SHOOT’s fall ensemble of up-and-coming directors includes a duo whose TV series documentary work has taken them all over the globe the past eight years, capturing people in assorted countries, their cultures, their culinary tastes, ways of life, their struggles and triumphs.
Also in the talent mix are: an accomplished agency copywriter in Australia who has now moved into the director’s chair, making his initial filmmaking mark internationally and in the U.S.; a music video director who last month made a major splash in spotmaking with a viral phenomenon that shows the emotional connection between a man and his dog; a helmer whose offbeat, darkly comedic ad agency promotional video scored a Cannes Bronze Lion; and a still photographer whose artistic affinity for food has translated sucessfully into commercials and viral video fare.
Here’s our fall collection of some promising directors to watch:
Tom Vitale & Zach Zamboni
With a collaborative filmmaking bond that has thus far yielded five primetime Emmy Awards between them in recent years for their work on a pair of Anthony Bourdain documentary series, director/producer Tom Vitale and cinematographer Zach Zamboni are now diversifying into commercials and branded content as a directorial duo, having joined the roster of production house Workhorse Media.
As a producer/director, Vitale won Emmy Awards for Outstanding Informational Series or Special in both 2013 and 2014 for Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown, an ongoing show on CNN. Meanwhile Zamboni earned three Emmys for Outstanding Cinematography for Nonfiction Programming on the basis of episodes of the Travel Channel series, Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, in 2009 and 2011, as well as an installment of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown in 2013.
Vitale and Zamboni came into Bourdain’s camp separately but now have worked eight straight years together, translating into more than 150 hours of television which has taken them all over the world, exploring the culinary, social and geopolitical landscapes of numerous countries. On the current season that’s unfolding of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown, episodes at press time were slated to air covering Paraguay, Iran and Jamaica. On the surface the Bourdain shows are a culinary travelogue of sorts but they go much deeper into shedding light on and promoting insights into different cultures, a serious documentary pedigree that’s reflected in the Parts Unknown series earning a Peabody Award in 2013.
The Bourdain shows mesh the immediacy of a documentary with high production value. “We approach each project as a small independent film, figuring out ways to look at the world in different ways,” related Zamboni. “Our process is to find what the stories are in each episode and to figure out how to best realize those stories and do justice to the people and the cultures we are covering. Tom and I are storytellers–and we like to tell stories in both long and short form.” On the latter score, he affirmed, “We’re looking forward to the challenges of commercialmaking.”
Vitale noted that over the years he and Zamboni have become increasingly close-knit as collaborators, discussing ideas, teaming on extensive pre-production, and sharing responsibilities for all aspects of their projects. He feels this will translate well into their working relationship as co-directors of commercials and branded content. Plus Vitale noted that on spots and branded content he will have Workhorse Media owner/executive producer Pola Brown assuming producer responsibilities, freeing him to more fully focus on directing in tandem with Zamboni.
“Pola has been our champion,” assessed Zamboni. “She is a huge believer in our work and actively pursued us. We’ve gotten lots of calls to do commercials and other kinds of film work. But it was Pola who aggressively went after us and kind of brought us over the threshold, getting us to commit to this [the advertising discipline].”
Meanwhile Zamboni and Vitale are taking Parts Unknown into new territory as well. “The shows this upcoming season look and feel nothing like each other,” shared Vitale. “Our Iran show, for example, is really intense yet beautiful. With our show on Paraguay, I think we’ll take viewers by surprise–it’s a beautiful and mysterious show reflecting the country, and we’ve incorporated nonlinear and other techniques that are new to the series. We will also have an episode in Jamaica which is completely different. Additionally, we’re always blending elements–dramatic and serious yet at times humorous–through the entire series.”
Another constant is conveying the feel and atmosphere of a country. “It’s one thing to be in a place and feel the atmosphere,” said Zamboni. “For us, it comes down to how do we translate that atmosphere and tonality to the audience. That’s where the art is–to help our viewers feel the place, to feel the moments and culture. We’ve become highly skilled at going out and working with real people and bringing their stories forward. We’re looking forward to working with real people and actors in commercials, to apply the eye and ear we’ve developed in the field to create something that audiences can relate to and connect with.”
As for their division of labor as a directing duo on spots and branded content, Zamboni expects to still often be shooting but conjectured that there might be “some projects for which we’ll bring in a camera operator.”
Vitale noted, “The real value is in our brainstorming, bouncing ideas off of each other. When we’re working now on Parts Unknown, our responsibilities are blurred. We contribute in whatever way is best for the particular project. We have made so many trips around the world, it’s hard to count the ways that the people we’ve met and the cultures we’ve encountered have influenced Zach and I and who we are.”
