Grannies Go Wild, Jackass-Style, as Liquid Death Intros Iced Tea

Why grow old gracefully when you can behave like a Jackass instead?

A bunch of comically naughty, violent grannies bring that devilish dream to the masses for canned water kingpin Liquid Death. Their antics introduce a line of iced teas with names like Grim Leafer, Armless Palmer and Rest In Peach. Each contains 30 calories, agave and caffeine.

In a wild film below, elderly troublemakers—actually, friends of the brand in drag—raise unholy hell. You’ll see crazed takes on MMA, punk rock, parkour … and an incendiary (probably NSFW) rooftop sequence that ends with one hell of a bang.

The Monty Python troupe famously portrayed bad-apple grannies. Was that an inspiration, perhaps?

“We grew up on Monty Python and Jackass, so it’s no surprise we made an homage to some of our heroes,” Liquid Death VP of creative Andy Pearson tells Muse. 

More to the point, he explains: “Tea has been around for thousands of years. In fact, most people probably see it as something their grandmas drink. With that little kick of caffeine, it’s almost like the original energy drink. Ironically, most of the tea that’s on the market today is packed with caffeine and sugar. As a health beverage company, we set out to make a killer iced tea that didn’t come with all the unhealthy junk–something your grandma would probably even approve of.”

In the end, the concept boiled down to “taking all the stuff energy drinks try to own and just remaking it with grannies instead.”

As for offending folks with questionable content, well, Liquid Death’s never fretted over that before, so why start now?

“Everything in comedy is ripe for being used for a good-natured laugh,” says Pearson. “No one got mad when Dana Carvey played the Church Lady on SNL. They just laughed. This is really more of a commentary on the ridiculous nature of energy drink marketing.”

Fair enough. But Church Lady didn’t shoot fireworks from her nether regions. Not yet, anyway.

“We love our older fans and feature them in our content all the time,” Pearson says. “Just a month ago, we announced that we were bringing the Godmother of Drumming Dorothea Taylor on as a brand ambassador. She rules.”

“Our audience is anyone who appreciates humor and entertainment,” he continues. “The iced tea category is massive, but it’s also been incredibly dull for a long time. Just like with water, we see this as our chance to get in and shake things up–from a marketing standpoint, a health standpoint and an environmental standpoint.”

Brand VP, marketing Greg Fans appears as the grandma hanging out the car window. Also on hand: skater/MMA fighter Jason Ellis, indie rocker Jen Razavi, comedian Shapel Lacey, skater Dane Burman and Liquid Death co-founder/CEO Mike Cessario.

SFX/makeup maestro Tony Gardner—the dude behind the Chucky doll and Daft Punks headgear—created the masks, while Jackass co-creator Jeff Tremaine directed.

CREDITS

Co-Founder/CEO: Mike Cessario
SVP of Marketing: Dan Murphy
VP of Creative: Andy Pearson
VP of Marketing: Greg Fass
VP of Design: Franke Dresmé
Creative Director: Will Carsola
Executive Producer: Johnny Eastlund
Senior Producer: Tatianna Rodriguez
Senior Campaign Manager: Tia Sherwood
Director of Program Management: Lia Alberti
Associate Creative Director: Stu Golley
Editor: Tyler Beasley
Senior Nihilist: Brendan Kelly
Production Coordinator: Emily Draznik
Production Manager: Cookie Walukas
Director: Jeff Tremaine
Director of Photography: Wyatt Troll
Executive Producer: Shanna Zablow
Camera Operator: Dimitri Elyashkevich
Camera Operator: Jackson Montemayor
Prosthetics: Alterian
Prosthetics Lead: Tony Gardner
Production Company: Gorilla Flicks