The May 2006 Vanity Fair magazine featured on its cover hugely popular movie stars Julia Roberts and George Clooney, and politicians Al Gore and Robert Kennedy, Jr. A stylist had dressed the four in complementary shades of green and set designers posed them Hollywood-style in front of a mossy, ivied backdrop for star photographer Annie Leibovitz's lens. Vanity Fair's “Special Green Issue,” including its cautionary headline warning that global warming is a threat graver than terrorism and its ecological call for “A New American Revolution,” clearly attempted to use sex and stars to sell sustainability to a moderately interested public. What led to this “eco-power pinup,” as Vanity Fair itself labeled its cover? And what's been the public response to this and other recent examples of a Madison Avenue approach? Using traditional qualitative methods, including interviews with editors and authors, research into public response, and a review of past lay-oriented journalistic efforts, I will explore whether this star-studded campaign could possibly reshape public opinion and interest or be, as history tells us, but a star-studded flash in the pan.