He’s known to millions of TV viewers as the boneheaded Uncle Eugene. But Canadian actor and writer Levi MacDougall has created a near-legendary man among dumb men of Canadian advertising. And there are lots of dumb men in the contest. Uncle Eugene sells Rogers wireless service by embarrassing himself as the only jerk in sight who isn’t with Rogers. The grand-daddy of his blundering appearances is the visit to the Telecommunications Museum (above). Eugene (Levi) is there with his nephew who humiliates his uncle in front of a large cast of characters. Anna Hardwick (second from left) is the slightly contemptuous guide who can’t believe that anyone could still receive the Internet over a phone line. Eugene is outed by his nephew for just this stone-age conduct. Mortified, Uncle Eugene clumsily beheads a mannequin staged as an old-fashioned phone operator and draws further disgust from cool guy Jamie Spilchuk (right) who is always there to show up Eugene for the dope that he is. Spilchuck has been MacDougall’s second banana in several commercials. We particularly like the one where he aces out MacDougall for a chance to pick up the cute girl trying to find the address of the ballet school down the street. Faster search on his Rogers phone, you see.
