LOS ANGELES-For director Kinka Usher, the timing couldn’t have been better. The noted spotmaker was in his 67th shoot day on Universal’s The Mystery Men, his feature directorial debut, when word came last week that he had been nominated by the Directors Guild of America (DGA) for its Best Commercial Director of 1998 Award. At that time, Usher had but 11 more shoot days to go on his movie and was already planning to get back into the commercial directing fray via his House Of Usher Films, Santa Monica, by early March.
"This really gives a jump-start to my return," said Usher who said that several calls have already come in from Wieden & Kennedy, Portland, Ore., Lowe & Partners/SMS, New York, and Leo Burnett Co., Chicago, regarding some prospective ad assignments. "While I like moviemaking tremendously, I’m looking forward to getting back to ads
and the relationships I have in commercials. I’ve missed that a great deal."
This is Usher’s third DGA nomination; it was earned on the strength of five entries: Sony’s "Egg" from Young & Rubicam, New York; Mountain Dew’s "Michael Johnson’s World" via BBDO New York; Miller Brewing Company’s "Cupid" out of Fallon McElligott, Minneapolis; Nike’s "Undercover Ushers" for Wieden & Kennedy; and Hallmark’s "Neighbor Lady" from Leo Burnett.
In figuring out what spots to submit for DGA consideration, Usher said his guiding philosophy is simply "to show diversity-emotional work, humor, storytelling, the ability to give a big scope to a piece of advertising, something that shows filmmaking in all its glory. And as a director, you try to create an emotional relationship between actors and the audience; to make that connection where people can see a spot and relate to the people in some way-like having Donald Trump in the bleachers and the real fans sitting in the good seats at an NBA game."
The Trump reference is to Nike’s "Undercover Ushers," which exhibits the comedic storytelling that’s a cornerstone of Usher’s reputation. The director is also known for production on a grand scale that helps to advance a premise, such as in Mountain Dew’s "Michael Johnson’s World." But for Usher, perhaps the most notable entry in his DGA batch was Hallmark’s "Neighbor Lady" because, he explained, "it shows a whole other side to me as a director. It’s a tug-at-the-heartstrings story about a single mom and her young son who live across the hall from a woman, Mrs. Cavanaugh, who never gets any mail. The single mom mails her a card and the boy sees first-hand what it means to his neighbor. … It’s great to be able to make people laugh, but to make them feel there’s optimism is a tremendous feeling."
As reported in last week’s SHOOT, Usher was one of five nominees named by DGA judges as best spot director of ’98; the other veteran of the DGA competition being bicoastal/international radical.media’s Tarsem, who garnered his second nomination. As a first time nominee, he won the coveted award as Best Commercial Director of 1996. The other three DGA-recognized directors this year are first-time nominees: the team of Amy Hill and Chris Riess of Tony K., West Hollywood and London; Rocky Morton of Morton Jankel Zander, Los Angeles; and Peter Darley Miller of Stiefel & Co., Hollywood.
Miller Time
Fittingly, Miller learned of his nomination while on location for a Sony PlayStation assignment out of TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles. It was an earlier PlayStation spot, "Scout," that helped him cop his DGA nomination; his other entries being Nike’s "The Great Magician" from Wieden & Kennedy, Slice’s "Dissection" for Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco, 360 Communications’ "Chase" for The Martin Agency, Richmond, Va., and Midway/NFL Blitz’s "Target Practice" from DDB Needham Chicago.
"I was stunned," said Miller of when he was informed that he had been named a DGA nominee. "I’m overwhelmed by it. I’m lucky to be with [Stiefel & Co. president] Frank Stiefel who’s allowed and helped me to pick and choose spots that would be the most appropriate for me to direct. … Some people think I’m insane, that I could do double the billing. But the approach Frank and I have taken has been rewarded. A nomination says that you’re a director’s director. Recognition from your peers is the most gratifying kind of recognition."
While humor is a common thread running through Miller’s entries, they also exhibit a wide storytelling range from what the director describes as being "sophomoric comedy that you have to laugh at, like a pie in the face" ("Dissection" in which a teenage student in science class asks for another frog after apparently having eaten the first) to "intentionally misdirecting the audience with an action/adventure, thriller approach that looks like murder is imminent but the payoff turns out to be something more mundane" ("Chase") to another spot with comedy that’s "both big and subtle" at the same time ("The Great Magician").