Zamboni added, “There’s great value in having directors who have seen more different people and cultures than most people have seen in a lifetime. It informs everything we do as filmmakers.”
Nick Kelly
From Down Under to NYC and from agency copywriter to settling into the director’s chair–those are the relatively recent transitions that Nick Kelly has made. Kelly joined The Sweet Shop last November, formally embarking on his commercial directing career after having first established himself as an agency creative, most notably as a copywriter with Clemenger BBDO in Melbourne, Australia.
Kelly wrote TV campaigns for such clients as Tetley Tea, White Pages, Libra and the Melbourne International Film Festival. The latter featured Geoffrey Rush and centered on a premise in which characters within a film were aware that they were in a boring movie. From inside the film, they negotiated over how their work could be better. This self-deprecating humor underscored that only the best films make it to the Melbourne Fest.
In retrospect, the Melbourne International Film Festival campaign was significant not just on the merits for being well received and lauded but also because it marked the first time then agency creative Kelly worked with The Sweet Shop and director Steve Ayson. (Ayson continues to be handled by The Sweet Shop in the Southern Hemisphere while repped in the U.S. and U.K. by MJZ.)
“I went on to work as an agency writer with The Sweet Shop on a number of spots ranging from smaller comedic pieces to big special effects work,” recalled Kelly. “And Steve Ayson is a terrific director and was a great influence on me–just from watching him work. I was privileged while on the agency side to work with some of the best comedy directors around, including Steve. Ultimately when I decided to direct, I went for the production company I respected the most and was fortunate that the interest was mutual.”
Before officially joining The Sweet Shop roster, Kelly had a trial run with the company after exiting Clemenger BBDO, directing a humorous spec spot for Foxtel, and a real-world commercial for a health insurance service, Health.com.au. His experience on these jobs was favorable, resulting in Kelly coming on board The Sweet Shop’s directorial roster. Kelly’s launch as a comedy director has picked up momentum internationally and in the U.S. He directed via The Sweet Shop the “Aussie Builders” spot for Snickers which was a viral hit and landed a Bronze Lion at this year’s Cannes Lions competition.
Continuing the “you’re not you when you’re hungry” campaign theme, the commercial depicted construction workers who weren’t themselves when women walked by their worksite. “Aussie Builders” generated millions of online hits in its first few days.
Kelly also helmed a comedic, big production takeoff of a talent competition TV show with Open Training Institute’s “The Y Factor” spot for DDB Melbourne. Contestants with useless, offbeat specialities are seen performing on stage, in the process offering affirmation that they would be far better off developing more relevant, marketable talent by getting a practical education at Open Training Institute.
As alluded to, Kelly has taken up residency in New York City in order to tap into directing opportunities for U.S. ad agencies. “I’m already familiar with the Australian market and thought it would be a good idea to try my hand in the American market. New York is a great city and I’m trying to take full advantage of what’s available, including taking improv comedy courses with Upright Citizens Brigade. Training with actors without wanting to be one myself has given me a different, more informed perspective on casting and performance.”
Kelly made his debut directing for a U.S. agency with a comedic “Rome” spot for TripAdvisor.com out of Johannes Leonardo, NY. He then went on to helm a musical comedy piece for Sabra Salsa out of Strawberry Frog, NY, in which farmers sing about their tomato crop.
Kelly’s formal education spanned advertising and photography as he studied at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology as well as the Victorian College of the Arts where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in fine arts with a photography major. As a student, he had early success at the D&AD competition, gaining recognition for his writing of radio ads. “Even if I had gone for art direction jobs out of college, I would have wound up being hired as a writer,” he said. “And that was all for the best because on the advertising side I was more interested in writing than being an art director despite loving photography.”
As it turned out, Kelly said his writing and agency experience has served him in good stead as a director. “For one, it’s very important as a new director to be able to create a strong treatment because you have to do all you can to convince creatives that you are the right person and have the right vision for the job. Coming from the agency side, I also appreciate emotionally how important the work is to creatives. I remember as a writer sometimes spending months and months trying to get from concept to screen–there are so many processes to go through, especially on global accounts. For creatives, the concept they come to a director with is a big deal, It’s something that’s been with them for a very long time.”
Gus Black
A spot which shows the bond between a man and his dog is also helping to connect director Gus Black with the ad community at large. Titled “Friends Are Waiting,” the PSA marks Black’s first major splash as a commercial director.
