Director Frank Budgen–co-founder of venerable production house Gorgeous, and acclaimed for his brilliant commercialmaking–has died at the age of 61. He had battled cancer in recent years but was thought to be in remission.
Among his iconic work were Nike’s “Tag” in 2001 (Wieden+Kennedy, Portland, Ore.) and Sony PlayStation 2’s “Mountain” (TBWA\London) in 2003, which both earned Grand Prix distinction at Cannes. Budgen was recognized, along with Tony Kaye, as the industry’s most awarded director at D&AD’s 50th anniversary awards show in 2012.
Budgen enjoyed a long run in the upper echelon of most awarded directors per the annual Gunn Report. Furthermore, among assorted other honors, Budgen was twice nominated for the DGA Award as Best Commercial Director of the Year. The first Guild nom came for his work in 2007, specifically Sony Bravia Television’s “Playdoh” out of Fallon, London, and Live Earth’s “S.O.S., Save Our Selves” for Y&R, Chicago. The former was produced by Gorgeous, London, The latter was produced by Gorgeous and Anonymous Content, which handled the stateside market for Budgen and several of his Gorgeous directorial colleagues for a 10-year stretch. (That changed in 2012 when Gorgeous opened its own operation in the U.S.)
Budgen’s second DGA nomination was bestowed upon his entries for the year 2010: Sony Bravia’s “World Cup” and “Thunderstruck” from Anomaly, New York and London, and Honda’s “RGB” out of Wieden+Kennedy, London. Shortly after he earned this nomination in January 2011, Budgen said of the Guild-recognized work, “They’re all simple ideas which often can turn out to be the best and most challenging.”
At the time of his first DGA Award nomination, which was announced in January 2008, Budgen related, “Every few years there’s a client who does one big commercial a year and that work is eagerly anticipated from one year to the next. In the past, it’s been a Stella Artois or Guinness. But in recent years, it’s been Sony [Bravia] from Fallon. I had passed on some of the previous Sony work, which perhaps wasn’t too smart. But I very much liked this spot [in which assorted colorful Playdoh bunnies invade the streets of New York, eventually helping to form one giant bunny which breaks up into a cavalcade of colorful Playdoh TV sets strewn about the city]. It was a chance to combine live action and animation…It was logistically as tough a project as I’ve ever done. It was old fashioned stop frame animation, with my work, done not with a cine camera but in stills. The sheer scale of the project was huge, flying in animators from England and Canada, and using ones we could get in America. Achieving consistency of lighting in the streets of New York was an ongoing challenge, with sunlight coming out from behind one building and disappearing behind another.”
The Sony Bravia “Playdoh” spot also scored the top ad honor at the 2008 Annecy International Animated Film Festival.
Sony Bravia 'Play Doh' from Passion Pictures on Vimeo.
Beyond his artistic and aesthetic sensibilities, Budgen brought to his spot filmmaking the practical experience of having been an agency creative. He started out as a copywriter at BBDO London, moving on to Saatchi & Saatchi and BMP DDB Needham. He began directing commercials at the latter shop, and then broke out to direct full-time in 1991. He teamed with director Chris Palmer and executive Paul Rothwell to launch Gorgeous in 1997.
