EPOCH FILMS’ LENSKI PUTS IN 10 CENTS WORTHFor a campaign that spoofs 1-800 chat line commercials in order to promote Boost Mobile’s new 10 cents per minute, mobile-to-mobile calling, Berlin Cameron United, New York, turned to director Matt Lenski of bicoastal Epoch Films. The two :30s–“Chat Line” and “Duckie”–feature phone-sex operators, too-tanned actresses, 1980’s rap icon Biz Markee and a perverse gym rat. For example, “Chat Line” opens on a beautiful woman–the kind chat lines want you to believe you’ll be talking to–posing the question, “Want to share your deepest desires? Now you can for just 10 cents a minute.” The scene cuts to a dumbbell-curling gym rat dripping with sweat and hair gel, “All night, all weekend, I know exactly what I’m gonna do!” It then jumps from caller to caller, one of whom is rapper Markee. Biz hollers Boost’s slogan from a bubble bath, “Where you at, baby?!” “Chat Line” closes on the Boost logo and all of the callers in a candlelit living room giving us a final “Where You At?!” before cutting to black. The creative ensemble from Berlin Cameron United consisted of creative directors Ewen Cameron, Jason Peterson and Harry Bernstein; copywriter Sunita Deshpande; art director Tamara Goodman and producer Anna Beth Weber. Lenski’s support team at Epoch included executive producer Jerry Solomon, with Pat Harris serving as producer. The DP was Max Goldman. Editor was Adam Jenkins of Cut+Run, New York. Visual effects house was Honest, New York, with Cary Murnion the VFX producer.
HUNGRY MAN TV DEBUTS THE BIGGSOnline web channel HungrymanTV.com is unveiling its fifth original series, The Biggs, this month. The series–directed by Hungry Man’s Marcos Siega–documents via puppetry the seedy life of Sir Rodney Biggs, a lewd and foul-mouthed rocker propagated in Shepherd’s Bush in West London. Additional episodes of “The Biggs” will premiere on HMTV on a monthly basis. Siega teamed with writer/actor/director Bix Skahill and make-up and special effects house Drac Studios (Van Helsing, Hannibal, Blade) to develop The Biggs. The Drac team masterminded the puppetry showcased in the series. There are several famous faces rumored to appear in The Biggs and ’80s pop icon Curt Smith (Tears for Fears) has recorded original music specifically for the online show.
PEOPLE IN THE NEWSMulti-platform production company Mekanism, San Francisco, has added Velvy Appleton as head of production. Appleton formerly served as a senior producer at Radium, San Francisco. Earlier he was a senior producer at VFX house The Orphanage….Elexis Stearn has been promoted from head of sales for commercials to executive producer at Culver City, Calif.-based visual effects house Zoic Studios. Stearn has been with the company since its inception five years ago, and has worked closely with cofounder Steve Schofield to shape the company’s spot division, which has turned out work for such clients as Sears, Burger King, Sprite, Chevy, Cadillac, Xbox, HP and Mini Cooper….Susie Shuttleworth has been named executive producer at Leroy + Clarkson, a New York-based broadcast design and production company specializing in network branding, TV programs, promotion and multi-media projects. She last served as exec producer for Bob English at New York-based design firm Nth Degree….
