The frenzy of advertising awards show season will culminate later this month with the Cannes International Advertising Festival. Several spots and other projects have amassed a bushel of honors–among them a trio of adidas spots–“Carry,” “Unstoppable,” and “Made to Perfection; the Rainier Beer and Subservient Chicken integrated packages; and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children’s (NSPCC) “Ventriloquist.” In this week’s agency producers series, SHOOT talks to the producers behind this stellar work about how each project came to fruition.
ADIDAS
The three adidas spots promote the brand’s basketball shoes, and celebrate the athletes associated with the shoe and apparel maker. Each is likely to made a splash at Cannes. “Carry,” directed by Noam Murro of Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles, features Kevin Garnett, the forward for the Minnesota Timberwolves literally carrying what seems like an entire city on his shoulders, to the tune “The Whole World In His Hands,” from Etta James, while “Unstoppable,” helmed by Brian Beletic of bicoastal Smuggler, shows Tracy McGrady, guard-forward for the Houston Rockets fighting off his inner demons as he drives the length of the court to dunk a basketball. And “Made To Perfection,” directed by Rupert Sanders, then of now defunct Omaha Pictures–he’s since signed with bicoastal/international Morton Jankel Zander (MJZ)–features a God-like figure who creates McGrady, Garnett, and Tim Duncan, forward-center of the San Antonio Spurs, and then places them on a basketball court to realize their destiny to become basketball greats.
The effects-intensive spots have garnered a number of accolades–including several Gold Pencils at the One Show, and several Gold Clios at the Clio Festival, among other honors. Jennifer Golub, executive producer at TBWA/Chiat/Day, San Francisco, the agency behind the spots, served as agency producer on the package. (Andrea Bustabade served as assistant producer on “Carry.”) According to Golub, she knew the spots were good early on. “As soon as I saw the key frames, I knew it was great work,” she relates. “And that is the privilege of working with such talented people. I think we really understand this brand, and the brand has done a great job communicating to us who they are, so the work that has come out of those conversations, and a great client relationship, has been very, very clear.”
While Golub saw each spot’s potential early on, it wasn’t until after they were completed that she had a chance to reflect on them, in large part because of the complexity of each spot, as well as going from one to the next in fairly quick succession. (“Carry” broke first, followed by “Unstoppable,” then “Made to Perfection.”) “For me, there’s no mind space to think beyond the challenges,” she notes. “I’m in it, and I can give you an example–with ‘Carry,’ I was worried the whole time. I was foremost concerned about the safety and comfort of Kevin Garnett, I was concerned about the safety of the stunt. I was concerned about the fluidity of the effect. I sweated procuring the track, managing the costs, and probably, most importantly, maintaining the lightness of touch throughout the edit–maintaining that tone, which is very special.” Avi Oron of Bikini Edit, New York, cut “Carry.”
Selecting the director for each project was challenging, and came down to the treatments, noted Golub. “With both ‘Carry’ and ‘Unstoppable,’ we spoke to a very select group of directors and their production companies, and the criteria there were individuals that had the personal ability to work with athletes, while embodying the creative and technical abilities to manage the projects,” she explains. “The selection was ultimately made through the treatment process, identifying the compatibility of tone to what was conceived and desired. In the case of ‘Made to Perfection,’ we approached Rupert Sanders first, and he got it so right, we stopped there.” Each spot had extensive visual effects–the effects for “Carry” and “Made to Perfection” were done at Method Studios, Santa Monica. Visual effects supervisors were Alex Frisch and Cedric Nicolas, respectively. Digital Domain, Venice, Calif., created effects for “Unstoppable,” which were overseen by visual effects supervisor Brad Parker.
Asked about the awards bestowed on the spots–and the possibility of winning at Cannes–Golub notes, “for me success is measured in satisfying my agency and my clients needs, and the rest is icing on the cake.”
