CEO
Odysseus Arms
1) Hey! Wasn’t VR supposed to be red hot by now? I just went into my AT&T store today and the VR goggles on display are all non-functional dummies, if that’s an indicator about how that is going. VR is going to be profound some day, and we’re all in, but right now, we’re getting asked to do massive sophisticated, multi-channel, integrated campaigns that center around followings brands have accumulated over the years.
Then there’s the six second ad, which came from the Facebook recommendation. Micro-movies are an entire industry. Six seconds is a wonderful space, we’re learning. We’ve had as much fun crafting a hundred short form videos as we do making broadcast.
2) Truth: you thought you knew what that was, didn’t ya? Thanks to all the fake news, goofball tweeting and Russians messing with our cheese, the consumer is exhausted. Exaggerations, hyperbole and fanciful tweaks to reality are generally repulsive to a population pounded by lies, half-truths and make believe. We’ve also seen a thirst for diverse, but real American people. Work that features genuine folks is red hot. You can be dramatic, cinematic with a lot of scope but what you’re saying had better be more truthful than you’ve ever been before. Or else.
3) As I write this, I’m stuffed into the back of a 1969 VW #BarefootBus escorting a hallowed bottle of bubbly through the Moab desert en route to the NYE national stage in Times Square. Millions of people are watching this and it’s my new normal. Creating and producing LIVE content. I’m proud of this because we had to make so much of it up on the fly. “Advertising” that acts more like a YouTube influencer than a commercial, meaning it constantly evolves with a narrative that builds, engages and gets jiggy when it has to. For production, smart executive producers who are excited about putting their skates on and jumping in the pool, will prosper. We need them.
4) Legacy brands are finally getting how to use social media to drive ROI. Content has finally risen to king. Facebook/Instagram are the most powerful platform on earth in terms of engagement, but it can be mysterious to many marketers. Here’s the deal: they made the thing so anyone can use it— I heard a stat that something like 80% of Facebook’s revenue comes from brands that didn’t exist 5 years ago. If that’s true, then legacy brands, with all their resources, should be killing it.
We’re getting the same engagement and views of a social calendar as a popular TV show. The industry has largely reformed around data and ROI, so production budgets and expectations look a lot different than they did in previous years. Here’s the thing: it’s a bit more work, but it’s more fun and the lawyers can barely keep up with us. So it’s a burgeoning golden age for content with all this support.
Rom-Com Mainstay Hugh Grant Shifts To The Dark Side and He’s Never Been Happier
After some difficulties connecting to a Zoom, Hugh Grant eventually opts to just phone instead.
"Sorry about that," he apologizes. "Tech hell." Grant is no lover of technology. Smart phones, for example, he calls the "devil's tinderbox."
"I think they're killing us. I hate them," he says. "I go on long holidays from them, three or four days at at time. Marvelous."
Hell, and our proximity to it, is a not unrelated topic to Grant's new film, "Heretic." In it, two young Mormon missionaries (Chloe East, Sophie Thatcher) come knocking on a door they'll soon regret visiting. They're welcomed in by Mr. Reed (Grant), an initially charming man who tests their faith in theological debate, and then, in much worse things.
After decades in romantic comedies, Grant has spent the last few years playing narcissists, weirdos and murders, often to the greatest acclaim of his career. But in "Heretic," a horror thriller from A24, Grant's turn to the dark side reaches a new extreme. The actor who once charmingly stammered in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and who danced to the Pointer Sisters in "Love Actually" is now doing heinous things to young people in a basement.
"It was a challenge," Grant says. "I think human beings need challenges. It makes your beer taste better in the evening if you've climbed a mountain. He was just so wonderfully (expletive)-up."
"Heretic," which opens in theaters Friday, is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, co-writers of "A Quiet Place." In Grant's hands, Mr. Reed is a divinely good baddie — a scholarly creep whose wry monologues pull from a wide range of references, including, fittingly, Radiohead's "Creep."
In an interview, Grant spoke about these and other facets of his character, his journey... Read More