Ford Motor Company recruited an attractive blonde, a female professional stunt driver, for a hilarious Valentine’s Day video titled, “Speed Dating Prank — 2015 Ford Mustang.” The video is part of the company’s publicity campaign for its 2015 Mustang .
The female professional driver meets separately on a blind date with several men at a Dallas coffee shop. None of the men was told that their blind date was a professional stunt driver.
The men engage the attractive and seemingly demure blonde in typical first date small-talk that some viewers described as “boring chat.”
After the date, she offers the men a lift home in her gleaming 2015 Mustang GT. But unknown to the men, the car had previously been fitted with secret cameras which record the female driver playing the dumb blonde, “admitting” that she does not know how to use her automobile’s stick shift.
One guy swears, “Oh sh**, really?”
Another smiles condescendingly, saying, “Do you want me to drive it?”
One guy tries to coach her as they drive along, instructing her when to shift the gear.
“You might want to shift it again…,” he says patronizingly.
Another offers imploringly, “Let me drive it. I’ll show you what this thing can do.”
As she drives along, she asks the men what they like to “do for fun on a weekend.”
One nerdy-looking guy loves music festivals, plays drums, bass guitars and also loves writing. But then he tries to impress the blonde with an impressive list of outdoor activities, such as bike riding, rock climbing and working out.
One says, “I’m a Ninja.”
“What?”
“I’m a Ninja,” he repeats shortly, casting a furtive glance at his date.
Another says he likes the theater and tries to convince the blonde that he’s a “really well rounded” guy.
Finally, she drives into an empty parking lot, saying, “I’m just going to go over here to turn around.”
But suddenly, she presses down hard on the gas pedal and the car speeds up. She then proceeds to show the men some stunt driving tricks, and soon her tires are literally smoking.
The men are caught on camera, gripping the armrest nervously as the car speeds up.
The guy who first asked to drive the car, grips his armrest and cries, “Are you serious?”
Another, trying to make a joke out of the situation, says nervously, “Why are we going so fast?”
But some of the men realize quickly that she is a skilled driver and their initial nervousness gives way to excitement.
The nerdy-looking guy with a long list of outdoor activities laughs and whoops excitedly. He looks relaxed when the blonde asks him as she spins the car, “So what else do you look for in a girl?”
He answers coolly, “Someone that likes to party just as much as I do.” The he whoops excitedly as the stunt driver executes a smoking high-speed powerslide.
The “Ninja” looks pensive as the blonde executes a spin.
The guy who had been coaching her patronizingly went euphoric, shouting, “Oh yeah baby. That’s what I’m talking about!”
When she stops, he says, deeply impressed, “You just whipped the sh*** out of this car.”
Another guy yelps, “Wow, yeah baby!”
After the wild ride, she lets the men in on the secret of her identity, saying with a smile, “I’m a professional stunt driver.”
She then points to the hidden cameras in the car and explains that the blind date was set up by Ford to mark St. Valentine’s Day.
She asks the man who had offered to show her how to drive the car, “What do you think?”
He says, “So I guess you’re showing me how to drive this thing aren’t ya?”
Another says at the end of the video, “This is like the best first date I’ve been on in my life.”
The video, uploaded to Ford’s YouTube channel “Ford Today,” on February 6, 2015, has been viewed more than 2.6 million times.
According to the website Car and Driver , the video was made by a Detroit-based production agency, The Work.
The Work’s Director Christopher Gruse, said that the female driver’s name is Prestin Persson. She is a Los Angeles-based stunt driver whose mother also is a professional driver.
“Prestin does a lot of car-to-car stuff. She drifts, she does rallies. A lot of what she is able to do we couldn’t because of safety. People in the car had no idea what she was doing. She’s a teacher at Willow Springs.”
To get the men to agree to go on a blind date, they were told they were being considered as contestants for a reality show and that the blind date was a test run for the show.
[Images: YouTube; Car and Driver ]