CHICAGO—Earlier this year (SHOOT‘s "Street Talk," 8/15-29, p. 38), Jeff Labbé exited his post as a senior VP/creative director at Leo Burnett USA, Chicago, in order to pursue a directing career. He has since made good on that plan, relocating to Los Angeles and making his spot directorial debut with "Bus," a client-direct PSA for the United Neighborhood Organization (UNO), a longstanding Chicago-based group dedicated to strengthening the Hispanic community through stabilizing, enfranchising and revitalizing local neighborhoods.
Bicoastal Headquarters produced "Bus," recruiting artisans and calling in favors along with Labbé to get the job done within the constraints of an extremely tight budget. Labbé has not signed with Headquarters. In fact, he hasn’t committed to any commercial production company. Labbé noted, however, that he had a positive experience helming the UNO job at Headquarters, and cited the company’s managing director Shelly Townsend and president Tom Mooney as being very supportive of not only the project but also of him as a director.
It was Eric King who introduced Labbé to Townsend. King—who worked closely with Labbé at his roost prior to Burnett, TBWA/Chiat/Day, San Francisco—made the transition from agency creative to full-time director some 10 months ago, joining Headquarters in January.
When Labbé’s decision to focus on directing became publicly known, it generated high expectations given his creative pedigree. Prior to joining Burnett in 2002, he enjoyed a successful tenure at the aforementioned TBWA/Chiat/Day, perhaps most notably for his contributions as a writer/art director to the FOX Sports/Major League Baseball campaign, "Beware of Things Made in October," directed by Baker Smith of Santa Monica-based harvest.
Labbé teamed with writer/art director King, executive creative director Chuck McBride, copywriter Scott Wild and producer Betsy Beale (now executive producer at bicoastal editorial house Lost Planet) on the FOX package. The spots—"Nail Gun," "Leaf Blower" and "Boat"—went on to individually and/or collectively gain accolades at such competitions in ’02 as the Cannes International Advertising Festival, the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP) Show, the London Design & Art Direction (D&AD) Awards, the One Show, the Clios and the Andy Awards. "Nail Gun" also received a primetime Emmy Award nomination in ’02, and helped Smith earn his first of two consecutive Directors Guild of America (DGA) nominations as best spot director of the year.
Before his two-and-a-half year tenure at TBWA/Chiat/Day, Labbé spent three years as a creative at Wieden+Kennedy, Portland, Ore.
"BUS"
Labbé not only directed but also served as creative director/ writer on "Bus," working with two former Burnett colleagues, copywriter Nick Cade and art director Adrien Bindi. Cade and Bindi—who worked independently on the PSA, separate from their ongoing duties at Burnett—were drawn to a prime UNO initiative, which is to help bring down the high school dropout rate among Hispanic teens. The creatives came up with an initial concept to address that issue, then dovetailed with Labbé for creative director support and, as the project evolved, his participation as a director. Labbé and his creative compatriots presented the finished concept to UNO and won the organization’s approval.
"Bus" takes us to a sheriff’s squad car, which buzzes through inner city streets past possible criminal suspects, including a graffiti-writing teenager and a young man with a gun tucked away in the waistband of his pants. But the law enforcement officers don’t seem to care; their sights are instead focused on a school bus.
The squad car cuts the bus off, causing it to stop as the nervous students on board start to hide their books and school supplies as if they were contraband. One boy puts notebook paper in his mouth in a futile attempt to swallow the "evidence." Sheriffs raid the bus and begin rousting the students. An officer puts a chokehold on the kid with the mouthful of paper in an attempt to get those written notes regurgitated. Another officer frisks a female student, finding a textbook hidden in her jeans. He then clasps handcuffs on her as if she were a felon.
A male student suddenly bolts out the bus’ emergency exit door in a bid to escape. As soon as he jumps into the street, a group of officers surround him—backup help and squad cars have encircled the bus. The youngster’s backpack hits the street, and a calculator is knocked loose onto the ground.
These bizarre arrests of students are put into perspective by a succession of three supers, which fill the screen against a black background: "No One Has Ever Been Busted For Going To School," "82% Of All Convicted Criminals are Dropouts," and "United Neighborhood Organization." The latter super is accompanied by UNO’s Web site address (www.uno-online.org).
Both the :60 and :30 versions—in English and Spanish—of this :90 have aired in the Midwest. The :90 is currently on UNO’s Web site. Labbé was attracted to the project because of the important message being promoted. "Last year, seventy-thousand Hispanic students dropped out in greater Illinois," he related. "That dropout rate is tragic. Sitting down with the client and seeing that its heart is in the right place—and the commitment to the cause on the part of Nick and Adrien—spurred this project on. So many people and companies wound up contributing their services and resources on a pro bono basis."
Labbé’s support team at Headquarters included Mooney; Townsend, who served as executive producer on the job; head of production Cyn Guzman; and producer Tim Harmon. The DP was Eric Treml.
Editor was Steve Prestemon of Mad River Post, Santa Monica. Online editor/Henry artist was Ben Looram of A52, Los Angeles. Colorist was PJ Marsiglia of Company 3, Santa Monica. Trisha Wilson produced for Company 3. Audio mixer was Jeff Payne of Eleven, Santa Monica. Music was donated by the band Molotov through Universal Music Publishing Group, Los Angeles.
Meanwhile, Labbé continues to be in the market for a production house roost. He has a couple of spot directorial assignments pending, but wasn’t at liberty to discuss them at press time.
