Sexy Scarlett Johansson Super Bowl ad draws a flag for taunting

A new ad featuring a sexy Scarlett Johansson is slated to run during the Super Bowl — as long as it gets one significant tweak. Advertiser SodaStream has to take the words right out of ScarJo’s mouth.

No, not the ones in the beginning where she says, “Like most actors, my real job is saving the world” before touting the ecological benefits of the product. Not the ones in the middle where she wishes, “If only I could make this message go viral.” Rather, it’s the part at the end, where she says, “Sorry, Coke and Pepsi.”

(The parts where the soda straw lingers suggestively on ripe lips while her bedroom eyes lock their gaze on the camera will apparently remain intact.)

Perhaps, with Pepsi sponsoring halftime and Coca-Cola’s message likely to be seen in more than one commercial, Fox was uncomfortable letting the little guy poke the bears?

All this comes after SodaStream’s 2013 ad, showing exploding Coke and Pepsi bottles, was flat-out rejected by last year’s Super Bowl broadcaster, CBS, according to Ad Age. So much for the company’s plan to take on the big boys directly — though they did release the ad online anyway.

Daniel Birnbaum, chief exec of SodaStream, told USA Today that the company will indeed drop the line from the spot, but not happily. “If I could get my money back, I’d be happy to be out of that deal,” he said. He also said the ad wasn’t intentionally set up to get rejected so they could capitalize on the “ban” publicity.

In a behind-the-scenes video, Johansson said she enjoyed doing the commercial. “Just being able to do something that’s flashy and eye-catching, it’s fun,” she said. “It’s something I normally don’t get to do. It’s a whole new world.”

She also said she and the brand came together organically, as she was already using the product on her own.

But that brand affiliation hasn’t been without bumps in the road even before the clash with Fox, so much so that Johansson took to the Web Friday to explain why she would partner with an Israeli company that operates a factory in the West Bank settlement of Maale Adumim.

That’s right, by becoming the global face of SodaStream earlier this month, the actress found herself smack in the middle of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and at odds with Oxfam International, a charity with which she’s been working since 2005 and for which she’s been a global ambassador since 2007.

Learn more about that brouhaha at World Now, which has all the details.

Anyway, you can see the unedited ad above — and then expect a little more Johansson, and a little less taunting, in the spot that airs Sunday.

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