<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" Viral videos are kind of like Keanu Reeves&amp;#039;s career \u2013 no one knows why they watch or what it is about them that attracts viewers. But there you are, watching Neo deliver those abnormally flat lines (&amp;quot;There is . . . no spoon?&amp;quot;) for the fifteenth time, just like you&amp;#039;re forwarding &amp;quot;Chocolate Rain&amp;quot; on to your mom because you just know she&amp;#039;ll get a kick out of a such a small kid with such a deep voice! Generally, viral videos succeed because they show us something we&amp;#039;ve never seen before, like 2 Girls 1 cup (unless you&amp;#039;ve spent some time in South East Asian &amp;quot;cabarets&amp;quot;). So when big name celebrities try to get into the act, it undermines the very sanctity of &amp;quot;that no-name girl defending Brittney Spears&amp;quot; or &amp;quot;that no-name guy doing every dance ever created&amp;quot; or &amp;quot;that no-name guy giving his labrador a bath&amp;quot; (maybe we have different tastes). But every so often one of them pulls it off. Through a modicum of self-depreciation and shedding the unmitigated sense of entitlement, they manage to create the illusion that they are, in fact, just like us. Talk about something you&amp;#039;ve never seen before. Making Music with John Mayer Perhaps by virtue of the fact that John Mayer has set the bar so low for success that clearing it amounts to &amp;quot;not being douchy,&amp;quot; this video is pretty terrific. Truthfully though, you have to give him some credit for being so self-effacing. Once you&amp;#039;ve bedded your 1,000 groupie, it&amp;#039;s kind of hard to see past the blinding glare of your own fantasticness. Drunk History with Jack Black      Further proof that dad was right: Everything is better when you&amp;#039;re drunk. Maybe not factually correct, but certainly better. I always thought it was suspect that Ben Franklin would go out in a lightening storm and risk his life just to &amp;quot;discover&amp;quot; electricity. It shouldn&amp;#039;t take a guy who vomits from about five feet up off the bowl to make sense of the story for you. But you know what? It makes more sense than the alternative: that Ben Franklin wasn&amp;#039;t a self-important windbag. Acting with James Franco It&amp;#039;s an exercise in contradictions: Acting? James Franco? But this is what viral marketing is all about -- changing people&amp;#039;s perceptions. So while you would normally sit at home and think, &amp;quot;James Franco couldn&amp;#039;t convince a bear he was dead if he was in the midst of being mauled,&amp;quot; after watching this, at least you&amp;#039;re convinced that indeed anything can happen in green screen: dinosaurs, socks, bottles . . . Movie Promos with Ben Stiller      Unless you finally got that time machine working and traveled back to 1992, you probably didn&amp;#039;t watch the MTV Movie awards. In which case, you missed what may prove to be the best thing about the upcoming film Tropic Thunder. Before I saw this, if you told me you had a video of Robert Downey Jr. going to town on Jack Black&amp;#039;s nuts, I would have chuckled to myself and thought, &amp;quot;That Robert Downey -- he&amp;#039;s full of surprises.&amp;quot; But now I just think that Robert Downey should be bronzed and stored for posterity. The Green Team With Will Ferrell From his George Bush impersonations to &amp;quot;The Landlord,&amp;quot; Will Ferrel has been a pioneer in viral video making. One more barrier broken down? The video rape joke. If you think the video starts out soft, stay tuned. Because it finishes strong. No pun intended. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/videos/a4576/5-best-celebrity-made-viral-videos/>