Final 2015 Ford Mustang intro of the day

After a day that started the day before in Shanghai and Sydney before progressing around the world to Barcelona, New York and Dearborn, the redesigned 2015 Ford Mustang finished the world's longest debut by driving into wet cement in front of the TCL Chinese Theater in Hollywood, just like the movie star it is.

“Mustang has starred in over 3,000 movies and television shows,” said Joe Hinrichs, Ford's president of the Americas.

Mustangs have had starring roles in such cinematic hits as diverse as "Goldfinger," "Bullitt" and "Gone in 60 Seconds." The new Mustang will get a hero role in the upcoming" Need For Speed" movie. That's not even mentioning all those "Charlie's Angles" and "Beverly Hillbillies" drive-on scenes on TV. The car should have a SAG/AFTRA card.

So it was fitting that the 2015 Mustang GT debuted in Hollywood by rolling its low-profile tires across wet cement in front of the TCL Chinese Theater, where many great stars and starlets have done the same thing with feet, hands, legs and even a hoof in the case of Roy Rogers' horse Trigger.

“The Mustang transcends American pop culture,” said Hinrichs.

And to show that, Hinrichs and Ford head of global product development Raj Nair then tried to imprint the galloping horse logo in the cement with a cast aluminum stencil. It wasn't as easy as it looked. While Hinrichs may be a little above his ideal BMI index, Nair looked lucky to break 140 pounds on even the most optimistic scale. The pair struggled mightily to get the imprint into the cement but couldn't achieve more than a vague outline of the famous horse.

“We need somebody heavier,” Hinrichs said.

Eventually, the guys in charge of the cement used a hammer to smoosh the logo into the hardening goo.

“It had to be hard enough to support the car,” explained one of the crew.

When he was done with the hammer work, the logo looked nice.

While the big slab of Mustang-embossed concrete would not displace Gary Cooper or Van Johnson, where exactly it would go was unclear. One Ford exec said it would stay “Right here,” but pointed around the corner in the general direction of the sidewalk, sort of. Others said it was bound for “New York.” Still others said the far more likely “Dearborn.” Who knows? As long as they don't displace Roy Rogers and Trigger.

By Mark Vaughn