The decision to break into the U.S. market was an easy one for Danish director Kasper to answer. "I mean, it’s the U.S.," he notes, "that’s about it. It’s the biggest market. There’s a lot of good stuff coming out of the States, and I like the humor very much."
In fact, Kasper, who directs stateside spots via bicoastal Piper Productions, has been busy making a name for himself here for the last year by applying the comic sensibility and humorous style that’s served him so well in the rest of the world since 1996.
In 2000, he began getting recognition on the international stage. A spot he directed for the Volkswagen Lupo, "A Few Drops," out of DDB Paris and produced through Les Producers, Paris, won a gold Lion at the Cannes International Advertising Festival. He followed that up the next year with another Gold Lion for Interflora’s "Toolshop" out of Robert/Boisen & Likeminded, Copenhagen, Denmark. At this year’s Cannes festival, two of Kasper’s spots, Interflora’s "Remote Control," and "Figures" for TopDanmark Insurance, both out of Robert/Boisen & Likeminded, were shorlisted. The latter features porcelain figurines getting bumped to the edge of a table by loud music, almost falling to the ground and breaking.
In Europe, Kasper is repped by Bacon, Copenhagen, a company he co-founded with directors Martin Werner and Joachim Back. Prior to forming Bacon, he was repped in Europe through the now defunct Bullet, which produced all of the aforementioned spots with the exception of "A Few Drops" and "Figures," which was produced through Bacon.
Kasper’s first U.S. spot was called "Ode To Sausage," for Eckrich out of Grey Worldwide, New York. In it, regular looking guys dance around a grill in a Ziegfeld Follies-style musical number, bumping bellies and dueling with spatulas, singing of their love for sausage.
Kasper notes that while he directs humorous fare, he isn’t attracted to comedy for the sake of comedy alone—he’s attracted to ideas. "The best stuff I see is definitely comedy," he notes. "Actually, most of the stuff I see is comedy."
While Kapser receives boards with comedy themes, he notes that they aren’t always that funny. "It can be written as comedy and not be funny at all, which is ninety five percent of the time," he notes. "The other five percent, you get some really good and funny scripts or really good ideas."
Perhaps one reason that some of the silly scenarios behind Kasper’s spots work on a more subtle level is because he doesn’t go over-the-top visually. He admits that his style is rather unobtrusive. "I usually end up with a silent look," he says, "because the ideas that turn me on are pretty silent in a way. It’s like a real-life situation with a quirky twist. … What I’ve always been real careful about is not letting the style dominate the spot so that it overshadows the idea."
Two spots that demonstrate Kasper’s aesthetic are "Armor/Intro" and "Armor/Drawbacks" for the Washington State Lottery via Publicis in the West, Seattle. The spots feature a man who has won the lottery’s "Win for Life" games, meaning he’ll get a $1,000 a week for as long as he’s alive. To maximize his winnings, he’s encased himself in head-to-toe armor in order to ensure that he avoids any accidents that could prevent him from living a long life. Both spots present the winner attempting to act ordinary in the cumbersome armor. He’s pelted with golf balls, can’t catch a bus because the armor prevents him from running uphill, and he’s unable to use an ATM because his fingers are in armor-plated gloves.
"We had the whole agency and production crew standing with their little buckets of golf balls trying to hit this guy," relates Kasper, "and Kevin Kehoe, the creative director comes in and says ‘Stop, everyone, because I used to pitch in high school.” And then he just knocked this guy almost unconscious."
Kasper says that he really hasn’t had to change his style or approach for the U.S. market. But that doesn’t mean he hasn’t had to make certain adjustments. The biggest thing he’s had to get used to, he says, is that directors generally aren’t as involved in postproduction in the U.S. "That is a little strange for a European guy, because we are very involved in the post process," he says, but adds that when possible, he tries to be involved.
Kasper’s most recent U.S. credits include Miracle Whip’s "Research" out of J. Walter Thompson, Chicago, and "Slurp" for A1 Steak Sauce via FCB Chicago. In the latter, a very proper-looking man sits down to eat his carefully arranged steak dinner, while his faithful dog eats from his dish on the floor. Suddenly, slurping noises begin, but rather than coming from the dog, it turns out that the owner is making the offensive sounds in an effort to get the last drop of A1. One thing Kasper learned on that shoot is that he’s not crazy about working with animals, which he likens to working with models: "You know, that’s just what they do; they sit there and look pretty, and dogs just sit there and drool."n
