From Spec Spot To Emmy Winner
By Millie Takaki
A leap of faith catapulted a directorial career much further than the aspiring helmer himself could have envisioned. The steadfast belief was in a concept for a Hallmark Cards spot that had taken a backseat to another commercial but David Harner, then a creative at Leo Burnett USA, Chicago, felt that “Required Reading” required special attention so it wouldn’t get lost in the shuffle. Having directed occasionally while at Burnett, he sought to have the commercial made on spec, linking with executive producer Scott Gardenhour of The Institute for the Development of Enhanced Perceptual Awareness, Venice, Calif., who was receptive to and supportive of the idea.
Harner and Gardenhour called in favors to get “Required Reading” produced on a tight budget. Harner directed the spot via The Institute. The spec piece was then screened for the client who embraced it immediately, leading to its debut during a Hallmark Hall of Fame telecast. While that would normally be the culmination of a spec odyssey, it was only the prelude as the two-minute-and-45-second spot went on to earn a primetime commercial Emmy Award this past August, tying for the coveted honor with FedEx’s “Stick” directed by Traktor of bicoastal/international Partizan for BBDO New York.
In “Required Reading,” Ed, a man in his 50s, reluctantly walks into a classroom for reading lessons. The teacher starts him with a children’s book, the title of which he can’t even read. Later that night, he takes the bus home from school as a girl passenger notices the book in his backpack. He “explains” that the book is his daughter’s. Subsequent classroom lessons show Ed slowly yet steadily making progress until he can read on his own. We then see him at home opening a box containing greeting cards he’s received over his lifetime. He reads the first one out aloud: “Papa means love. I know this is true. I know it because my papa is you. Happy Father’s Day, Papa.” It is signed, “Love, Jenny.”
Harner not only directed “Required Reading,” but also served as creative director/writer/art director. Burnett group creative director Tim Pontarelli was creative director/copywriter on the job. Shortly after completing the commercial, longtime agency creative Harner jumped over to the production house side of the business, joining The Institute to pursue his directing career. He chose The Institute based on the positive experience he had there on “Required Reading” and the commitment of Gardenhour to help make the spot a reality.
“I liked working with Scott, felt we were on the same wavelength in terms of our outlook on advertising and the new directions it is moving into,” relates Harner whose agency pedigree appealed to The Institute not only relative to helming commercials but also in terms of creating and developing original entertainment content as the advertising industry branches out into different forms.
“Scott and I are very much into content ranging from programs to Webisodes and so on,” continues Harner. “So many people, for example, are going on the Internet–for them the Internet has become their TV and the prospect of creating programming for that medium, and other mediums, is quite exciting. Scott could go out and sign all kinds of directors. But he told me his prime interest was in directors like me who are capable of writing longer form content.”
A veteran ad agency creative, Harner started at Hill Holliday Connors Cosmopulos, Boston, as an art director who wrote much of his own work. He then relocated to Manhattan where he spent the next 10 years, seven at BBDO New York, moving up the ladder from senior art director to a VP/group creative director who ran the new products group. Next came stints as group creative director at Young & Rubicam and Ammirati & Puris, both in New York. Harner was then lured to Chicago some six years ago by Burnett creative mainstay Cheryl Berman with the opportunity to diversify his creative work into longer format commercials, with Hallmark specifically in mind.
Along the way during his Burnett tenure came the chance to also direct some select projects, including fare for such clients as Allstate and Petsmart. Harner began building a director’s reel. But the high-profile breakthrough project turned out to be “Required Reading.” He has since at The Institute directed commercials for Safeway via Berlin Cameron, New York, and some Canadian fare for A&W out of agency Rethink, Vancouver, B.C.
Harner is grateful for his agency creative endeavors spanning a wide range of clients, describing the experience as invaluable for his transition to director. He cited working on Hallmark as an education unto itself.
“Hallmark is the ideal client,” observes Harner. “They have a tradition of creating their own content and entertaining people. With the Hallmark Hall of Fame and the commercials airing during it–commercials that viewers actually look forward to seeing–a deep brand loyalty is being created that gets to the very essence of what Hallmark is about, touching people emotionally. That type of brand advertising is special and sets the bar high for what we need to do more of.”
Aspiring to that lofty goal, notes Harner, “with the added challenge of now trying to reach people, especially teens, who don’t watch television as much anymore, means that we have to think differently–both in terms of the commercials we do and the new content we develop.”
Review: Writer-Director Andrea Arnold’s “Bird”
"Is it too real for ya?" blares in the background of Andrea Arnold's latest film, "Bird," a 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams) rides with her shirtless, tattoo-covered dad, Bug (Barry Keoghan), on his electric scooter past scenes of poverty in working-class Kent.
The song's question — courtesy of the Irish post-punk band Fontains D.C. — is an acute one for "Bird." Arnold's films ( "American Honey," "Fish Tank") are rigorous in their gritty naturalism. Her fiction films — this is her first in eight years — tend toward bleak, hand-held verité in rough-and-tumble real-world locations. Her last film, "Cow," documented a mother cow separated from her calf on a dairy farm.
Arnold specializes in capturing souls, human and otherwise, in soulless environments. A dream of something more is tantalizing just out of reach. In "American Honey," peace comes to Star (Sasha Lane) only when she submerges underwater.
In "Bird," though, this sense of otherworldly possibility is made flesh, or at least feathery. After a confusing night, Bailey awakens in a field where she encounters a strange figure in a skirt ( Franz Rogowski ) who arrives, like Mary Poppins, with a gust a wind. His name, he says, is Bird. He has a soft sweetness that doesn't otherwise exist in Bailey's hardscrabble and chaotic life.
She's skeptical of him at first, but he keeps lurking about, hovering gull-like on rooftops. He cranes his neck now and again like he's watching out for Bailey. And he does watch out for her, helping Bailey through a hard coming of age: the abusive boyfriend (James Nelson-Joyce) of her mother (Jasmine Jobson); her half brother (Jason Buda) slipping into vigilante violence; her father marrying a new girlfriend.
The introduction of surrealism has... Read More