Everybody’s got game in Los Angeles–at least in a new :30 for the Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP). Titled “Pass,” the spot created by L.A.’s TBWA/Chiat/Day opens on a dude sitting on a hillside when–to his surprise–a PSP falls from the sky and into his hands. He plays with the handheld video game system for a bit before deciding to share the fun, hurling it into the city where it continues to be enjoyed then passed along–via a toss–by everyone from a muscle car guy to rapper/actor Mos Def. Ultimately, the PSP winds up back in the original dude’s hands.
The idea to pass around a PSP was born in the minds of TBWA/Chiat/Day associate creative director/copywriter Brett Craig and associate creative director/art director Doug Mukai. The pair had also conceptualized a previous PSP spot titled “PSPOV.” Directed by Dave Meyers of bicoastal @radical.media, the music video-style “PSPOV” showed various people using a PSP but from the PSP’s point-of-view.
“Pass” focuses on the point-of-view of the user, but like “PSPOV” also demonstrates that “there are a lot of different people using the PSP in a lot of different ways,” according to Craig.
Craig and Mukai couldn’t help but throw a joke into “Pass.” In one scene, a guy on the street is thrilled when the PSP lands in his hands, but his girlfriend isn’t. In fact, she quickly rips the device out of his clutches and tosses it out into the ether. Any guy in the target demographic who has a girlfriend who resents his obsession with video games will certainly snicker at that humorous aside.
RUN-AND-GUN
While the idea behind “Pass” was straightforward enough, TBWA/Chiat/Day knew the spot, which called for multiple locations and actors of varied backgrounds and ethnicities, would work best in the hands of a director with the ability to shoot run-and-gun-style and a strong sense of casting. The agency found those qualities in not one but two directors–more specifically the directing duo of Jan Vogel and Rene Villar-Rios known as Vogel Villar-Rios or VVR for short. “We had seen some of their work for Coca-Cola and Nike,” Craig said of the pair that works out of bicoastal Believe Media, “and they seemed like they were connected to the [youth market] target and had a raw, real way of doing things.”
Craig witnessed the pair’s “raw, real way of doing things” first-hand when he worked with them. “They were into casting as many real people as they could, and when I say real people, they would grab people who were standing on the corner when we were scouting and sign them up,” Craig said laughing. One of those real people, for instance, was the kid we see playing hoops on a basketball court on Venice Beach. The muscle car guys were also actual muscle car enthusiasts, and the DJ really does spin records for a living.
“For us, our casting is crucial,” Vogel remarked. “In this case [TBWA/Chiat/Day] gave us a lot of freedom and that led to something original and cool. We love street casting and to find new faces– It takes time and feels like we are looking for a needle in a haystack. But the sweat is worth it. The original faces from the street bring a flavor that doesn’t exist in the regular commercial talent pool.”
Of course, it is one thing to cast real people. It is another thing entirely to get natural performances out of people who have no experience in front of the camera, but VVR was able to do just that for “Pass,” noted Believe Media executive producer Gerard Cantor.
POINT AND SHOOT
VVR, who in addition to being directors are also both DPs, shot “Pass” handheld on 35mm over the course of three days in Los Angeles. It certainly came in handy to work with directors who could also shoot, Craig said, pointing out, “They can divide and conquer. One can keep rolling on one scene, and the other one can go off to get something we need. That happened a lot when we were in a pinch.”
Actually, Craig mused, VVR never seemed to stand still. “It was nuts. Every day as the sun was setting they were still trying to get film. Right at the end of the last day, Jan was running across Venice beach out to the ocean trying to get one more shot,” Craig recalled. “Those guys really worked their butts off.”
VVR’s long-time gaffer Pat Grosswendt (who has worked with the likes of Robert Altman) was also an instrumental player in the production, Cantor said, praising Grosswendt for his ability to create the natural-looking lighting called for on this particular shoot.
Once the footage was shot, Bill Chessman of TBWA/Chiat/Day’s in-house editorial facility Venice Beach Editorial cut one :60 version of “Pass” (that has been finished for potential airing on television but is currently being shown on the Internet) and two :30s. As is the case with any spot, some of VVR’s favorite moments–including a barbershop scene and another involving a Vespa–had to be left on the cutting room floor. “It’s a shame, but it comes with the job,” Vogel reasoned. “You win some, you lose some.”
There was some effects work involved in “Pass.” ZOIC Studios, Los Angeles, had to go in and replace the green screen that covered the PSP screen during the shoot with game footage.
Meanwhile, the hip-hop soundtrack pulsating throughout the spot was composed by Ben Kahle of bicoastal Elias Arts. If one didn’t know better, one would assume the music was perhaps the work of Mos Def or another contemporary hip-hop artist. “Basically, the client said to us, ‘We want the song to be interesting enough that someone would want to download it,’ ” Craig said, “and Elias came up with this great original track.”
While everyone’s efforts combined to make “Pass” a great spot, one has to ask how the multiple PSPs employed during the shoot fared. Were any damaged? After all, they were being tossed from person to person all over Los Angeles. According to Craig, the cast was pretty good at catching and throwing them (rubber molds of PSPs were used for some of the bigger tosses), so none of the valuable devices were lost. “Only one person got smacked in the head with one,” Craig shared. “You just knew in three days of shooting that was inevitable.”
Hmmm. Wonder if Craig and company realize that one PSP actually did go missing. “Rene pocketed one,” Vogel tattled to SHOOT. “You can’t take the hood out of the homeboy.”
