Allen Martinez didn’t want to be a director. He wanted to be a drummer. He moved to Los Angeles from a small town outside of Chicago in ’89, and studied at Hollywood’s Musician Institute for two years. During that time, Martinez played everything from funk to country in Los Angeles clubs. "But my career wasn’t going like I wanted it to, so I choose another dead-end career—art," says Martinez, who now directs spots out of Tate & Partners, Santa Monica. Martinez enrolled at the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, Calif., with a major in advertising. He took a course in filmmaking, and his teacher was so impressed by Martinez that he encouraged him to change departments.
"We sat out in the parking lot after class for an hour, and he’s telling me why I should switch over to the film department," says Martinez. "I’m the kind of guy who was never good at sports—you know, always intramural everything—and here’s this guy saying, ‘You’re really good at something.’"
It was good advice. After earning honors from the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP) Show in ’98 and ’99, Martinez seems to have found his true calling. "I’ve gotten a lot of attention in a relatively short period of time," he says. "Any attention is good. We’re just trying to create a buzz and say, ‘Hey, I exist.’"
The spot honored by the AICP in the low budget category in’99 was "Kaboom," for Ugly Duckling Car Sales, via dGWB, Irvine, Calif. A man stands on a desert roadside making a phone call from an emergency phone box. In the background is his broken-down car. As he tries to explain to a mechanic that the car is making an odd, "rah, rah" sound, the mechanic tries to determine exactly what the sound is. Suddenly, the auto explodes, and the frustrated motorist deadpans that the vehicle is now making a "boom" sound. The mechanic says, "A boom?" And the driver says, "A kaboom."
Martinez is reluctant to call himself a comedy director. "I’m always trying to find the balance in things," he says. "If you give me a comedy board—and my sense of comedy is more on the dry side—I’ll try to find the reality in a situation, because the reality is where the humor is. You have to really dig into the drama; then the humor will come out. In the same respect, if you gave me a really dramatic board, I’d try to find the irony in it, and use the irony to bring out humor, so [the spot] isn’t so heavy."
Martinez found that balance late last year with Totes’ "Flambé," out of Sive/Young & Rubicam, Cincinnati. The ad features a man and woman enjoying a romantic dinner. As a waiter prepares to flambé the dessert for the couple, he is captivat-