“SUBSERVIENT CHICKEN”
Agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky (CP+B) caused a stir with it’s “Subservient Chicken” campaign, which comprised three :30 spots, a print component, as well as a buzz-generating Web site that allows users to command a chicken to complete actions such as dancing, jumping jacks, or sitting on a couch. The site, www.subservientchicken.com, remains active, and since its launch has received 15,195,220 unique visits, and a total of 425,599,736 hits, and still averages about 15,000 unique visits a day. The campaign has mastered the awards shows–it scored Best of Show at the One Show Interactive, the Grand Clio in the Clio Festival’s interactive competition, the Yahoo! Big Idea Chair Award at the ANDYs, a Silver at the British Design & Art Direction (D&AD) Awards, and is competing in the Titanium Integrated category at Cannes.
David Rolfe, co-head of integrated production at CP+B, who produced the “Subservient Chicken” package along with freelance producer Terry Stavoe, related that he and the agency had no idea the campaign would generate such buzz. “We were concentrating so much of our creative forces behind the TV spots–and the TV spots were great spots, but they were difficult to make because they were so surprising, and so different,” relates Rolfe, referring to “Pencil,” “Accordion,” and “Vest,” directed by Rocky Morton of bicoastal/international Morton Jankel Zander. The latter two spots feature a creepy looking guy thumbing through Polaroids, and instructing the chicken what to do and wear, while “Pencil” features two comely young women who drop a pencil in order to check out the chicken’s backside. Rolfe related that Morton was extensively involved in the design of the chicken suit, which was created by Stan Winston Studios, Van Nuys, Calif. The Web site was created internally, and with The Barbarian Group, Boston.
Rolfe notes that the project was one of the first efforts CP+B created for Burger King. “The Web site came out, in conjunction with the TV, and the site just started exploding, and we really didn’t have any idea of the power of it,” says Rolfe. “That’s why I do think interactive is always worth working on in terms of tie-ins with television because a lot of times you can create them in very simple ways–i.e. you don’t have to spend a lot of money, you don’t expand loads of resources, and you can create something that’s huge. “And the branding potential for it was extraordinary in the end,” he continues. “It was surprising to everyone–the client and the agency.”
Rolfe related that the project was a “democratic movement,” in that Jeff Benjamin, creative director for interactive at the shop, sent an email around the agency asking staffers to respond with their requests for what they would make a chicken do if they could. Those responses became the basis for the chicken’s actions. “It was a lot of fun to realize it,” states Rolfe. “It’s such a fantastic tool–it has a basic level of recognition for Burger King, and it just works in a very subtle way for BK, and for [the tagline] ‘have it your way.’ “
Asked about the work’s potential to bring home a Lion from Cannes, Rolfe notes, “I think it’s going to do well. I think expectations are going to be pretty high for it.”
RAINIER BEER
The RainierVision campaign for Rainier Beer, out of Cole & Weber/Red Cell, Seattle, has taken the industry by storm. The fully integrated package includes new and vintage TV spots, a cable-access style show featuring two die-hard fans of Rainier Beer called Rainer Vision, which aired on a UPN affiliate in Seattle, print and posters, as well as a 12-foot, neon R that rode around Seattle in a pick-up truck, and a Web site that tied all the elements together. (Wyatt Neumann, who directs under the Neverstop, New York, banner, helmed the broadcast elements of the project.) The package has won assorted accolades: the Gold Cube in the inaugural hybrid category at the Art Directors Club Awards, a Gold Clio in the Content and Contact category, as well as the inaugural Battle of Brands competition presented by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP). “The award success is amazing,” says Nicole Hartshorn, the agency producer on the mammoth project. “When you work so hard with a team you love and it pays off, there is nothing like it.
“Honestly, we had no clue how things would turn out for ‘RainierVision,’ ” continues Hartshorn, who joked that the summer the series and the other elements were created was the longest of her life. “We knew it was something unique and special, but the insanely low budget and weekly deadline scramble made me more thankful that we actually had something on air each week.”
A total of 11 episodes of the show featuring Tim and Chuck, for whom Rainier Beer is as necessary as water, were produced, with a budget that Hartshorn estimated was “less than half the cost of a typical thirty-second spot. … Scrappy–yes, but once we had a team committed to the project, it was going to get done no matter what.”
