tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51420465099438820102024-03-18T18:23:00.783-05:00Craig McNamara writes“Deconstruction on Madison Avenue,” advertising essays, and storiesCraig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.comBlogger238125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-18643420378881139112024-03-17T23:14:00.005-05:002024-03-18T18:22:29.733-05:00"Thinking Too Hard" essay: Zeitgeist brands<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><p style="text-align: left;"><i style="font-family: Calibri; text-align: left;">What's a Zeitgeist brand? Find out in this essay </i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">–</span><i style="font-family: Calibri; text-align: left;"> which you can listen to me read or just read on your own </i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">–</span><i style="font-family: Calibri; text-align: left;"> from my book, "Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much: Stories and Essays from a Career in Advertising."</i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allow="autoplay" frameborder="no" height="600" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/1777455177&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true&visual=true" width="100%"></iframe><br /></div><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">
<div style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Interstate, "Lucida Grande", "Lucida Sans Unicode", "Lucida Sans", Garuda, Verdana, Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; font-weight: 100; line-break: anywhere; overflow: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap; word-break: normal;"><a href="https://soundcloud.com/craig-mcnamara-3" style="color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" title="Craig McNamara 3">Craig McNamara 3</a> · <a href="https://soundcloud.com/craig-mcnamara-3/zeitgeist-brands-by-craig-mcnamara" style="color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" title="Zeitgeist Brands by Craig McNamara">Zeitgeist Brands by Craig McNamara</a></div>
<div><br /></div><div>Every once in a while, the right brand appears at just the right time, when larger events in the world or culture add a special resonance to the product. To me, they're "Zeitgeist Brands" – after the German word that translates to "spirit of the age." It's one of the most powerful marketing tools available, but almost by definition, it's one of the most unpredictable. Hard to create and usually impossible to duplicate.</div></span></span><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Sometimes it happens by accident, but it can be planned, too. Apple's 1984 TV spot, for example, played off the cultural fascination with reaching the titular year of Aldous Huxley's dystopian novel. But that was more about making an introductory splash; although it laid the groundwork for the Macintosh computer's image of a user-friendly device, the spot itself was a single-event phenomenon.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Here are two better examples. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Although <b>Tang</b> was launched in 1959, it took a launch of a different kind before the orange-flavored breakfast drink by General Foods really took off. </span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7btFGNlezMwsYIYVzhwrtUgYKLbc9MRuQlJwp29VbE_KKKLsKWiD5BahIBEKMY8nIdG7_J1Tm5U-CrBv_gRqTKlrkvVbrZYfT13mQuLpyahbbEf-CHHav_6qGTj6ouqbfjYgRGFZf59LruqMUIEaLpOWk05ElXaJZkQODvi1PT2lrEAWtJP63MVzB91g/s3000/Tang%20Space%20Suit_Ad_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="2266" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7btFGNlezMwsYIYVzhwrtUgYKLbc9MRuQlJwp29VbE_KKKLsKWiD5BahIBEKMY8nIdG7_J1Tm5U-CrBv_gRqTKlrkvVbrZYfT13mQuLpyahbbEf-CHHav_6qGTj6ouqbfjYgRGFZf59LruqMUIEaLpOWk05ElXaJZkQODvi1PT2lrEAWtJP63MVzB91g/w303-h400/Tang%20Space%20Suit_Ad_rev.jpg" width="303" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; text-align: left;">After 6 years of lackluster sales, the powdered drink was chosen by NASA for the Gemini spaceflights, NASA's series of ten manned spaceflights during the years of 1965 and 1966. It was in the era of public fascination with the space program, and General Foods played up the connection at every opportunity, until the product itself was indelibly known as the orange drink of the astronauts. To a kid in the 1960s dreaming of space walks and moon exploration, Tang was one small sip for man, one giant leap closer to your heroes.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At first, the commercials were as serious as a school science film using copious NASA space footage, but by 1970, Tang was courting kids with a kicky “moonwalk” dance and jingle: <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Do the moonwalk like the astronauts<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Join the space gang, drink your energy Tang<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Tang is for breakfast, lunch, or after school<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Tang is energizing like rocket fuel.