By Art Smith

Sometimes it takes a "car guy" to appreciate the heritage of a brand like Jaguar. John Doyle, executive creative director at Young & Rubicam (Y&R) Los Angeles, Irvine, Calif., admits to loving cars, "especially when you get a brand that has a heritage—an authenticated, very distinctive place in the car world. That’s the great thing about Jaguar."

Doyle, who has worked on a number of car accounts, is drawing on those feelings in the current work the agency is doing for Jaguar of North America to highlight the car maker’s history and reputation for power and performance. For the "born with/lives for" theme found in recent Jaguar work, Doyle reached back to the words of the car line’s founder, Sir William Lyons. "[Lyons] said, ‘The car is the closest thing we can create to something that is alive,’ which is an amazing statement," Doyle relates. "The new XJ, which is Jaguar’s flagship product, is new technology from the ground up. We had to come up with a campaign, a ‘construct’ if you will, that allows us to talk about what the car is born with and what it lives for."

The result was "Mechanical Rabbit," directed by Tim and Jeff Cronenweth—a.k.a. The Cronenweths—who direct via Untitled, Santa Monica. The spot opens with a gleaming metal rabbit on a track much like those at dog races. Suddenly, a chrome cat—the famous Jaguar "leaper" hood ornament—moves into frame and the rabbit is chased across the Golden Gate Bridge and through the streets of San Francisco by a black XJR sedan. During the chase, the text "Born with: 390 supercharged HP" appears, referring to the car’s horsepower. When the rabbit is finally cornered, the text reads, "Lives for: the hunt."

According to Doyle, the concept came from group creative director/ copywriter Rich Siegel. "He has a very inventive mind. I was pretty excited about it because I’d never seen a car company use that [idea]," notes Doyle. "Also, you think of a dog chasing a rabbit, not a cat. We’re finding that people really love the iconography of the leaper—it’s such a great icon."

The spot takes advantage of the fact that the leaper draws on Jaguar history and the performance image the brand is seeking. "We’re trying to get this brand to behave differently in an entertaining way," Doyle says. "As a luxury brand, formerly they did a lot of work that almost dealt with [the cars] in a fashion way. Our task is now to bring to light the performance aspect of Jaguar—to say, ‘This is Jaguar, and it has a wonderful, storied past. This is the brand of E-type and the XK.’ In the same way that those cars made you feel the life of that brand, we need to start doing it in a way [where] we convey the brand in broadcast and print and at every touch point we can provide for the consumer."

Performance ability

The more recent "Critical Delivery," also directed by The Cronenweths, features the S-Type sedan. In it, a team of doctors must deliver a human organ from an operating room to another location in three minutes. Rather than taking an ambulance, they opt for the Jaguar. As in "Mechanical Rabbit," the leaper icon is shown before the car as a whole. The "born with" line is the same, but this time the tagline is "Lives for: special deliveries."

"The thing that connects the spots is this notion of what the car is made of, what it’s born with," Doyle states. "It’s the performance. It’s born with a three hundred ninety-horsepower, supercharged engine."

Although the Cronenweth brothers are fairly new to directing commercials, Doyle had no apprehensions about using them for the spots. "They really got the idea, knew where we wanted to go with it and did a great presentation on how it all would be mapped out," he recalls. "I loved the combination of Tim’s personality, which is pretty exuberant, and Jeff’s, which has a lot of wisdom in his thinking. They listen and collaborate well. Tim will exude a lot of possibilities and Jeff will sit back and think about them because he knows he ultimately has to execute them."

Jeff and Tim Cronenweth co-directed the two spots, with Jeff Cronenweth additionally serving as director of photography and camera operator. The brothers have worked on a number of feature films—including One Hour Photo, Fight Club and Se7en—in various capacities. "I was confident, from an art director’s standpoint, that working with them was right," Doyle says. "Since they are in the early stages in their teaming up as directors, they invested a lot into it. Obviously, they were hoping this would generate more interest in them as a team. I’d certainly work with them again."

Of the two Jaguar spots, "Mechanical Rabbit" was the more challenging, Doyle shares. "We were a bit concerned in San Francisco that weather would be a factor, but things held up," he says. "We got to close down half of the Golden Gate Bridge for a period of time. The mayor was great, wanting to get production going on in the city again. I was amazed at our accessibility to sites and how cooperative the city was."

The rabbit itself and the track on which it runs were CGI creations from Digital Domain, Venice, Calif. "Critical Delivery" was shot in and around a recently closed hospital in Los Angeles.

The spots drew kudos from the client and Jaguar dealers, Doyle reports, and with almost three years with Jaguar on the client list, the agency is mounting a global campaign in conjunction with Y&R, London.

"It’s been encouraging, working with [Jaguar]," Doyle says, "and we have a lot of hopes for our future with them, and the future they have planned for themselves in the building of new Jags. It’s going to be a lot of fun."

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