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Jake Gyllenhaal is the new face of a Calvin Klein fragrance, an incredible piece of news for anyone who is paying careful attention to fragrance marketing or to the life and times of the greatest actor of our generation.
In the first ad, Gyllenhaal plays the romantic partner of model Liya Kebede and is implied to be the father of four-year-old actress Leila. You could, if you wanted, interpret this as a small joke about a series of viral blog posts from the last month, all of which repackage a vague Gyllenhaal quote about his dream of someday being a father into a high-stakes narrative of “Jake Gyllenhaal wants a baby right now and he’s basically taking volunteers! Line up ladies, and what are your SAT scores and genetic predispositions?”
The press release for Eternity describes Gyllenhaal as an Academy Award nominee (true) and BAFTA winner (true), as well as the star and producer of the recent film Stronger, which “opened to rave reviews” (true, and it was particularly well-reviewed by the web’s one and only Jake Gyllenhaal newsletter). Something the press release for Eternity neglects to mention is that Jake Gyllenhaal — currently an adult man poised to win an Oscar and trying medium-hard to become a parent — used to be an angsty early twentysomething who was constantly lounging around on the floor in white button-downs and low-rise denim, often exposing his Calvins. In fairness, it’s probably just kind of hard to keep your Calvins hidden when you are young and hot and rich and incredibly bored and sleepy and hot and not near a chair.
Was this propensity of Jake’s the reason he was selected as the face of Eternity? I have no idea, I don’t care, and it’s been a fun morning of Google Image searches for me. Congrats, Jake!