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So if you want to do like the astronauts do<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Join the space gang and do the moonwalk, too.</span><span style="font-family: Century Schoolbook, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Of course, as public interest in space exploration waned, the halo effect that was pumping up sales of Tang also dissipated. That Tang couldn't retain the same levels of popularity based on its merits alone was probably foreshadowed in the very reason it was chosen for the astronauts. According to a NASA engineer, water that was being produced as a byproduct of the Gemini capsule's life support system was drinkable but poor-tasting. Adding Tang to the water made it more palatable. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Not exactly the most ringing endorsement for a product; it may have been a drink for astronauts, but judged on taste alone, a lot of moms and kids didn't think the watery, grainy orange concoction was much of a drink for earthlings. (The same fate would befall Pillsbury's attempt at zeitgeist-channeling, Space Food Sticks, a forerunner of today’s energy bars).<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Tang is still around – a recent reformulation has replaced much of the sugar with artificial sweeteners in a bid to stay relevant in our obesity-obsessed culture – and still remembered best for its Gemini connection, but like the culture's interest in space exploration, Tang will probably never again reach such heights of popularity.</span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieLqTOl1VQUwWzVzIcLU7s9gUY4HolPoP6wutJfJN7LwNQ4YNFgkDHXpaFhyphenhyphenzw9PsohypbJDoQFyHNTZco2Bom89_ogs0CLuh7Oi1vrc6Ki0T4lAw_-6i2SOkBLTlYVTgmdzJs3eMhEBtYQFAqhbG483wlgV1PEVGPXVdA8lj88DgbAoEomY8TGMEwrV8/s1800/Virginia%20Slims%20ad_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1463" data-original-width="1800" height="325" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieLqTOl1VQUwWzVzIcLU7s9gUY4HolPoP6wutJfJN7LwNQ4YNFgkDHXpaFhyphenhyphenzw9PsohypbJDoQFyHNTZco2Bom89_ogs0CLuh7Oi1vrc6Ki0T4lAw_-6i2SOkBLTlYVTgmdzJs3eMhEBtYQFAqhbG483wlgV1PEVGPXVdA8lj88DgbAoEomY8TGMEwrV8/w400-h325/Virginia%20Slims%20ad_rev.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Phillip Morris introduced <b>Virginia Slims</b>, a spinoff of their Benson & Hedges brand, in 1968. If you are what you smoke, this slimmer, longer cigarette was as aspirational as you could get when marketing to young, professional women. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But it was the advertising campaign that really cemented the bond between the smoker and the smoked. The pros at Leo Burnett – the same people who indelibly linked Marlboro cigarettes to male ruggedness and independence – now worked similar magic with Virginia Slims. This time, instead of finding inspiration in the American West, they looked to America Now – specifically the women's liberation movement that was growing in society and awareness by the media. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The campaign’s messages of emancipation, equality, and empowerment – leavened with humor and contemporary stylishness – were epitomized by its slogan<b>. </b>"You've come a long way, baby." In fact, it became a cultural catch phrase, as the ads and commercials became one of the most ubiquitous expressions of the women's movement (albeit a safe, non-threatening expression, if you discount the tar and nicotine).<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A typical spot began with supposedly archival footage showing turn-of-the-century women in subservient roles shamed for sneaking a cigarette, then segued into the Modern ‘70s Woman fearlessly brandishing her cancer-stick, while a full-throated men's chorus – cannily suggesting the patriarchy's approval – </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">belted out the jingle: </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You’ve come a long way, baby<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">to get where you got to today<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You’ve got your own cigarette, now, baby <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You’ve come a long, long way<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As perhaps the fate of any product so closely aligned with a cultural moment, Virginia Slims would follow roughly the same arc. After growing in market share throughout the 1970s, Virginia Slims started receding in the late '80s in the face of new competition from the Capri and Misty cigarettes – whose focus on sex appeal and sexual power that had become the new expression of independence for young women put them more in sync with the shifting zephyrs of the zeitgeist. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Virginia Slims came a long way, but now the torch (okay, the cigarette) was passed.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * * </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You can read more excerpts from my book <a href="https://www.blurb.com/b/11016785-thinking-too-hard-and-rethinking-too-much" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></p></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-22774656370374658642024-03-10T16:58:00.009-05:002024-03-11T21:50:59.627-05:00Storytelling in advertising, reincarnated<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; text-align: left;">We know storytelling is all the rage now in marketing. And like most fashionable things, there’s usually some precedent in the past. Why else do we have the phrase, “Everything old is new again”?</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Still, you’re not likely to come across a story today like the one in this 1938 Arrow Shirts ad. If authenticity is all, this is more, well, horseplay:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT-PBfXvNeRrlBlSq1yEU_29iggNZpxF4zdfd3TRCFxGo6DtbEmseXf2RuNTKfyzgGQAIhPSRXRDwoRY7h4CE0zrAhp2DEubClA5l9_MKd_d8rs4gkBv2F3kXtUyBTnhSEf8CfDJqRkLdR6xGtw22hMctJG2E31DNNv7_FLm2O_YhehT8MXRXzLlw41fU/s1438/Arrow%20Horse%20Ad_Y&R_1938.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1438" data-original-width="1068" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT-PBfXvNeRrlBlSq1yEU_29iggNZpxF4zdfd3TRCFxGo6DtbEmseXf2RuNTKfyzgGQAIhPSRXRDwoRY7h4CE0zrAhp2DEubClA5l9_MKd_d8rs4gkBv2F3kXtUyBTnhSEf8CfDJqRkLdR6xGtw22hMctJG2E31DNNv7_FLm2O_YhehT8MXRXzLlw41fU/w298-h400/Arrow%20Horse%20Ad_Y&R_1938.png" width="298" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It was written by <a href="https://www.oneclub.org/hall-of-fame/-bio/george-gribbin" target="_blank">George Gribbin</a> of Young & Rubicam, who was <a href="https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/history2/32/Young-Rubicam-Inc.html" target="_blank">recalled</a> as saying, <span style="background: repeat white; color: #333333;">"One of the great assets of this agency is that a man here feels he can express himself as a writer." </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Certainly, he accomplished that here; sixty years later, the ad was still well remembered, ranking 98</span><sup style="font-family: Calibri;">th</sup><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> of the Top 100 Ads according to Advertising Age magazine in 1999. It begins,</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Joe always said when he died, he’d like to become a horse. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One day Joe died. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Early this May, I saw a horse that looked like Joe drawing a milk wagon. “I sneaked up to him and whispered, “Is it you, Joe?” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">He said “Yes, and am I happy!” I said, “Why?” He said, “I am now wearing a comfortable collar for the first time in my life. My shirt collars always used to shrink and murder me. In fact, one choked me to death. That is why I died.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Goodness Joe,” I exclaimed, “Why didn’t you tell me about your shirts sooner? I would have told you about Arrow Shirts. They never shrink.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Admittedly, the idea that a man found relief from the strictures of business wear as a horse yoked to a heavy wagon isn’t really a persuasive argument. But, by drawing you in and keeping your interest, it made Arrow’s point.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Before advertising started emphasizing word play, humor, visual appeal, and shock value in the second half of the last century, storytelling was a staple of many an ad campaign. And when I say “story,” I’m talking epics. Ads would routinely feature long paragraphs of copy, mimicking the dense, tightly-spaced copy of the newspapers of the era. This was also the pre-television era when people were willing to invest a considerable amount of time reading columns of copy in ads – assuming the story hooked them up front.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Perhaps you're aware of this classic of the genre, circa 1925:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgklCQ8FxfYBkQCT8gAlKexCFMBtbRyx1UREiComrcxhq9DHkn8vCNdL2PMyWwa2wVOJhcAp8MxkmmPgWcD4Y3TFyESeoPdz7Zky6Uq9i4SEarE0xFdd3NHWypzgUg2cwotwIxDXji3BN7_JUFffni4-XzT43t0v3WbXyys5mmmo3KTqhKc54BpgtWVjIA/s2981/Piano%20Ad_Rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2981" data-original-width="2227" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgklCQ8FxfYBkQCT8gAlKexCFMBtbRyx1UREiComrcxhq9DHkn8vCNdL2PMyWwa2wVOJhcAp8MxkmmPgWcD4Y3TFyESeoPdz7Zky6Uq9i4SEarE0xFdd3NHWypzgUg2cwotwIxDXji3BN7_JUFffni4-XzT43t0v3WbXyys5mmmo3KTqhKc54BpgtWVjIA/w299-h400/Piano%20Ad_Rev.jpg" width="299" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I’ll bet that headline still draws you in with its cliffhanger ending, even if the look and layout of the ad is off-putting to modern eyes. