandi Apoussidis: Executive Producer
100Berlin Creative Retouching: Retouching

Patti
Steven Sebring: Director
Paul Park: DOP
FireShot Productions: Production Company
Robert Mulligan: Executive Producer 
Chandler Clarke: Producer
TJ Sansone: Assistant Director
Percio Luciano: Assistant Camera
Annette Vetere: COVID Safety Specialist
John Osterman: DIT
Scott Butzer @Cabin Editing: Editor
Tim Masick @Company 3: Colorist
Jamie XX: Music Composer
Wenke Kleine-Benne: Sound Design / Mix
Steven Sebring: Photographer
FireShot Productions: Production Company
100Berlin Creative Retouching: Retouching

De Niro: “You’ve got your mountains, your ski resorts, your charming little towns, your green valleys. There’s no drama. No drama at all! … I’m a certain kind of actor. I need an edge—conflict jeopardy. Switzerland is just too perfect!”

Bob drops an F-bomb and suggests profanity would spice up a Swiss tourism commercial. (Fuck, yeah!) But Rog has his own script ideas.

Federer: “How about the two of us on this special mission? We ski down the slope…”

De Niro: “What? We’re skiing down a slope together?”

Federer: “We go sky diving…”

De Niro: “Come on…”

Federer: “…then we land on these fields, and the cows are grazing…”

It’s an offer the D-Man can readily refuse.

Some ad watchers have zinged Federer through the years for his wooden acting. (These are narrow-minded, self-important people cut by their middle-school tennis teams!) Here, however, Roger is perfectly cast and fires nothing but aces. De Niro’s De Niro, cantankerous throughout, the perfect comic foil.

Both GOATs knowingly lampoon their respective good-guy/bad-ass images, generating 90 seconds of Alpine delight, capped off by a Tom Hanks joke. Burn! (Or, in this case, Bern!)

“No Drama” ranks among the top tourism ads in recent memory. It cannily communicates that as travel resumes worldwide, Switzerland offers charms to restore heart and soul after so much Covid drama.

“We wanted to find a story that allows us to bring across our undramatic message,” Wirz BBDO creative chief Livio Dainese tells Muse. “So, we came up with the idea to partner gentleman sportsman Roger Federer with Robert de Niro, the godfather of dramatic movies. Fortunately, both loved the idea.”

The team shot each star separately, “first Mr. De Niro in New York, and then Roger Federer in a beautiful chalet in the Swiss mountain village of Zermatt,” Dainese says. “Roger and Robert talked about the whole film beforehand, of course. They also came up with their own ideas—as you can see when Mr. De Niro decided to wear his beautiful home office shorts.” (Yeah, you can’t unsee that.)

Federer proved to be quite down to earth, says Dainese.

“We were all busy preparing on the shooting day, and suddenly this guy appears and says, ‘Hi, I’m Roger.’ No 20 assistants, no limousine, no whatsoever. Roger just walked from his hotel room straight to the location. See, that’s how safe it is in Switzerland!”

Indeed, no drama at all.

CREDITS

Switzerland Tourism:
André Hefti (Marketing Director), Martin Pally (Marketing Manager), Dominic Stöcklin (Head of Social Media), Pascal Bloch (Visual Concept Manager), Daniela Chiani (Project Manager), Alexandra Weber (Head of Digital Marketing), Markus Berger (Head of Corporate Communications)

Wirz BBDO:
Livio Dainese, Alain Eicher, Johannes Raggio, Jannic Mascello, Elise Smidt, Elena Gabriel (Creation); Cosima Lang, Laura Saner (Storyline); Erasmo Palomba (Agency Producing); Simone Jehle, Janna Löhr (Consulting); Rahel Signer (Media Implementation); Pumpkin Film (Film Production); Sonja Brand (Executive Producer); Julia Illig (Producer); Nicolai Monberg (Edit); Martin Werner (Direction); Manuel Ruiz (NYC), Jan Mettler (CH) (Director of Photography); Ballad (Music and Sound design); Per Kasch (Photography); BaconX und Südlicht (Image Processing)