Bill Weems.
I never met Bill. I talked to him once on the phone. Otherwise I only knew him by reputation. But he comes to mind frequently, most recently during last week’s 12-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
Bill was a commercial producer who was among the victims of hijacked United Airlines flight 175 which crashed into the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001. He lost his life at the age of 46.
Bill was en route from Boston to Los Angeles for the posting of a campaign for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star products directed by Danny Ducovny for advertising agency Mullen. Bill freelanced for both ad agencies and production houses.
Professionally, he was highly regarded. Personally even more so as a dedicated husband and father.
Bill and so many and so much more needs to be remembered–not just one day a year. A perspective that inspires and haunts me is what I naively thought in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.
I thought, for example, that we’d come together more than ever before as a country. I thought that serious journalism would make a major comeback. How could it not in light of what had just happened?
Fast forward to today and polarization rather than thoughtful, civil debate seems to be the norm in the court of public opinion.
As for the Fourth Estate, tabloid journalism has become mainstream.
By no coincidence, polarization and tabloid nonsense share a common bond–they’re generators of profit, with little or no regard for what the cost is to society at large.
That’s why BBDO New York’s campaign–print, media, outdoor, digital and video advertising–for The National September 11 Memorial & Museum struck a responsive chord for me.
In BBDO’s public service television spot produced by Brand New School and titled “Day To Remember,” which broke last week, a Robert De Niro voiceover relates:
“Take a day to reflect. To explore. To learn. To honor the best in humanity that overcame the worst. To remember compassion, kindness, courage. Take a day to remember the day that changed us forever.”
Utah Leaders and Locals Rally To Keep Sundance Film Festival In The State
With the 2025 Sundance Film Festival underway, Utah leaders, locals and longtime attendees are making a final push — one that could include paying millions of dollars — to keep the world-renowned film festival as its directors consider uprooting.
Thousands of festivalgoers affixed bright yellow stickers to their winter coats that read "Keep Sundance in Utah" in a last-ditch effort to convince festival leadership and state officials to keep it in Park City, its home of 41 years.
Gov. Spencer Cox said previously that Utah would not throw as much money at the festival as other states hoping to lure it away. Now his office is urging the Legislature to carve out $3 million for Sundance in the state budget, weeks before the independent film festival is expected to pick a home for the next decade.
It could retain a small presence in picturesque Park City and center itself in nearby Salt Lake City, or move to another finalist — Cincinnati, Ohio, or Boulder, Colorado — beginning in 2027.
"Sundance is Utah, and Utah is Sundance. You can't really separate those two," Cox said. "This is your home, and we desperately hope it will be your home forever."
Last year's festival generated about $132 million for the state of Utah, according to Sundance's 2024 economic impact report.
Festival Director Eugene Hernandez told reporters last week that they had not made a final decision. An announcement is expected this year by early spring.
Colorado is trying to further sweeten its offer. The state is considering legislation giving up to $34 million in tax incentives to film festivals like Sundance through 2036 — on top of the $1.5 million in funds already approved to lure the Utah festival to its neighboring... Read More