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It was written early in his career by <a href="http://advertisinghall.org/members/member_bio.php?memid=570" target="_blank">John Caples</a>, later revered as a master of mail-order advertising (and a pioneer in applying scientific methods for testing advertising). The ad here, Caple’s best-known, is a sterling example of how he yoked storytelling to “the more you tell, the more you sell” of direct-response copy.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I’ll save you the squinting and nose prints on your computer screen – here's the gist of the copy:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To the amazement of all my friends, I strode confidently over to the piano and sat down. ... The crowd laughed. They were all certain I couldn’t play a single note. … <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Then I started to play. A tense silence fell on the guests. The laughter died on their lips as if by magic. I played through the first bars of Beethoven’s immortal Moonlight Sonata. I heard gasps of amazement. My friends sat breathless, spellbound. … <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Then I told them the whole story. “Have you ever heard of the U.S. School of Music? I asked.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As Julian Lewis Watkins recounts in his book, <i>The 100 Greatest Advertisements: Who Wrote Them and What They Did</i>, “The ad was an astonishing success, bringing in a record number of coupons. … It went on to run in other publications for several years and was much imitated.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Though not really an imitator, the Arrow Shirts ad is built from the same DNA </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">(Deft Narrative Advertising, perhaps) </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">of hooking the reader with an engaging story and irresistible headline. But instead of aping the look of turn-of-the-century newspapers, this ad looks more like a piece of mid-century magazine fiction – and appropriately, tells a more fanciful tale as well.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">George Gribben also applied his talent (and his skewed imagination) to ads for Borden’s dairy products. He didn’t create <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_the_Cow" target="_blank">Elsie</a>, the bovine homemaker and milk pusher – that was <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/David-Reid-creator-of-Elsie-the-Cow-2545594.php" target="_blank">David William Reid</a> – but in the 1940s, Gribben was responsible for a number of whimsical ads that took advertisement storytelling into a bizarre faux children’s-book realm.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I don’t know if he wrote the ad below, but I like to think Gribben did it as a kind of rejoinder to his earlier “Joe Came Back as a Horse” ad: <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Haven’t I told you never to trust a horse?” snapped Elsie.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6kp38Ly2oeLMb-uHQ3YYIzn4_c01ePgEqmSxyEsevE6PQTvdol-1W5FaFWTwxepsIQak-qxD6NjbxxlOrhK5QVZ8sn6T2wFMWFiCM-JV2eVDtrOnEHt1rG_Xu-gmHSW0mbYUfYAmYyDQ0ZWBMsyvhu1IKARnpHic-VJR0BTtPbrsla-hkhUX8xhxX4KE/s2814/Bordens_Elsie%20Ad_1940s.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2814" data-original-width="2203" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6kp38Ly2oeLMb-uHQ3YYIzn4_c01ePgEqmSxyEsevE6PQTvdol-1W5FaFWTwxepsIQak-qxD6NjbxxlOrhK5QVZ8sn6T2wFMWFiCM-JV2eVDtrOnEHt1rG_Xu-gmHSW0mbYUfYAmYyDQ0ZWBMsyvhu1IKARnpHic-VJR0BTtPbrsla-hkhUX8xhxX4KE/w314-h400/Bordens_Elsie%20Ad_1940s.jpg" width="314" /></a></div><br /><p></p><br />Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-43411633138576611932024-01-31T18:14:00.002-06:002024-01-31T21:27:14.987-06:00The eye has it<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMxHToy4B8IJ9AT0O0VS0scfZ4B1o5QT9c7KaKyM388Wxvy7vDdna4jZBvx32EMH67oG4WLd782QQ_caZ3O_FTpWJ0cSg9-lbsAl4W64lIipGjGqJFhwSMasiATz25FhoGtcoAMlPpd9i75mMNI_fag7w84ojzRo-be0co4admVCE-4ONz5u4RNK0ZnKM/s639/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_Theatre%20Card.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="502" data-original-width="639" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMxHToy4B8IJ9AT0O0VS0scfZ4B1o5QT9c7KaKyM388Wxvy7vDdna4jZBvx32EMH67oG4WLd782QQ_caZ3O_FTpWJ0cSg9-lbsAl4W64lIipGjGqJFhwSMasiATz25FhoGtcoAMlPpd9i75mMNI_fag7w84ojzRo-be0co4admVCE-4ONz5u4RNK0ZnKM/s320/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_Theatre%20Card.