In the early 1990s, Rich McCormick was one of several hundred young Marine lieutenants at The Basic School in Quantico, Virginia, when he was interviewed to appear in a new recruiting ad.
The Marine Corps was looking for “the most steel-eyed, square-jawed Marines they could find,” joked McCormick, now a Republican member of Congress from Georgia. The commercial would also require a Marine to perform Sword Manual Procedures.
As it happened, McCormick had been a drill team commander in college, and he was ultimately cast. The commercial that McCormick was selected for was “Chess,” one of the most memorable recruiting commercials in Marine Corps history. (Perhaps only surpassed by the ‘Lava Monster.’)
“It was a great moment of pride,” McCormick told Task & Purpose. “It was something you feel like you want to tell the whole world about because it means that much to you. There’s no more pride that you can feel than representing something you hold near and dear to your very being of how you define itself.”
An epic tale
The ad features giant chess pieces that come to life and music reminiscent of “O Fortuna,” making it feel like a scene from the movie “Excalibur” about King Arthur. A white knight in full armor becomes a one-man wrecking machine, slaying three bad guys in gladiatorial combat and finally taking the opposing king prisoner.
As the knight raises his sword in the air, his blade is hit by lightning, and he is transformed into a chiseled, square-jawed Marine, who shows off his Sword Manual skills in his Dress Blues.
That was McCormick.
The commercial was also shot inside the same warehouse as the climactic fight scene in the movie “Highlander” between Connor MacLeod and the Kurgan, McCormick said.
The end scene was shot several times from different angles, while McCormick drew on his experience with the drill team, when he was graded on every single precision movement
“There’s a certain set of things: Heels on line; do not move; eyes locked straight forward; shoulders back; chest out; stomach in — all the things you do when you’re a typical Marine in an inspection,” McCormick said.
The white knight was played by a stuntman, who broke his ankle in the shot where the horse rears up so lightning can strike the sword, McCormick said.
“Probably a good thing I wasn’t on that because I was in the middle of training,” said McCormick, who later appeared in three episodes of the CBS show “American Gladiators,” a show in which contestants had to race through a series of physical challenges.
Showing Marines as tough and smart
“Chess” was one of several recruiting ads in the 1990s that used a hero’s journey to become an elite warrior as a metaphor for the grueling training needed to become a Marine, said Capt. Andrew Wood, a spokesperson for Marine Corps Recruiting Command.
These ads were meant to capture the imaginations of young people and inspire them to think about what it meant to earn the title of a Marine, Wood told Task & Purpose.
“Chess addressed an image problem the Marine Corps wanted to solve, which was a common misconception that physical strength comes at the expense of intellectual capability,” Wood said. “Marines aren’t just ‘tough, elite warriors,’ but ‘tough, smart, elite warriors.’ The use of chess as a backdrop enabled the Marine Corps to maintain its emphasis on battle and warrior ethos, but also introduced the intellectual component required to be a Marine. ‘To compete, you’ve got to be strong. To win, you’ve got to be smart.’”
With the smallest advertising budget of all the military services at the time, the Marines were trying to produce “blockbuster” recruiting commercials meant to “cut through the clutter” and leave a big impression, Wood said.
“Chess was later recognized by Adweek as one of the ‘25 Most Epic Ads’ of all-time,” Wood said. “Any cursory search online will reveal a host of comments posted by people claiming, ‘This is the one that got me to join!’ or validating Adweek’s assertion of the caliber of this ad.”
“It will forever be part of what defines me”
McCormick was commissioned as a Marine officer in 1990 and served in the Corps until 2006 as a CH-53E Super Stallion pilot, according to the Marines. He left the Corps as a major, went to medical school, and transitioned to the Navy, where he became an emergency medicine physician. He deployed to Afghanistan in 2016 as the head of emergency medicine at Kandahar Airfield, and retired the following year as a commander.
In 2022, McCormick was elected to Congress as a Republican from a district just outside Atlanta, Georgia. He is a member of the House Armed Services Committee.
McCormick described seeing himself in the commercial as a surreal experience and said his mother kidded him by asking why he didn’t smile during his scenes.
Following the commercial, McCormick became a “semi-celebrity” within the Marine Corps, he said, adding that Marines are tremendously proud of their service and that every Marine would love to have the opportunity to be the face of the Corps.
“You’ll find more Marine stickers on the back of cars than every other service combined, even though we’re the smallest service,” McCormick said. “You always value things that you work hard for, and you’re not going to work harder for anything than being a Marine.”
Many years later, McCormick said the experience “will forever be part of what defines me.”