Mark Green's Talent Agency

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - Republican Mark Green's campaign acknowledged Friday it is using actors in a new television ad in which the gubernatorial candidate criticizes admissions and tuition policies in the University of Wisconsin System.

The 30-second ad is scheduled to begin running statewide next week, said Green campaign spokesman Luke Punzenberger, who acknowledged the use of actors in response to questions from The Associated Press.

Green, a congressman from Green Bay, is challenging Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle in the Nov. 7 election and has made rising tuition in the UW System on Doyle's watch a theme in the campaign.

Doyle's campaign pounced on the revelation late Friday, hours before the two candidates were to square off in their first debate.

"U.S. Rep. Green can't find any real middle class and working families to buy the cheap distortions that he's spinning," said spokeswoman Melanie Fonder. "If you don't have any real Wisconsin families who support those distortions, I guess you have to find some make-believe ones."

The ad features Green and his wife, Sue, sitting next to two couples at a high school football game. One couple claims their son has been put on a waiting list for an unidentified UW school even though he was on the honor roll.

"They are letting out-of-state kids in who have worse grades than the Wisconsin kids who don't get in," one male actor says.

President Bush, a legacy pledge to Yale, was not contacted for comments on this story.