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Not just a vivid poster here. A vivid lesson in the impact of good cropping.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I was reading an article on the movie-poster art of <a href="https://www.tvweek.com/open-mic/2016/03/two-artists-one-youve-heard-of-the-other-you-havent-bruce-springsteen-and-al-kallis-implore-us-in-the-time-of-your-life-live/" target="_blank">Al Kallis</a> for American International Pictures. AIP was, per <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_International_Pictures" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a>, <o:p></o:p>"the first company to use focus groups, polling American teenagers about what they would like to see and using their responses to determine titles, stars, and story content. … a typical production involved creating a great title, getting an artist such as Albert Kallis who supervised all AIP artwork from 1955 to 1973 to create a dynamic, eye-catching poster, then raising the cash, and finally writing and casting the film.”</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Kallis had the pedigree. Along with his previous work as a poster layout artist for the influential Saul Bass, Kallis was the son of Maurice Kallis, a famed movie poster artist himself.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Perusing the work of Kallis the younger, I have to assume that <a href="http://monsterbrains.blogspot.com/2011/08/amazing-poster-art-of-albert-kallis.html" target="_blank">his posters</a> were likely more effective at evoking terror and dread than the movies themselves. His artwork and compositions had a lurid pulp-magazine quality, with the requisite helpless women in skimpy outfits menaced by otherworldly beasts, aliens, or Lovecraftian horrors.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Still, most of his poster art just earned a shrug from me. But the one at the top of this post – for 1957’s <i>Not of This Earth </i>– I found oddly mesmerizing.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Not having seen the movie, I don’t know what that weird lump with the eyeball and tendrils is all about. What really caught my eye was the close-up of the woman filling nearly half the lobby card. (That’s either star Beverly Garland or a lookalike). Have you ever seen a better depiction of sheer terror? The eyes wide, the mouth in mid-scream, the hands desperately clawing at her own face. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Kind of a masterpiece for the genre, I’d say. But wait – let’s see what that image looks like when cropped for the vertical rectangle of a movie poster.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMUgFFpRzWTxFw0TP7tKC1-pH_91lmyoVR9qtGirwsaN0vM-NAc5WbRUvO80uSrmaXHnntHVJeQH8JjQisDZuJOyja8_nJkqRoJX28PZONDPiSl9m5GU7oUW6A4YZNW42jzCmtbMn15WgWnCiYwJnXrKNRjQNO-thrHrScsjwwNL9xjv04Ff-Hmw939Ss/s1024/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_Poster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="671" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMUgFFpRzWTxFw0TP7tKC1-pH_91lmyoVR9qtGirwsaN0vM-NAc5WbRUvO80uSrmaXHnntHVJeQH8JjQisDZuJOyja8_nJkqRoJX28PZONDPiSl9m5GU7oUW6A4YZNW42jzCmtbMn15WgWnCiYwJnXrKNRjQNO-thrHrScsjwwNL9xjv04Ff-Hmw939Ss/w263-h400/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_Poster.jpg" width="263" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Wow.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The impact of that face is now even greater, putting it right up in your own face. But most of all, her horrified left eye, framed by her splayed fingers, is now near the center of the poster – and, even more than in the lobby card, that eye is seemingly making contact with you. Yes, that green space slime is there, too – interestingly, the tightness of the crop forces the images closer together, making a parallel between their eyes – but there’s no question of what it is that’s drawing you in. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Incidentally, they remade the picture in 1988 – but this time, the poster has none of the original’s eye-popping oomph, and no amount of cropping would save it.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYbTz9YMoxd8ztWCVyEKjgwOpPu0yRgdnpMpScZfP8z4XGbTq4DRZOviWVtd8MvdPvxHMwjGpQrKO8OyqCOZnE7U3eMGaxp6g66JRofb1MQW3nMo-VdUtKl9iGRMSR69bBO2vUB-MRR9Fqp_wPfu02nul_l1UCRMzJIrzhMVsb6DeoJesfskgQ0ZvyKlk/s1673/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_1988.