AstraZeneca aims to inspire consumers to try its cholesterol drug Crestor with a new TV campaign told in fairy-tale format that dramatizes the health struggles of those trying to lower their cholesterol levels.

The drug maker is expected today to unveil on broadcast and cable television in the U.S. a 60-second spot that details the cholesterol sagas of characters named Joe, Katie and Steve. The marketing effort takes aim at aging baby boomers, a group that is just learning about its own high cholesterol levels.

In a singsong, rhyming voice-over, actor Patrick Stewart relates the failure of these earnest souls at lowering their cholesterol through diet and exercise alone. Enter Crestor, a powerful new cholesterol-lowering drug, launched in the U.S. last August. The campaign won't appear in Europe or Asia because of restrictions on direct-to-consumer drug advertising.

AstraZeneca, based in London, hopes the characters' personal stories will prompt people with high cholesterol to ask their doctors about Crestor. The once-a-day pill is the latest drug to reduce bad cholesterol. The market for such drugs, known as statins, is estimated at $22 billion world-wide.

Crestor faces tough competitors. The drug is squaring off against Pfizer's flagship Lipitor, the best-selling prescription drug in the world, and several other established brands, including Merck's Zocor and Bristol-Myers Squibb's Pravachol.

But AstraZeneca's biggest challenge appears to be overcoming consumer complacency.

In this ad for Crestor, a character named Steve exercises vigorously but doesn't see his cholesterol drop until he tries the AstraZeneca drug.

The narrative approach of the ads, featuring Dr. Seuss-style copy, stems from AstraZeneca's analysis that consumer response to ads for rival cholesterol remedies is tied for last place with response to ads for blood-pressure pills.

"It doesn't appear to make a dent" in spurring consumers' willingness to get medical help, says Sharon DeBacco, brand director for consumer marketing at AstraZeneca's U.S. headquarters in Wilmington, Del. "People feel distanced from this condition and its treatment," she says. "It's important to give these folks the opportunity to see themselves in these characters."

One reason for the poor response to ads for cholesterol treatment is the people with the problem have no outward symptoms, unlike allergy or migraine sufferers.

But many consumers also balk at cholesterol drugs because they think the problem can be solved with diet and exercise alone, says Ms. DeBacco. This is untrue for many people with the condition. Others find news of developments relating to the treatment of high cholesterol to be an annoying reminder of their advancing age and choose to live in denial of its danger.

So AstraZeneca, she says, sought ads that would soothe, yet motivate.

WPP Group's Quantum Group, an agency specializing in health care, created the Crestor ads. The work is a significant departure from commercials for Pfizer's rival drug Lipitor. Some of those spots show buff middle-aged men and women whose Achilles heel turns out to be high cholesterol. Not the Crestor spots. "These are not Hollywood-glamour faces and bodies you're seeing," says Stu Klein, president of Quantum Group. "We're looking at portraying very real people. There's almost a subconscious identification with these people."

The ads may also capitalize on the appeal of reality television. "Taking a character and showing how their life evolves as they take the drug is unique," says Andrew Pierce, senior partner at Lippincott Mercer, a brand-strategy consulting concern. Too many drug ads emphasize product characteristics at the expense of emotional connection, he says. The AstraZeneca approach, he adds, seem to strike the right balance.