It’s hard to disguise Arnold Schwarzenegger. There’s the size of the man—even at 71 years old, he’s broad, if not soaring. His face has been a regular presence on screens for decades. And of course, he’s got that accent. “No one can hide the accent,” Schwarzenegger says.

Alex Davies covers autonomous vehicles and other transportation machines for WIRED.

So the men and women looking to buy an electric car at a Burbank, California, dealership weren’t fooled when a large Austrian wearing a fake mustache, wig, and Hawaiian shirt introduced himself as Howard Kleiner. Nor were they fooled by his patently ridiculous arguments against going electric: That a horribly noisy Hummer will impress rather than piss off one’s neighbors, that street cred beats a tax credit, that generating pollution is an easy way to curb overpopulation, that hitting the gas pump “is sometimes more satisfying than sex.” But the jokey lines and the confused reactions of the car shoppers produce what may be an effective ad.

The former bodybuilder is, in fact, a big fan of electric cars who signed a fair number of pro-environment bills into law during his two terms as California’s governor. And so the commercial gets serious at the end, with Schwarzenegger saying, “Electric cars save money, time, and the environment, without sacrificing any of the fun and excitement of driving.”

The “Kicking Gas” ad, which debuts Tuesday, is the work of Veloz, a consortium of more than 40 automakers, utility companies, government agencies, and advocacy groups dedicated to accelerating the adoption of electric cars in California. Veloz will share the four-minute video online, pay to promote it on Facebook and Instagram, and rent 34 digital billboards across California for four weeks to point people to the video on Veloz’s website.

“We’re really trying to move electric cars out of the early adopter phase,” says Josh Boone, Veloz’s executive director. Even if US regulations remain lax, rulemaking from Europe and especially China has pushed automakers to pledge their allegiance to an electric future. The road from here to there, though, is rough. American consumers can now choose among dozens of battery-powered models, and while sales have increased in recent years, EVs still make up fewer than 2 percent of new car purchases.

A lack of advertising may account for part of the holdup. An analysis by the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management found that in 2017, various automakers including Chevrolet, Nissan, Ford, and Toyota spent five to 10 times more money promoting their gas-powered cars as their electrics.