"The concepts and opportunities I’ve been presented are what make the difference," said Miller who recollected just several years ago that he seriously considered quitting directing. "I was doing more music video stuff and wasn’t moving forward the way I wanted to in commercials, so I laid low for awhile." Miller noted that the career turning point for him came a little more than three years ago when he joined Stiefel & Co. (SHOOT, 1/5/96, p. 1) "where I got the chance to prove myself and to collaborate with talented agency people."
Duo Tone
For the wife-and-husband directing team of Hill and Riess, "awe" would be the operative word, not just in terms of reaction to being nominated but also regarding the subject matter of one of the spots that helped make them nominees.
The piece, "Pediatrics" for Bronson Medical Center out of Biggs & Gilmore, Kalamazoo, Mich., entailed Riess and Hill filming infants and children in the hospital’s neo-natal and pediatric intensive care units, respectively. The subjects included a 16-year-old leukemia patient, another young boy on life support and babies delivered prematurely. The spot also captured the comments of Bronson Medical Center doctors and nurses; the overriding observation, related Hill, being the doctors talking about "how resilient and responsive the babies and kids are. … At the end of the shoot, we were just in awe of these people-the doctors and nurses and how they were changing lives-and the patients for their resiliency."
In sharp contrast to "Pe-diatrics" is the humor of Saturn’s "Driving Range" for Publicis & Hal Riney, San Francisco, and Long John Silver’s "London Loves Us" via jordanmcgrathcase&partners, New York. The latter was shot in London where Brit actors were cast to taste Long John Silver’s fish and chips and react to the experience. The reactions were twofold. On one level, they loved the food; on another level, they hated Americans for being able to take over a Brit culinary staple.
Meanwhile "Driving Range" was the place of employ for a youngster with a thankless summer job: retrieving golf balls, and in the process, being a moving target for swinging hackers. But the twist is that the kid wants to make you feel his job is cool. This insistence on looking for the silver lining even extends to his crummy parking space, which is in the line of golf ball fire; luckily his Saturn has dent-resistant panels.
"We tried to reflect a variety in our work," said Hill of their DGA entries. "We didn’t want to be pegged as only doing a certain thing. We mixed emotion, com-edy, reality, real actors, real people-and the AmSouth piece was quite a departure from our dialogue work; it was very visually driven."
Riess added that beyond any strategy, he and Hill also simply picked "our favorite work." He described news of the DGA nomination as "shocking and thrilling."
Rocky Humor Picture Show
"It’s great to be nominated by your peers," said Morton. "I’m ecstatic over the nomination."
Morton’s nominated work consisted of: Sony PlayStation’s "Laundromat" as well as Taco Bell’s "Bobbing Head" and "Romeo and Juliet," all from TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles; FOX Sports’ "Feet" via Cliff Freeman and Partners, New York; and Sega’s "Egg" for Ground Zero, Marina del Rey.
The latter first came on the scene in early 1997, but Morton explained that he shot additional footage, and a revised version debuted last year, qualifying it for the DGA competition. "Underlying my entries is humor," he observed, "but there’s a range to the work-from the lightest comedy with the Taco Bell dog to a more warped and twisted variety with Sega’s "Egg.’ "
Another variation on the comedic theme is "Feet," which opens on a pair of feet diapering a baby. The dexterity of the feet and the voiceover leads you to believe that you’re witnessing a person who’s bravely overcome a handicap so that he or she can perform life’s daily tasks, including infant care. But it turns out that the man in question has developed virtuoso feet so that his hands will be free to surf round-the-clock on the FOX Sports Web site.
Morton added that among the difficult decisions was determining which Taco Bell commercials to submit. He has directed the famed chihuahua, Gidget, in the last 17 Taco Bell spots. "It was hard to select only two, but I made it a point to enter more than one to the DGA [competition] because I wanted to reflect the fact that I worked on that entire campaign."
At press time, SHOOT hadn’t connected with Tarsem, who was on location in Brazil. Tarsem’s DGA entries were: Miller Brewing Company’s "S ance" and "Dances With Dog" for Fallon McElligott, Beck’s "Romance" via Saatchi & Saatchi, New York, and John Hancock’s "Sarajevo" out of Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos in Boston.
The DGA Awards ceremony is set for March 6 at the Century Plaza Hotel, Los Angeles.
