After months of Covid-19 scares freezing major productions such as “Batman” and “Jurassic World: Dominion,” Super Bowl advertisers largely avoided concepts involving big crowds and exposed locations.
The e-commerce marketplace Mercari said it cast actors who already lived together. A commercial for the sandwich chain Jimmy John’s mostly features the comedian Brad Garrett in scenes by himself (a spokeswoman said that the company wanted to observe pandemic safety guidelines and “be sensitive in portraying anything that would be perceived as out of sync with consumers’ eyes in 2021”).
Rachel Ferdinando, the chief marketing officer of Frito-Lay North America, said that roughly 90 percent of the staffing on its Super Bowl commercials was virtual.