A good salesman seems to know what his customer wants—even when that customer talks as though her mouth were full of marbles. After all, if Dr. Doolittle can talk to the animals, why can’t a shoe salesman understand the babbling of a human female in need of footwear?
We find ourselves in a brightly lit shoe store, a piped-in instrumental rendition of Close to You playing in the background. An attractive young woman is seated, being waited on by a smiling, attentive sales clerk.
"You know, we have this in beige and in black," he informs her.
The woman never fully closes her wide-open mouth; her oral response is unintelligible, but not to the alert sales guy.
"Dinner party, sounds fancy," he says.
High-decibel garble continues to come out of the woman’s mouth.
"Need something strappy," recommends the knowing salesperson.
"Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah," replies the woman.
"Size seven," guesses the clerk.
This time we can at least make out a laugh in the woman’s voice.
"Eight," realizes the perceptive salesman. "OK, look around."
He heads off to the back room to pull out several size-eight pairs of shoes. He can smell the sale.
But the woman doesn’t rise from her chair. Instead she nervously bides her time by "singing" the ongoing Close to You in her own inimitable style. She’s carrying the tune, but the lyrics are incomprehensible as they leave her still-open mouth.
Another customer looks on—and listens—in disbelief. Our shoe salesman cheerfully returns, with several boxes of shoes.
"These are leather, so they might hurt a bit," he says, pointing the heel of one shoe towards her, then bringing it close up to her face.
Suddenly the scene transitions: The bright lighting turns cold and blue. The salesman becomes a dentist and the heel, a drill. The woman is seated in the dentist’s chair, her mouth numbed by Novocain and full of dental instruments. Her impaired vocal skills are now no longer incongruous with her surroundings: Obviously she was fantasizing about mall shopping to escape the reality of the dreaded dentist’s office.
A voiceover asks rhetorically, "Somewhere you’d rather be?"
A logo for Arizona’s Westcor shopping malls fills the screen. The voiceover concludes, "Westcor shopping centers—the perfect escape."
Titled simply "Dentist," this :30 was directed by Tim Ward of bicoastal Great Guns. Formerly an associate creative director at BBDO New York, Ward launched a directing career several months ago, joining the newly formed U.S. operation of London-headquartered Great Guns (SHOOT, 4/27, p. 1). Tom Korsan served as executive producer for Great Guns USA. Line producer was Mary Sanders. The commercial was shot by DP Anghel Decca.
The offbeat concept came from a creative team at agency Cramer-Krasselt, Phoenix, Ariz., consisting of creative director Ian Barry, associate creative director/group head Jon Shore, art director John Johnson, copywriter Travis Graham and producer Heather Candelaria.
"Dentist" was cut by editor Roger Holmberg of Phoenix-based Great Scott Productions. Colorist was Rob Sciarratta of Company 3, Santa Monica. Audio mixer/sound designer was Sam Esparza of Phoenix-based Big U Music.
