Celebrity Marriage Ads Hit N.Y.

A new series of videos sponsored by the Human Rights Campaign in New York will personalize marriage equality with messages from celebrities and political leaders including Julianne Moore, Fran Drescher, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and Whoopi Goldberg.

According to The New York Times, the commercials are timed to coincide with hope for another marriage equality vote in the state senate in early 2011. The marriage equality bill failed the senate by a vote of 38-24 last December, and powerful Catholic leaders have vowed to fight the bill again.

Brian Ellner, a former Bloomberg aide who heads HRC's Campaign for New York Marriage, thought of the ads, which will appear online first and on television as a marriage equality vote nears.

"In interviews, those appearing in the videos expressed puzzlement and dismay that New York had fallen behind states like Vermont, Massachusetts and Iowa in legalizing same-sex marriage," reports the Times.

Others expected to appear in the ads include Kyra Sedgwick, the Rev. Al Sharpton, Kevin Bacon, the chef Tom Colicchio, and Jeanne Moutoussamy-Ashe, the widow of Arthur Ashe.

See the ad featuring Julianne Moore below.