An accomplished music video director with credits spanning such artists as Green Day, the Eels, Deftones, Atlas Genius, Goo Goo Girls and Nashville rock act The Wild Feathers, Black joined Traveling Picture Show Company (TPSC) about a year ago to break into commercials and branded content. He has helmed several projects at TPSC but his recent spot promoting Anheuser-Busch InBev’s 5th annual Global Be(er) Responsible Day (September 19) elicited an off-the-charts response; at press time, “Friends Are Waiting” had amassed nearly 18 million YouTube views and counting. A shorter version of the spot is also getting play on television.
The spot illustrates the importance of drinking responsibly which includes not getting behind the wheel of a car while impaired. “Friends Are Waiting” introduces us to a young man and his Labrador as we see their friendship build over the years, back to when the man was a lad. Then one day the guy and his buddies go out, leaving the pooch behind to wait at home for the return of his master. However, the wait is inordinately long as nighttime passes. A supered message notes that sometimes the waiting never ends.
Fortunately the man finally returns home the next morning, much to the dog’s delight. Out drinking, he decided to sleep at a friend’s house rather than drive, making for a happy reunion with “man’s best friend.”
Exhibiting a deft directorial and storytelling touch, the tug-at-the-heartstrings commercial came from ad agency Momentum, which served as a creative consultant on the job. TPSC and The Big Tree produced the piece. “When John Noble [TPSC exec producer] relayed the storyboard to me, I immediately thought this was the ideal job. I’ve worked a lot with dogs and the message and story were just perfect,” said Black whose affinity for canines had already translated into a Beneful (Purina) dog food campaign from St. Louis’ Checkmark Communications. He is also working on a philanthropic music video project with Warner Bros. Records and Hill Holliday which will promote Best Friends, an animal rescue organization whose efforts include finding good homes for dogs.
Black’s storytelling talent is also evident in his music video work, which is what attracted TPSC to the director. When Black joined the company roster last year, Noble related, “What really drew us to Gus were his conceptual storytelling abilities, his unique sense to bring a song to life in a special way; we know this skillset can also be translated when telling a brand story. Gus’ work on The Wild Feathers video had an immediate impression on me, gorgeous visuals coupled with strong conceptual storytelling. He’s a writer, director and songwriter too, a new multidiscipline perspective for us.”
Separate from TPSC, Randi Wilens of RW Media continues to rep Black for music videos. Black said that he still calls upon TPSC to produce some of his larger scale music videos.
Jono Hunter
Perhaps two jobs for Canadian ad agency john st. best encapsulate the directorial range of Jono Hunter who broke in on the roster of production house OPC//Family Style in Toronto just two years ago. The first is exFEARiential, an agency self-promotional short which takes to a shockingly outlandish level the practice of pranking consumers in order to attain viral video status. This over-the-top, darkly comedic piece–which also features john st. staffers nonchalantly discussing their fear-inducing work in banking, retail and B to B–won a Bronze Lion at Cannes this year. Earlier exFEARiential won an award at The One Club’s One Screen Film Festival, the global short film and video competition for the film and advertising industries. The tongue-in-cheek john st. promo arguably represents Hunter’s biggest directing splash to date, helping to further his growing reputation in comedy.
On the flip side, a lower profile spot for the Canadian Nurses Association out of john st. shows the subtle, caring interaction between a nurse and a patient who has suffered a relapse. The two share a warm smile as she tends to him at his home. A super appears on screen asking, “How do you make sure his spirit doesn’t relapse too?”
“I’m interested in exploring performance and human interactions. I don’t want to limit myself to one particular genre,” affirmed Hunter. “For the Canadian Nurses Association, we cast actual nurses, with all the other characters being actors. We were able to develop a caring bond between the nurses and actors.”
Early on in his career, Hunter’s range in comedy has also been showcased–just juxtapose exFEARiential with the subtle, simple approach of a Big Brothers Vancouver campaign for DDB Vancouver based on the premise that “being a Big Brother takes less time than you think.” One 15-second PSA, for example, shows an adult Big Brother driving a car with a lad next to him in the front passenger seat. The boy asks if it’s alright to say certain cuss words which are all bleeped out. Each time the Big Brother says “No,” underscoring that at times it’s simple to give needed guidance to a youngster.
Hunter has also journeyed into the surreal with his short film The Dentist which debuted at last year’s London International Film Festival, garnering nominations for Best Short and Best Supporting Actor. The Dentist has gone on to gain additional exposure on the festival circuit.
OPC//Family Style provided support for the short and for that matter has played a key role in Hunter’s directorial career from the outset. After film school, he served as a production assistant on assorted jobs while continuing to serve as a musician in bands he and his friends put together. One production manager was particularly supportive, scheduling him on PA gigs in and around his band touring exploits. That production manager worked frequently for OPC/Family Style and Hunter began to form a bond with the people at the company. In the meantime, he took advantage of certain circumstances.
