I used to pay to go see the Cannes International Advertising Festival reel every year to watch the best commercials from around the world," relates Tim Godsall, who directs spots stateside via Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles, and in Canada via untitled, Toronto and Vancouver, B.C. "But it never occurred to me that it was actually someone’s job to come up with them."
While in his mid-20s, Godsall began to see his love of the medium in a new light. "It just seemed like a custom fit for my short attention span and my set of quasi-skills, so once that notion crystallized, I went off and pursued it," he says. The new career path led the Montreal native back to Canada—he’d spent some time in New York working at Spy magazine—to freelance for Toronto agencies MacLaren McCann and Roche Macauley. By the mid-1990s he was stateside again, working as a creative director/copywriter at kirshenbaum bond + partners, New York. Deciding to pursue directing, Godsall signed with bicoastal Epoch Films and untitled, shifting his stateside representation to Biscuit earlier this year. Godsall continues to bounce back and forth between Canada and the U.S., and says that the markets possess more similarities than differences. "The only noticeable difference between the markets, in my opinion, is that U.S. scripts usually have more money to play with," he says, "while the Canadian things tend to be more streamlined due to budget constraints."
After joining untitled, those constraints led Godsall to what he calls "the definitive turning point" in his career. "A few months into my tenure there," he relates, "I started to see much more interesting work with no money attached to it whatsoever, and it gave me the opportunity to do some really challenging things."
This year marks Godsall’s third as a full-time commercial director, and he’s earned accolades for several humorous campaigns that he directed via untitled. The list of honors includes two Silver Lions at this year’s Cannes International Advertising Festival—one for his Canadian Hockey Association campaign ("Golf," "Cop" and "Grocery"), out of Palmer Jarvis, DDB, Vancouver; and the other for "Peggy’s Ring," a Rogers AT&T Wireless spot via MacLaren McCann, Toronto. In addition to his Silver Lions, Godsall also saw several of his spots—among them "It’s Me," "Log" and "Audition" for Rogers AT&T Wireless, and B.C. Lottery’s "Gnomes," "Bejeweler" and "Genie," out of Bryant, Fulton and Shee Advertising, Vancouver—land on the Cannes shortlist. Meanwhile, his "Golf" earned a Bronze Clio.
The work
Godsall seems to be on fire in Canada and is equally prolific stateside. Since signing with Biscuit, he’s directed ads for Saturn and Discover Card, out of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco; Compass Bank ("Ficus Tree" and "Throwing It Away") out of Crispin Porter+ Bogusky, Miami; Southwest Airlines ("Conference Room") for GSD&M, Austin, Texas; Jimmy Dean ("Demolition Derby" and "Squirrel Tag") for Leo Burnett USA, Chicago; and Honda for Rubin Postaer and Associates, Santa Monica.
When asked what attracted him to Biscuit, Godsall says, "It’s all the classic clichés—it’s just a very smart, focused company where the emphasis is always on good work."
Capping painfully awkward, often surreal situations with character-driven comedy may be Godsall’s trademark, but don’t try to typecast him as simply a comedic director. "Hopefully I don’t have a style per say," he relates. "I’d aspire to not have one, in fact, and try to do whatever makes sense for each project. My goal is to just take a smart idea and not blow it in all the various ways that it can be blown."
Godsall doesn’t go the over-the-top route. "I like subtle," he notes. "I would always opt to go not far enough rather than too far. I like for people to come to the idea themselves rather than hitting it too hard—like we’re wheeling out our gag for your amusement—which can often be the tendency when there are thousands of commercial directors vying for the dozens of projects."
That credo is reflected in just about all of the spots he’s helmed. In the Canadian Hockey Association’s "Golf," a youngster berates his nervous dad on the golf course as the man tries to make an easy shot in front of his peers. The angry child spews advice from the sidelines in a heated tone until finally, the dad winds up missing the shot and then hangs his head in shame as the boy storms off, calling his pop "pathetic." The result: a comedic but thought-provoking PSA urging parents not to push their kids too hard when it comes to sports.
In his B.C. Lottery spots, the comedy is front and center in ads set at a faux home shopping network that targets filthy rich—and taste-challenged—lottery winners. In "Bejeweler," Ivana Trump is seen hawking a small machine that quickly and easily attaches priceless jewels to clothing. The innovative machine, she promises, will free the wealthy from the constraints of earrings, bracelets and tiaras by allowing them to wear as many precious stones as they can attach onto their clothes. In another ad, "Genie," a handy dicer/slicer that can eliminate hours of culinary grunt work is the featured product. The surprise comes in the spot’s final frame, when viewers learn that the "item" is actually a person who can be bought to do the work for you.
Godsall is currently in the early stages of planning a shoot for his first short film, which he hopes to accomplish before the end of the year. He says he’s not in a hurry to direct a full-length movie anytime soon. "Ultimately I’d love to make a feature film and even to do one or two music videos a year," he shares, "but for now I’m still very absorbed in and focused on commercials—trying to figure out what the hell I’m doing with those."
