The Toys "R" Us store in Times Square is always packed with fun and colorful toys—but how do all of them get there every day by 10 in the morning? They take the PATH train, of course.
Goodby, Silverstein & Partners (GS&P), San Francisco, puts forth that humorous premise in "The Next Shift," an imaginative spot shot in and around Manhattan and featuring a plucky pool of inanimate talent. Directed by Frank Budgen, who is represented in Europe by Gorgeous Enterprises, London, and by bicoastal Anonymous Content for stateside work, "The Next Shift" depicts real toys commuting to Toys "R" Us Times Square—which has no storage space—in a variety of ways. A Barbie doll waits for the subway; a bathtub tugboat ferries across the Hudson River; a tiny Volkswagen Beetle navigates its way through Chinatown traffic; plastic parachutists drop out of the sky in front of the store; and Geoffrey the Giraffe takes an escalator—all in an effort to get to "work" on time.
The latest in a series of ads illustrating how different companies benefit from using Hewlett-Packard (HP) software and hardware, "The Next Shift" has an underlying message: It’s HP technology—not unusually resourceful Elmo dolls—that enables the store to restock its shelves on a daily basis. "This was a really simple way of showing how [HP] makes sure these toys get from a warehouse in New Jersey to the Toys ‘R’ Us Times Square store in Manhattan," says copywriter John Knecht, who came up with the idea of commuting toys "about half an hour into the flight on the way back [to San Francisco] after visiting the store."
Instead of using CG New York backdrops, the team from GS&P opted to fly across the country and shoot the spot in the city. "What we wanted to do was portray the toys realistically, and put them in as real a New York commuter environment as possible," explains John Norman, group creative director/art director, who shares the art directing credit on the spot with associate creative director Todd Grant; Elizabeth O’Toole and Colleen Wellman served as agency producers on "The Next Shift."
Creative director Steve Simpson agrees. "[The relationship between] Toys ‘R’ Us and HP is, from my perspective, one of the single most successful examples of what we’re trying to do with the campaign," he says, adding that the spot’s success hinges on its realism, as well as its subtlety.
Simpson credits Budgen with bringing both qualities to the ad. "You could imagine [the spot] in the hands of some other directors—it would have been cloying and sweet," he says. "Frank’s sophistication and lack of sentimentality in the way he shoots things, his intelligence and restraint—all those things kept it from being sappy."
"I think what he brought was a subtle charm to the spot," Norman concurs. "It’s very polished. Very Frank Budgen."
Not surprisingly, Budgen was the creative team’s first choice to helm "The Next Shift." "When we set out to do the campaign, we had a list of directors that we really wanted to work with. He was at the top of that list," notes Simpson. "We were really pleased that he was interested—on the basis of a few more spots we’d done—in working with us."
A highly collaborative director, Budgen "convinced everybody that a toy should move in the spot only if it moves [in real life]," Simpson reports. "He didn’t want to do any kind of special effects or tricks."
Budgen and the team then picked toys—like the sea-worthy little boat and the parachuting action figures—that could potentially "commute" well. "His way of shooting it really dictated the toy selection," Simpson explains.
On Location
In turn, the New York locations were selected based on the toys. "If it floated, we wanted to see the New York skyline in the morning, so we went on the Hudson," Norman relates. "It was a matter of finding the best location that fit the way the toy moved."
One of Norman’s favorite shots was that of the VW beetle in traffic. "It came from one of the scouting shots Frank did," he says. "He was very good at finding the most picturesque New York scenes."
"We spent a lot of money on scouts," adds Lisa Margulis, an executive producer at Anonymous who worked with Budgen on the project. "Frank had the location scouts use toys in their shots, [which] gave him a pretty good idea whether an idea [would work] or not. Or Frank would see something—say a good parking garage on 137th, or an aboveground subway."
Though Harris Savides served as DP, he began work in the middle of the five-day shoot, which occurred on two consecutive October weekends. "For the first two days, it was a skeletal crew, with Frank shooting pretty nimbly throughout the city," Margulis recalls. "On the next weekend, it was a bigger crew with Harris shooting. We got quite a lot done on those days as well."
According to Knecht, Savides and Budgen strove to create the spot’s edgy look. "In a lot of their discussions, they talked about film stock," he remembers. "A lot of it was to try and make [the backgrounds] look flat. They wanted to bring in some of the darkness and the scariness of a big city."
Shot largely in inclement weather, "The Next Shift" effectively evokes early winter mornings in New York. "Everything around the toys is kind of muted," Simpson points out. "It brings out the brightness—the sort of joyous coloring—of the toys. All those primary colors, like on that little tugboat. It’s bright yellow, bright blue and bright red, shot against this skyline that’s inky."
Because the crew was "fighting the light and the subtle current" of the Hudson, Norman says the tugboat scene was probably the most challenging of the bunch. Still, being on location in Manhattan posed no real problems. "Since we were shooting during the weekends, it wasn’t that difficult to block off the streets," he relates.
And, Knecht quips, "the toys were mostly cooperative. I think The Hulk [action figure] is the only one who charged overtime."
Kidding aside, Margulis was often impressed by the "acting abilities" of the talent. "It was very interesting shooting toys because you expect no reaction from them, yet their non-reaction becomes a very subtle piece of acting that moves you as much as a live actor would," she states. "The wind in Barbie’s hair was almost melancholy, as was the [stuffed] giraffe coming up the escalator. And Elmo going down the elevator was funny on set, but set to music, it became deeper somehow."
