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Lady Liberty may be massive, but she’s modest. You can’t say the same for David Beckham, who’s putting his impressive manhood, well, smack in our faces.
Starting today, his package will be seen all over Manhattan, courtesy of 10-foot-high gleaming statues of the Brit in his H&M-branded underwear. It’ll make you wonder why his famously sullen spouse, Victoria “Posh Spice” Beckham, never smiles.
To go along with its statue promotion, H&M is unveiling a print and billboard ad campaign starring the sexy soccer player and his family jewels.
The statues’ larger-than-life size, along with the revealing ads, is making parents hot under the collar — in all the wrong ways.
“I wouldn’t want my kids to see him looking like that,” says Sarah Kramer, 40, a Lower East Side mom who has a 4-year-old daughter and a baby boy.
“We all know that sex sells, but this is way over the top. When your wide-eyed preschooler is pointing to [Beckham’s] briefs and saying, ‘What’s that, Mommy?’ you’re struggling to find the right answer!”
New Yorkers and tourists alike won’t be able to avoid the statues, which are being installed in areas such as the South Street Seaport, the Flatiron District and Fifth Avenue at 59th Street as well in stores.
And it seems the athlete/celebrity with the whopping $3 million LA Galaxy contract, four cute kids and a pop-singer-turned-fashion-designer wife, can now add “controversial move” to his list of accomplishments.
One p.r. expert shown advance shots of the soccer ace in his latest campaign for David Beckham Bodywear briefs, long johns and tank tops says they look tacky and fake.
“H&M should be embarrassed,” says Manhattan marketing veteran Donnetta Campbell, founder of the communications and entertainment firm TheBarnYardGroup and a mom of five children ranging in age from 15 to 22. “I can’t imagine what the marketing team is thinking for the brand and its customer base.” And the sculpted briefs, she notes, are “strange-looking. It looks like an alien porn shot, and you’re thinking, ‘Is that all him?’ ”
For her, Beckham’s sex-god status has gone limp. He doesn’t know how much is too much, and needs to put it away.
“It’s tacky,” says Campbell. “You wonder why he had to go that far. I could understand if he was just starting out and needed the attention, but he’s a long-established star, and it’s not like he needs the money. I could see a reality-TV person like The Situation doing it — it’s very ‘Jersey Shore’ — but not David Beckham.”
In a press release regarding the statues, H&M says “style icon” Beckham “represents a unique opportunity for the retailer to offer millions of male fans and consumers an accessible yet stylish line of bodywear.”
The latest ads come six months after Beckham — father of Brooklyn, 13; Romeo, 9; Cruz, 7; and their 1-year-old sister, Harper — told a reporter that his three oldest kids begged him to stay clothed in public after seeing the first set of H&M ads in the UK and the US in February.
“They were like, ‘That’s really good, but everyone’s going to see you in your [underpants],’ ” Becks told the Mirror. “I definitely do walk around the house in my underwear, but not naked. With the boys it’s not a problem because they’re naked all the time, but with a little girl now, it’s different.”
Lilian Venezia, a mom of three teen daughters who lives in Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, certainly wishes he would zip it. She says the images, shown to her by The Post, look “unreal” and “absurd.”
“I don’t have a son, but I wouldn’t want young men to think what makes you successful in life is the size of your [genitals],” says the 50-something nurse practitioner. “I would rather they appreciate his strength as one of the world’s greatest athletes.
“Who on Earth is telling Beckham that he looks great in the pictures? He must be blind to the ridiculousness.”
Ad Age, the industry journal of the Mad Men crowd, is equally unimpressed.
“Certainly there is a publicity play there, but I’m not entirely sure whether it’s going to sell any underwear,” says reporter Natalie Zmuda. “It’s going to get a lot of attention like his [raunchy] Super Bowl ad [with lingering shots of his prowess], but people are pretty skeptical, and saw through that.”
Since a large number of fashion brands, such as Calvin Klein and Victoria’s Secret, have rolled out risqué advertisements, she adds, the shock factor is no longer so effective.
“People are a lot more desensitized these days,” says Zmuda, who points out that Beckham’s Super Bowl commercial performed best among women over the age of 50 — not the targeted demographic.
But not everyone believes the latest ads are a flop. One p.r. guru says it’s a win-win for H&M and the star.
“It’s very impact-oriented, edgy stuff, which H&M sells, and is consistent with his image,” says Brian Dobson, who is based in Ridgefield, Conn. “At the Olympics opening ceremony in London, he was in a speedboat along the Thames — and people loved it.
“The ads correspond with his youthful, hip fan base. Yes, he’s a dad, [and other fathers] might be hesitant to pose like that, but not him.
“He has that tough, ‘You ready for me?’ kind of look, and it’s very
New York.”
Dobson reckons there’s another reason Beckham wants to portray himself as a somewhat cheesy sex symbol.
“Soccer fame tempers, but entertainment and celebrity fame can be maintained,” he says. “He is in the process of making the transition from global sports icon to style icon, and he likely has movies in his sights.
“It reminds me of Marky Mark in those Calvin Klein ads, which propelled him to fame as Mark Wahlberg. Beckham doesn’t need to be propelled — he’s there already — but he’s using the same vehicle.”
Meanwhile, Leslie Singer, who runs Manhattan branding consultancy SingerSalt, says it’s about time women were treated to some eye candy.
“Here we have David Beckham looking fabulous and endowed, and we’re saying, ‘Eek, that’s in bad taste!’ ” she says. “Well, excuse me, but cleavage and breasts are everywhere. Women have been portrayed in ads in bad taste for so long now that this is tame by comparison.”
Some H&M customers agree. Lisa Connell, 36, of Stuyvesant Town, a stay-at-home mom of two boys, has zero objections to the eye-popping ads.
“You can practically tell which religion he is, but he looks very masculine,” she says with a laugh. “Beckham is a hero, and all that’s missing is the cape with an S on the back.”
jridley@nypost.com