It’s been a year and a half since Chuck Bennett and Clay Williams—a.k.a. the directing duo of Chuck & Clay—left their posts as managing partners/creative directors at TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles, where they worked for five years, to join Crossroads Films, bicoastal and Chicago. Since then, what’s apparent about the team’s work as directors is that you can take the creative out of the agency, but you can’t take the creativity out of the creative. Simply put: When these guys approach a job, their agency life is very much at the root of their thinking.
"As directors we look at the whole picture," explains Williams. "They’re not hiring us to execute exactly what it is that’s handed to us. People hire us to plus their ideas and help figure out what’s going to be best."
"Plus" is a word used frequently by the team, perhaps because Chuck & Clay work by compounding each other’s ideas, making them better—and funnier. While they’re not limited to comedy, creating spots with that play-it-straight-kind of humor is their strong suit.
One of the greatest testaments to Chuck & Clay’s ability to build on a concept is the amount of repeat business they get from agencies. At press time, the duo had just finished shooting a second round of Diet Dr Pepper spots out of Young & Rubicam (Y&R), New York. The commercials, due to break in January, carry the same theme as the first package of Diet Dr Pepper ads they helmed last year—some things just aren’t as good as the original.
The first batch of Diet Dr Pepper work featured spoofs of pop culture fixtures. "Green Bay Watch" presents a Wisconsin-based parody of the opening sequence for the beach melodrama Baywatch. Bikini-clad Pamela Anderson-types and muscled men toting life-saving devices such as jumper cables run around in the snow, looking buff and sexy, while a theme song extolls the virtues of Wisconsin in winter. Another spot, "Hudson Riverdance," features out-of-shape men with big guts performing that famous Irish quick step onstage. Subsequent ads, including "Mating Game" and "Crime Family Feud," all carried the tagline, "Not everything can be as good as the original, but Diet Dr Pepper is."
"Diet Dr Pepper was a huge break for us," states Bennett. "We were new and not really proven, and Y&R totally took a chance on us."
For their second round of ads for the soft drink, Chuck & Clay were single bid, and they feel it’s the best work they’ve helmed to date. "[Y&R] stepped up the work and we’re a year stronger than what we had been, so we look at the dailies now and we’re very happy with [the new Diet Dr Pepper campaign]," Bennett relates.
Another big break came last fall when Chuck & Clay were awarded a three-spot package for the Internet search engine Lycos, out of Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos (HHCC), Boston. The ads—"Skeet," "Poor Kid" and "Wise Guy"—each chronicle an adult testimonial of a childhood shopping trauma, the pain of which has been eased by shopping on Lycos. For instance, "Wise Guy" tells the story of a woman whose mobster father shopped "after hours." After the initial trio, Chuck & Clay were tapped to shoot two more Lycos spots: "Doorbell" and "Fantasy Sports."
"Almost every agency we’ve worked with, we’ve ended up working with again, which is really gratifying," says Bennett, noting that they had just completed shooting a second package of ads— "Levitate," "Stocking" and "Test Dummy—for Red Lobster. The first Red Lobster campaign included "Guided Tour," "Patent Office" and "Welcome Wagon." It was done through McConnaughy Stein Schmidt Brown, which later became a part of Euro RSCG Tatham; the newly merged agency is now known as Euro RSCG McConnaughy Tatham, Chicago.
Repeat business aside, one of the more rewarding aspects of Chuck & Clay’s directing career thus far has been earning recognition as directors first, and not as agency creatives who direct. "The longer we direct," Bennett observes, "the more people don’t know that we were at an agency at one point—which is great, because in that sense we’re getting work solely on the basis of our reel and our abilities as directors."
YO QUIERO DIRECTING
Nevertheless, it’s hard to talk about Bennett and Williams without mentioning their legacy as the creators of the Taco Bell Chihuahua while they were at TBWA/Chiat/ Day. The little pup is, after all, a commercial icon that already has a firm place in the annals of advertising history. While proud of that accomplishment, Bennett and Williams are trying to move beyond it.
"[Creating the Chihuahua] was a fun thing to have done in advertising, but it doesn’t really pertain that much anymore the way it did a while ago," says Williams. Instead, what the Chihuahua has done has given the two an opportunity to take their careers to a different place.
While still at TBWA/Chiat/Day, Bennett and Williams started volunteering to direct spots, particularly for Taco Bell. Ads such as "Boat" and "Crank Call" not only ended up on the air, but also landed a place on Chuck & Clay’s early directing reel. All of the commercials they helmed while at the agency were run through bicoastal Morton Jankel Zander (MJZ). "We had done something like fifteen commercials with Rocky Morton [of MJZ] for Taco Bell, so we’d become good friends with [executive producer] David Zander and Rocky, and they helped us put a reel together," Bennett recalls.
"Elvis," an Energizer spot that the team directed through MJZ while at TBWA/Chiat/Day, became Chuck & Clay’s calling card when the two finally left the agency in the spring of 2000 to direct. In the ad, a gas station attendant who is enamored with Elvis (as evidenced by the unending Elvis memorabilia displayed in his gas station booth) is blessed one night when The King himself pulls into the station to fill up. Approaching Elvis for a picture, the attendant discovers that the batteries in his camera have run out. "The Elvis spot really worked in our favor because people had seen it on the air and liked it," reports Williams.
Armed with a reel of solid work and a reputation for great creative, the duo was courted by numerous production companies before landing at Crossroads. "It was flattering. We had so many people after us that it was a very, very difficult decision. It was very hard to call David Zander and say, ‘We’re not going to go with you,’ " Bennett relates.
Today, they have no regrets. The two are slated to helm a Sprint spot called "White Lie" for McCann-Erickson, New York. They already have a stockpile of well-received ads behind them from companies such as Expedia, Visa and Golden Grahams, and there seems to be no end in sight for returning clients such as Diet Dr Pepper and Red Lobster. One wonders if, after working together for nine years on the agency side and nearly two years directing, Bennett and Williams ever get sick of each other? Not a chance.
"It’s been a cool process, and I’m sure I’m going to get weepy in a moment," jokes Bennett. "From day one Clay and I have had this relationship where it’s always been about the idea. And it’s better than one mind, because it’s two different thoughts that always plus each other."
Williams chooses an analogy to explain their good karma. "There are certain friends that you can travel with and you get along," he relates, "and then there are other friends who you know will drive you nuts. We don’t drive each other nuts."
