In his 22 years with San Francisco agency Foote, Cone & Belding (FCB), Steve Neely has experienced the best of times and, well … last year.
"For the first 20 years I was here, I think I had the best job in the advertising business hands down," he says. "But the last year and a half was really difficult."
That’s stating it mildly. In January of ’98, FCB’s foundation was rocked when its creative cornerstone, Levi Strauss & Company, ended a 67-year relationship with the agency and defected to TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles. While FCB still retained the Levi’s Dockers account, the loss affected everyone-particularly Neely, who had worked as a producer on countless landmark Levi’s spots. "It was a big emotional hit," he says, "both for the agency, and [me] personally."
To make matters even more stressful, executive creative director Paul Wolfe quit the agency for a post at Messner Vetere Berger McNamee Schmetterer/ Euro RSCG, New York, leaving a sudden void at FCB’s helm. Neely, a career broadcast producer who had served as executive producer since ’83, was asked by Geoff Thompson, the worldwide executive creative director of FCB and the chairman/CEO and chief creative officer of the San Francisco office, to take a newly created position: deputy executive creative director, while continuing his production duties. The move was considered a quick-fix solution and wasn’t publicized. But Neely’s dual role lasted. He soon found himself at the most difficult-and challenging-point in his long career. "To have a piece of business that you’ve been working on taken away from you hurts, definitely," he relates. "And, at the exact same time, to have creative responsibilities deposited on you… It was a huge adjustment. And there was nobody to turn to. You couldn’t ask your ECD [executive creative director], "What should we do?’ because there wasn’t one."
Admirably, Neely survived this unusually rough period and acclimated himself to his new creative responsibilities. In March, he was officially named deputy executive creative director of the agency. Though he says he now spends "around three quarters of my time in the creative department," he still retains his executive producer post and enjoys producing the clever, cutting-edge spots that FCB is known for. "We have a really senior [production] department," he says. "They can take care of themselves. Unless there’s something that needs to be discussed, they’re always given the ball and told to run."
In that sense, Neely is a true member of the production department. Adept at handling whatever is thrown his way, he’s always been up for a challenge. While he admittedly "didn’t have a clue" what he wanted to do in his youth ("I went to six colleges in four states"), he eventually gravitated towards the University of Montana-and production. "I went to Montana for one quarter, but stayed five years," he remembers, laughing. "What happened was, this friend of mine and I made these two-hour satires of Gone with the Wind, The Bible and The Godfather. We’d hold these events, and charge one or two bucks, and we’d have 1,200 people coming to see a Super 8 movie. That’s when the light bulb went on. I really knew what I wanted to do."
Bay Watch
Neely wanted to produce movies so he moved to California. "I’d grown up in the Bay Area, and I didn’t want to go and live in Los Angeles." So he returned to San Francisco, dropped the movie dream and opted to work on commercials instead. He was hired at FCB in ’77 as "the AV guy." While he didn’t have much professional experience to speak of, his filmmaking skills served him well: "The guy who was executive creative director here at the time made off-the-wall movies in college as well, so we got along."
His job soon expanded beyond the audio-visual realm. "Within the first year, I hit it off pretty well with Mike Koelker who was the creative director on the Levi’s business," Neely recalls. "He took me under his wing, and things escalated dramatically. A year-and-a-half after I started here, I was working on very big Levi’s jobs with big directors, without having half a clue as to what I was doing."
When Koelker asked him to recommend a director for the ’79 Levi’s "Welder" spot, Neely remembered Joe Pytka (PYTKA, Venice, Calif.), with whom he had shot his first work-two Soft Scrub demos. Koelker hired Pytka, and Neely produced the ad- his first national spot. "The talent was John Goodman, who was skinny at the time," he says. "That ad stands out in my mind for a lot of reasons."
The tireless Neely found his career on the rise-and fast. "It was great," he recalls. "Everything was much smaller, in terms of how the agency worked-and how agencies work generally. There was really one account person and two or three creative guys and one producer that worked on the whole Levi’s division. We did three or four things at a time. It was a blast. I was single, I was young and I didn’t mind traveling. I’d look back three or four years later on things I’d done, and I would suddenly think, "How the hell did I do that?’ I didn’t know what I was doing half the time. I’ve always found, though, that if you say, "I don’t know, but I’ll find out,’ it’s not a bad response."
That response served Neely well. He went on to produce countless memorable spots for Levi’s, including the Emmy-nominated "Elevator Fantasy," directed by Michael Bay of bicoastal/international Propaganda Films and "Doctors," directed by Spike Jonze of bicoastal/international Satellite; the acclaimed Spike Lee-directed campaign "Button Fly Report"; and the landmark "501 Blues" spots directed by Leslie Dektor of Dektor Film, Hollywood.
His success wasn’t just "in the jeans." Neely also had a hand in such classics as the "Don’t Drift Away" campaign for Pacific Bell and the "California Raisins" Claymation spots, via Will Vinton Studios, Portland, Ore.
Neely is finding out now about a whole new aspect of the business, as he strives to build back the agency in the post-Levi’s era. In his dual capacity, he has introduced such impressive spots as Docker’s hip "Dunk Tank" and "Nightclub," both directed by Vaughan Arnell for Propaganda Films, and MTV’s blaxploitation-inspired spots "Suburb," "Warehouse" and "Snitch," directed by John O’Hagan of bicoastal Hungry Man. Recently, Neely worked with Will Vinton again on the Mike Wellins-directed Kikkoman spots "Simple," "Phone," "Knitting" and "How to Make," all of which feature a spokesman cuddly enough to rival the famous Raisins.
So far, ’99 hasn’t been entirely smooth at FCB. Neely says the agency was hit again earlier this year by more management changes and the loss of two clients-Keds and a portion of the Pillsbury account. But, he adds, the worst is definitely over. "Everything is very stable here at this point. And now the emphasis is on making everything as good as we can."
With this newfound stability, Neely has been finding time for yet another challenge: Coaching his son’s Little League team. "They’re a rockin’ little team," he says, smiling. "They’re 14 and 0. These guys think they’ll never lose."
Whether they lose or not, one thing’s for sure: They’re in very capable hands.7
