In spite of having landed his first Directors Guild of America (DGA) best director of the year nomination, Lenard Dorfman says 2000 was "not necessarily" one of the best years of his career. "Each year brings different challenges," says Dorfman, who helms spots out of bicoastal/international @radical.media. "That’s what’s great about being a director. It ain’t mundane."
The same could be said of the four spots that made up his DGA entry card, which vary in tone but share a certain realism and humanity. For instance, Excite.com’s "Camped Out" via Amster Yard, New York, shows a scruffy-looking guy on the street—one assumes he is a vagrant—who is later revealed to be camping out for concert tickets. By contrast, IBM’s Summer Olympic-themed ads out of Ogilvy & Mather (O&M), New York—"Harlem Fencer" and "Senegal Women’s Basketball"—feature inspiring, yet underdog, competitors in the Games. Finally, "DJ" for Contentville.com, also via O&M, takes a slice-of-life approach to illustrate how a man’s workaday existence differs from his leisure-time passion: spinning techno music. (Leslie Dektor of Dektor Film, Hollywood, won the DGA award.)
A gradua te of New York University’s film school, Dorfman joined @radical.media in 1995. Having also helmed a couple of documentary films—The Forgotten Cowboys and Dancing with Angels—he explains the range in his work this way: "What makes work excit ing is when you push boundaries, give a mixture of things that gives the audience something different. For each project I try to find the reality of what that world is. Documentary storytelling is an example of that, but [that world] could also be fantastic, straight or quirky. It all depends on the reality of the concept and what the spot is about."
Most recently, Dorfman directed a campaign for SBC Communications via Goodby, Silverstein & Partners (GS&P), San Francisco. The project took him to Bangkok, Los Angeles, Mexico, New York, Paris and Tunisia.
In fact, the director has traveled overseas a lot lately. Another recent project was a six-minute short film called Ban k Bali Affair via Hill Holliday, New York, for PricewaterhouseCoopers. Based on true events, the film reenacts a banking scandal in Indonesia in which money was laundered to finance a political campaign. Shown at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzer land, footage from the film will also be cut into spots for television and the Web.
Dorfman recently traveled to the U.K. for a Skoda campaign via Fallon London. "Forensic" and "Transporter" attempt to redefine the car’s image, while also poking fun at it. "The Skoda has some cultural baggage," he explains. "It’s seen as a shit car."
Now that Volkswagen has bought the auto company, however, that image won’t do. So in "Transporter" a tr ansport driver delivering cars comes across the Skoda and thinks he made a mistake—he can’t believe the Skoda is a Skoda. Meanwhile, in "Forensic" a Skoda figures into a crime scene. After the lab scientists pick through the car for a while, they r ealize, to their amazement, that it is a Skoda.
For Dorfman, there is an advantage in working both in the U.S. and overseas. "I’m fortunate to have those opportunities, to get that balance," he notes. "When you only work in the States you get myopic in a way. Going elsewhere is great on all different levels—as a life experience, and in terms of meeting creatives who have a different sensibility."
Moreover, working in England has its own unique set parameters. "There’s not as much cultural diversity, so the sensibility is much tighter, vs. the States," observes Dorfman. "Here, you often have to dilute the humor. But they can push that boundary because they know exactly whom they’r e talking to."
Next on the director’s agenda is his feature directing debut. He’s cur rently developing some dramatic longform projects and exploring other options.
In the meantime, he’ll continue to helm spots and "fight for good work" on every level. "I’ve always felt that I’ve done the best work when I get into unknown territory and have to figure things out," he notes.
But risk taking isn’t always appreciated in the high-stakes tug-of-war otherwise known as a commercial production. "So many factors go into making something that’s good," Dorfman continues. "You can get a great board and then people get nervous and it starts becoming diluted. A project isn’t finished until it airs, and in the meantime, everything is conspiring against you to fail. From my standpoint you have to be on top of your game, which sometimes means pissing people off. But when I do, I feel it’s because I’m being true to the spirit of the project."
If the DGA nomination is any indication, Dorfman must be doing something right. "It’s an honor just to be nominate d," he says humbly. So does he think he has shot at winning? "Fuck, I don’t know. I just hope the food is good."
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