(FORTUNE Magazine) – Rock singer Madonna's garbage-can garb and pouty red lips travel well. Mitsubishi Electric paid a reported $650,000 for the right to use fragments of her Virgin Tour rock video in a Japanese TV ad for videocassette recorders. Mitsubishi's VCR sales doubled in the three months after the ad came out in May, while sales of competing products rose only 15%. Japanese advertisers have long known they could grab attention by using American superstars, creating a lucrative sideline for the likes of Paul Newman, John Travolta, and Woody Allen. According to the 1986 Guinness Book of World Records, actress Faye Dunaway got top dollar. On behalf of Parco, a Tokyo department store, Dunaway uttered six words in English for some $900,000. The six words: ''This is an ad for Parco.'' Most Japanese advertisers avoid the hard sell, preferring to smother the prospective buyer with feeling, or kanjo. Often the ads make only the most casual connection between product and celebrity. The lure of foreign faces shows no signs of fading. Look for more American celebrities in the wake of Mitsubishi's Madonna coup.