A tennis ball yellow car ripped across the Sixth Street Bridge in a cloud of tire smoke on Tuesday night. But unlike the traditional hot rods, drag racers, and lowriders that have long made this L.A. River crossing famed among Angeleno automotive enthusiasts, and as a filming location in movies like Grease and Terminator 2, it did so without a honking gasoline-powered engine. Additionally atypical, the span was closed to public traffic and outfitted with signage that suggested it was part of the German Autobahn. Also, when the car’s occupants emerged, one was Brad Pitt.

The star was reprising a role, of sorts, that of Sonny Hayes, the redemption-seeking racecar driver from 2025’s smash hit F1. This was based not just on the car’s speed and attention-grabbing stunting, but because the company backing Pitt in both instances is the same: Mercedes-Benz. The German luxury automaker was the in-movie sponsor of Hayes’ fictional APXGP racing team. And its go-fast subsidiary, Mercedes-AMG, hosted the L.A. event to promote the global reveal of its latest vehicle, the AMG GT 4-Door Coupe, a swoopy 1153 hp all-electric sports sedan, capable of sprinting from 0-60 mph in a Ferrari-besting 2 seconds.

Joining Pitt at the event were a passel of other notables. Jacob Elordi, Kevin Hart, Kourtney Kardashian, Odell Beckham Jr., Gabriel Macht, and Finneas were all there, along with Olympic fencing medalist Miles Chamley-Watson, and Mercedes’ Formula One drivers George Russell and Kimi Antonelli. Adding to the spectacle, pop-punk pioneers Blink 182 performed a live set after the crossing.

Some of these bold-face names show up just because they crave association with Mercedes’ three-pointed star. “A great example is Jacob Elordi, who found us,” says the brand’s chief marketing officer Melody Lee. But, she adds, the structure is different for every celebrity. “Some come uncompensated because they just truly love the brand. Others, sure, they ask for compensation to show up, and sometimes we work it out with a car or a fee or both.”

What about Mr. Pitt? “That’s a paid partnership. I can be upfront about that,” Lee says. “He is a really good driver after his training on ‘F1,’” she says, though it’s unclear how this is relevant since he didn’t drive the new car across the span, but was a passenger, with a professional driver at the wheel. “And because of the ties between the team, the movie, and the car debuting here, he seemed like a logical choice.”

More important, how did Mercedes manage to close an iconic public roadway in the heart of Los Angeles in order to introduce an electric hot rod? “It took many months of discussions, negotiations, petitions, permits,” Lee says. “You obviously have to pay a price to shut down a major thoroughfare. But for the city of L.A, it’s a really exciting moment. It’s a lot of publicity for the city. But more than that, it’s an absolute tribute to the place that Los Angeles plays in our culture. The city, and the Sixth Street Bridge, are not just production locations, they’re iconic characters in movies and television.”