“We’d get this gear on Friday but wouldn’t be shooting until Monday,” Hunter recalled. “So I would occasionally use the gear to shoot over the weekend, making spec spots and weird short films.
“The executives here [at OPC//Family Style] saw the work, and then they saw even more as I kept active. I think they realized I wasn’t going away,” quipped Hunter, adding, “They were very supportive, giving me some internal projects to do and I started to form relationships with creatives, which led to bigger pieces and eventually my joining the company’s directing roster.”
Hunter hasn’t let go of his musical endeavors. He continues as a member of a couple of bands–playing bass for one, guitar for the other. And he has over the past year been developing a feature film project. Meanwhile his commercialmaking endeavors are ongoing, among the latest being a Maple Leaf Meats spot from john st. featuring pioneering female ice hockey player Hayley Wickenheiser who’s represented Canada at the Winter Olympics five times, capturing four Gold Medals and one Silver. Among Hunter’s other notable commercialmaking credits are the humorous Oatmeal Crisp “Marionette” from Canadian agency Cossette, and Warchild’s “Surrogaid” from john st.
Scott Pitts
For the third consecutive year, director/cameraman Scott Pitts’ food/tabletop work will be showcased at the New York Food Film Festival. His career progression is in a sense reflected in the evolving circumstance of his festival fare. Back in 2012, two of his spec pieces were screened–one a bacon-wrapped steak spot, the other a loving look at the making of a pistachio, orange glazed doughnut. This spec work took on a viral life of its own, including the bacon-wrapped steak video garnering play and coverage from The Huffington Post.
Then in 2013, Pitts returned to the NY Food Film Fest with a spec spot starring the Paloma cocktail, which is a grapefruit-based margarita. This time around, though, the spec piece caught the attention of Starbucks which resulted in Pitts being awarded a real-world commercial titled “Simple.” Out of agency Marlin in Springfield, Missouri, the spot takes viewers inside a Starbucks cup to see how the cream interacts with the coffee.
And at the 2014 NY Food Film Festival this month, Pitts will again see his work front and center–but this time it will be a real-world California Tomato Farmers piece showing the making of a bacon, lettuce, tomato and avocado sandwich, perked up further by a tomato jam. So in three consecutive NY Festivals, Pitts has gone from spec work in year one to spec work the next year resulting in an actual commercial, and finally to a real-world online spot being on display for food aficionados, gourmets and professionals from around the world.
At press time, Pitts was directing and shooting live action and print for a client-direct California Table Grapes Commission campaign. He did the same for a client-direct Northwest Cherries campaign. “Stills matching the video in some respects provides a kind of brand continuity which I think is important,” contended Pitts. “Memory reflex can be advantageous. If people see the still at the point of sale, it may conjure up images in motion that they’ve seen on TV or on the Internet, reinforcing an appetite-appealing experience.”
Pitts has spent over 10 years shooting food still photography for assorted clients and agencies as a partner (with E.J. Armstrong) at Armstrong Pitts Studios, Seattle. A couple of years ago, he gravitated towards and diversified into live-action food/tabletop work, initially of an experimental spec nature. As that spec work has yielded more real-world live-action assignments, often in tandem with his still photography as part of overall integrated campaigns, Pitts began to elicit interest from commercial production houses, culminating in the director landing at his first full-fledged spotmaking roost, Twist, which provides production, sales support and bases of operation in such markets as NY, Los Angeles and Minneapolis.
In terms of his food/tabletop approach, Pitts identified the number one dynamic as being “appetite appeal.” He observed that “there’s appetite appeal in imperfections–you don’t have to go the traditional route of pristine looking food like the perfect lemon squeeze over a plate of sizzling shrimp. For me, that food doesn’t seem real. It looks plastic and consumers are more sophisticated today and don’t respond to it as the public once did. All these restaurant ads often look the same on TV; their food doesn’t stand out. My approach is to celebrate the imperfections of food which makes it unique and appealing. While the overhead angle perspective on food remains popular in the still world, not so in video. I’ve often gone with that perspective on my moving picture live-action work–it’s a cookbook perspective that can make people hungry.”
Another factor in Pitts’ approach is an active involvement in music and audio design. “What does a tomato sound like when it’s sliced? Who knows? But you can be creative and engaging with it,” related Pitts. “Adding the right sound and accompaniment can make your work layered, more interesting, relatable and accessible. My intent is to show food in ways that are imperfect and more approachable.”
