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What? An ad that tries too hard? But there's no such thing. Or is there?

Yes, there is.

I have long been fascinated by this common mistake. We see it often in print advertising which tries so hard to stop and startle the reader that it fails to communicate.

I've learned this is also a familiar problem in baseball. The harder a player tries not to fail, the more he fails.

New York Times columnist David Brooks made a special study of the matter recently and devoted a whole column to it.

“Baseball is one of those activities in which the harder you try, the worse you do,” he wrote. “The more a pitcher aims the ball, the wilder he becomes. The more a batter tenses, the slower and more tentative his muscles become.”

This ad for Keep a Child Alive wants to knock the ball out of the park but instead hits it foul.

Perhaps what every agency needs is a creative coach who will stop by the cubicle now and then and say soothingly, “Take it easy, champ. Don't try so hard to win an artistic achievement award. Just give us an ad that clearly and persuasively promotes the advantages or benefits of the product or service to people most likely to buy it.”

It was not necessarily and entirely the fault of the creator(s). The problem began before that. Somebody got the bright idea of dolling up show-business celebrities as Africans to express their empathy with Africans suffering from AIDS. And then came the next bright idea: Why not do a series of ads asking for public support, each ad featuring a different celebrity photo?

In itself, this was not a terrible idea.

But then the heavy hand of brand advertising makers designed a master ad for the series and it was decreed that each ad in the series must be forced to agree.

This is a common sin I have pointed out before. The copy/art team had a great idea for a powerful message, but couldn't use it because it didn't fit the preordained format.

Now comes the art director who tried too hard. Class, I direct you to the title of your textbook, Colin Wheildon's classic guide “Type and Layout: Are You Communicating or Making Pretty Shapes.”

In this case, the art director or someone directing the art director wanted a pretty, startling poster fit to hang in the Museum of Modern Art.

So it was dictated that no copy should be allowed to interfere with the art-photography head shot except for the “headline” “I AM AFRICAN.”

It was decided that the name of the featured celebrity would be hidden in tiny white type at the very top.

Then under the “headline” appears what might be called body copy, in all caps, justified, and in white type: “HELP US STOP THE DYING. PAY FOR LIFESAVING AIDS DRUGS THAT CAN KEEP A CHILD, A MOTHER, A FATHER, A FAMILY ALIVE. VISIT KEEPACHILDALIVE.ORG TO HELP.”

Good telegram. Just making the photo a little smaller to provide room for setting this copy in larger type would have gone a long way toward making the ad more effective. However, it still would've violated my smorgasbord-copy rule for providing the prospect as much or as little necessary information without crowding the ad.

But as it is, the ad is just a novelty to be merely glanced at by readers paging through Gourmet Magazine, where I found it.

Even those who don't spot the line identifying the subject as the multitalented Briton Alan Cumming (or who do spot it but don't recognize his name) might merely think, “Hmm…who is this freak? And what is he trying to tell me?”

OK, so I exaggerate a bit to make my point. But you see what I'm getting at.

Furthermore, this is one of those ads that (if you have nothing better to do) makes you stop and wonder what it's trying to say.

Admittedly, it would take only a split second for the savvy reader to figure out that the headline and adorned face means “I am being addressed by someone who identifies with suffering Africans.” But it also takes only a split second to glance at an ad like this and turn the page.

In my makeover, I wanted, as usual, to remain true to the original intent while improving clarity and appeal. (I didn't think it would be fair to throw out the whole celebrities-as-Africans idea and start from scratch.)

I decided to try to accomplish three things:

1. To do a better job of displaying and explaining the headline.

2. To show and clearly identify a number of the sponsoring celebrities in order to broaden their overall appeal. Thus a reader who's not familiar with Alan Cumming but adores Richard Gere or Gwyneth Paltrow might be more attracted and motivated by seeing them among the sponsors.

3. To provide a “smorgasbord” of information and persuasion about the “product,” so that readers can help themselves to as much or as little as needed to be encouraged to respond.

When I was all done, I found that I had some doubts about the basic premise implied in the headline and explained on the Web site. Namely, that we should want to save dying Africans because some of our remote ancestors were African. It's a bit of a stretch. It would seem just as reasonable to assume that we human beings should all want to help each other because we are our brother's keeper or all part of the family of man.

I thought of a nifty campaign which would call for flying these celebrities to Africa and photographing each of them hugging or holding the hand of an African child. But (a) that would be beyond my mandate, and (b) it would also be beyond the Makeover Maven's limited powers of illustration.

Or how about a series in which each ad features one of the celebrities talking to the reader about what “Keep a Child Alive” means to him or her? As a leadoff, ex-supermodel Iman, born in Somalia and wife of David Bowie, would say (as recently quoted):

“[Why am I involved?] First of all because I am an African and I have seen the continent being ravaged and ravaged and ravaged through the years. Unfortunately, this year AIDS is celebrating its 25th anniversary. Twenty-five million Africans have died, 60 million people around the world are infected with AIDS and 40 million are living with HIV. The death toll is one problem, what it's doing to the economic structure is another problem. We're losing all our children.”

A series like that might be my first choice. But maybe it wouldn't be trying hard enough?

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THOMAS L. COLLINS (thomas.l.collins@verizon.net) has been a direct marketing copywriter, admaker, agency creative director and co-author of four books on marketing. He is currently an independent creative and marketingconsultant based in Portland, OR.

Find more Makeover Maven columns at http://directmag.com/opinions-columnists/makeovermaven/.