Part of the vastness of the Rainier project, came out of wanting to increase awareness for the brand, which, Hartshorn explains, had a long history of cult advertising. The agency wanted to tap into the history, so it was decided that some vintage Rainier spots would be broadcast, with new materials–including the show and other elements–to support it. “Cole & Weber has really hit a stride with non-traditional formats. We never seem to be comfortable stopping at the original assignment,” relates Hartshorn, who noted that all the components “fed off each other”–the show led to the truck with the R sign, there were fliers. “Each Rainier component fed off the other. — We tried to carve every avenue to get Rainier seen, heard, talked about.”
Neumann had great chemistry with the RainierVision hosts–Tim Horner and Kevin Brady–and was selected to direct because of “his high energy and ‘of course we can do that’ response was a no-brainer fit,” explains Hartshorn.
A new round of work for Rainier is in the offing–a short film in the vein of last year’s TV show, and four spots, report Hartshorn. “This time we had more foresight, more time to prep and had re-occurring characters from last year,” she explains. “We concentrated our efforts on a single five-day shoot, higher production value and a more controlled script. It’s different, but definitely has that same raucous Rainier heart of last year.”
“VENTRILOQUIST”
Daniel Kleinman through now-defunct Large directed “Ventriloquist,” for the NSPCC via Saatchi & Saatchi, London. (He has since started Kleinman Productions, London.) The haunting spot, which seeks to raise awareness of abused children, effectively shows the stranglehold abusers have over their victims by presenting Sally, the abused little girl as a ventriloquist’s dummy. Throughout her day, when questioned, she either doesn’t speak, or speaks words from her puppet master, who in actuality is her abuser. The tagline: “Abused children can’t speak up.”
The ad has won a number of accolades, including a Gold Clio and an ANDY Award. Given the NSPCC’s history at Cannes–a 2002 effort for the organization, “Cartoon,” directed by Frank Budgen of Gorgeous Enterprises, London, scored a Gold Lion–it’s chances at the festival are good. “It’s great when any ad goes on to be applauded by the industry, it’s the icing on the cake,” says Manuela Franzini, the agency producer on “Ventriloquist.” “Winning awards is very motivating especially if the commercial also performs well for the client in the marketplace. Awards juries are notoriously skeptical about PSAs in general, with the false perception that creating impactful advertising is somehow easier. The NSPCC is a genuine advertiser with a real marketing budget, unlike some commercials that are sometimes made for more spurious reasons and I think that this can command respect. Saatchi has helped create some of the most powerful and memorable advertising ever created for this cause, but it has also been a draining experience, emotionally speaking, with the thought of abused children continuous in one’s mind. Paradoxically, winning an award is rewarding but also somehow irrelevant.”
Franzini notes that she knew the spot would be a good one from the beginning. “As a producer you instinctively know whether or not the idea will move off the page into moving image in a form that will communicate the message clearly, and this was backed up by the high level of interest shown by top directors who recognized the value of this project,” she explains. “The production team, model makers, crew and cast were really committed to the project and their enthusiasm shows through via the high production values that we managed to achieve on a relatively modest budget.”
Sally, the ventriloquist’s dummy who portrayed the abused child, was created by Asylum, a London effects company recommended by Kleinman, who cast a little girl who would provide the basis for Sally, making her appear more life-like. “Sally became the central prop around which a successful ad hinged,” says Franzini. “As a visual metaphor for an abused child, she had to be somewhat lifelike yet obviously a dummy. Through Sally we wanted viewers to be able to identify with an abused child’s feelings, continually feeling the presence of the abuser even when that person is not really there.
Franzini explained that Kleinman was called upon to direct because of his showreel, and his treatment, which she called “spot on.” She also noted, “one aspect of Danny’s work is that he can recognize when an idea needs to directed with subtlety and it was this quality of his, the attention to small detail that made all the difference. He is also a director that involves you and listens, really listens to what the agency has to say. This was a truly collaborative production with client, agency and production company all working to achieve exactly the same objective.”
