I remember a commercial from my youth in the late 60s/early 70s where a boy with dark hair is running through the streets of his village to ring a church bell and announce lunch. I think it was Chef Boyardee or something like that. It’s not the Prince spaghetti commercial set in Boston (ChatGPT gave me that recommendation).
Any help appreciated. It’s as minor a thing as it gets but it’s still bugging me that I can’t remember the product. (And I want to re-watch the commercial.)
It was indeed Chef Boy-ar-dee (ravioli, I think), accompanied by a ditty sung to the tune of “Oranges and Lemons (Say the Bells of St Clements)”:
For you and for me, from Chef Boy-ar-dee.
It wasn’t just one boy, it was a whole crowd of urchins rushing through what looked like a small town in Italy or France. They all ended up in what must have been a picnic area full of tables set for lunch.
This was in the late '60s, I think. I remember wondering where the hell these kids lived so they got free lunch, and how I could go and live there too.
Is this it?
“At lunchtime the bell tolls / spaghetti and meatballs / for you and for me / it’s Chef Boy-ar-dee”. I remember it well 
ETA oh ninjaed. Maybe I’m remembering a different commercial?
Basically, yes. But I think it’s a later version of the one I remember. I’m pretty sure that one was shot in grainy B&W, more like film vérité.
Also, I was 31 in 1986, so I probably wouldn’t have wondered about where I could get a free lunch like that.
No bell ringing, but could it be this one?
Again, it’s similar, but not quite what I remember. I’m sure the one I’m thinking of had “Oranges and Lemons” as the soundtrack, and I believe it was set in a small town or village.
This one was filmed in Venice, and the lunch tables are set up in San Marco Square. I spent ten days in Venice around Easter 2000.
I thought I knew exactly what commercial the OP is thinking of, but I don’t remember it having any singing. For some reason I have a vague memory of an Italian American woman screaming “Anthony!” only she pronounces it “ant knee”. Does that ring anyone’s bell(pun intended) ? If so, was this also Chef Boyardee?
That’s actually from The Shoes of the Fisherman movie. Newly-elected Pope Kyril (Anthony Quinn) wants to get to know the people of his bishopric—remember, the Pope is also the Bishop of Rome, and he has not met them. He does not know about them, since he does not come from Italy at all. So one night, he puts on ordinary street clothes and sneaks out of the Vatican into the city to meet the people. He hopes that he is not recognized.
He encounters a physician who needs his help in obtaining a prescription from a nearby pharmacy. He gets it, and on his return, the unseen woman is screaming for Anthony. Over and over again. He hands the prescription to the physician (who finally recognizes him), and says something like, “Do you suppose that Anthony will ever respond to his mother?”
I remember the 1966, I was six then. The 1986, nope.
This?
That’s it; thank you! You are a scholar and a gentlebird. Apparently the “ant knee” pronunciation is just something we added in when mocking it.
I think Terentii is on the right track. It is not any of the other videos posted above (but thank you). I really want to see this commercial again, it’s driving me bonkers.
Anthony was a real boy who appeared in that commercial, not an actor (although that apparently wasn’t his real mom). Many years later, my wife, working as a dental assistant in the North End, worked on Anthony’s teeth.
They did a sequel to the commercial many years later. Sadly, for THAT, they used an actor, not Anthony Martignetti, even though he was still alive and kicking. I don’t know why they didn’t get him back.
He apparently died four years ago at age 63.
I remember that lyric being used, too, so there must have been more than one Chef Boy-Ar-Dee commercial made using the same tune.
I’ll buy you a lobster dinner at Scott’s the next time I’m in London if you can identify the product being flogged in another B&W commercial ca. 1965, in which a fruit peddler is pushing his cart through what appears to be little Italy in NYC and crying “STRAW-ber-RIES! BLUE-ber-RIES! CHE-ee-EER-RIES!”