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1673" data-original-width="1100" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYbTz9YMoxd8ztWCVyEKjgwOpPu0yRgdnpMpScZfP8z4XGbTq4DRZOviWVtd8MvdPvxHMwjGpQrKO8OyqCOZnE7U3eMGaxp6g66JRofb1MQW3nMo-VdUtKl9iGRMSR69bBO2vUB-MRR9Fqp_wPfu02nul_l1UCRMzJIrzhMVsb6DeoJesfskgQ0ZvyKlk/s320/Not%20of%20This%20Earth_1988.jpg" width="210" /></a></span></div><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><o:p></o:p></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-63320913369526137242024-01-17T17:03:00.002-06:002024-01-17T17:04:27.054-06:00I wanted to like this ad, I really did<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpWySPu38d7ohdCTNSR06FqN5ZP-Bf_Ah3tP7RdlcAze7HrnIZOA8cSYzFrU_GflIREYA5Jz9rIrqn9sN3IPlW2jenYE3UDYvpn_GsG4K72CKhcNguqEAtynQ2s1YgEOSlo9zWa-CaNZvLmv3gWCY9zSWrT1PpRPn55VEKfMCn8QnrIGz7g9LokKA3bfc/s1775/Arrow%20Shirts%20Ad_1951_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1775" data-original-width="1374" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpWySPu38d7ohdCTNSR06FqN5ZP-Bf_Ah3tP7RdlcAze7HrnIZOA8cSYzFrU_GflIREYA5Jz9rIrqn9sN3IPlW2jenYE3UDYvpn_GsG4K72CKhcNguqEAtynQ2s1YgEOSlo9zWa-CaNZvLmv3gWCY9zSWrT1PpRPn55VEKfMCn8QnrIGz7g9LokKA3bfc/w310-h400/Arrow%20Shirts%20Ad_1951_rev.jpg" width="310" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When I first came across it, I (wrongly) assumed it was the work of Doyle Dane Bernbach, using a very minimalist layout to catch attention and evoke emotion, sort of like they did with the Polaroid ads in the ‘60s</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">.</span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">No logo, just a simple headline, and an intriguing illustration that tells you nothing about the product, only the elation it will inspire in the woman in the your life. What an incredible way to portray a woman leaping into the arms of her man, I thought, showing only what’s necessary to imply the situation, spurring the reader to imagine the embrace, the eyes, the kiss.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Brilliant, I thought. Then I read the headline. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">“Wear an Arrow Shirt and</span></div></o:p></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-large;">you'll simply sweep her off her feet!”</span></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">No.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">No, I don’t believe this ad, even for a minute. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The only way to sell this scenario is if the emotion implied feels true. Even in 1949, it’s hard to imagine anyone got this excited about a dress shirt. Unless he just got home from the service and this is the first time in years she hadn’t seen him in green khakis … maybe.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Admittedly, these were not the glory days of Arrow Shirts. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Though dating back to the late 1800s, the shirts and their detachable collars peaked in popularity between 1905 and 1931, the heyday of <a href="http://mistercrew.com/blog/2010/09/07/arrow-collar-man/" target="_blank">The Arrow Collar Man</a>. This urbane, sophisticated fellow was depicted in advertising by well-known Saturday Evening Post illustrator, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._C._Leyendecker" target="_blank">J.C. Leyendecker</a>.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“The Arrow Collar Man became the symbol of the ideal American male,” the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1964/11/29/archives/advertising-arrow-seeking-a-new-image-shirt-maker-hopes-to-meet.html" target="_blank">New York Times</a> recalled in 1964. “Adoring women showered the Arrow Collar Man with marriage proposals, with thousands of Valentine's Day cards, with gifts, poetry and songs. … Men rushed to haberdashery stores to buy the new collar styles he introduced.”<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Eventually, not even the Arrow Collar Man’s sex appeal could withstand the changing tastes of consumers, particularly men who, returning from World War I, now preferred a softer, attached collar like they had on their uniforms.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As sales dropped, Arrow’s owner, Cluett Peabody and Company, switched to attached-collar shirts, and developed the “Sanforized” process to prevent shrinking. But it cast about for years seeking a new way into consumers’ favor. Again, from the New York Times: “Arrow engaged new artists. They tried humor, success stories, sophistication.”<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Which brings us back to this ad, which I assume was meant to embody all of those qualities – and failed. </span></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><div style="text-align: center;"> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpWySPu38d7ohdCTNSR06FqN5ZP-Bf_Ah3tP7RdlcAze7HrnIZOA8cSYzFrU_GflIREYA5Jz9rIrqn9sN3IPlW2jenYE3UDYvpn_GsG4K72CKhcNguqEAtynQ2s1YgEOSlo9zWa-CaNZvLmv3gWCY9zSWrT1PpRPn55VEKfMCn8QnrIGz7g9LokKA3bfc/s1775/Arrow%20Shirts%20Ad_1951_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1775" data-original-width="1374" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpWySPu38d7ohdCTNSR06FqN5ZP-Bf_Ah3tP7RdlcAze7HrnIZOA8cSYzFrU_GflIREYA5Jz9rIrqn9sN3IPlW2jenYE3UDYvpn_GsG4K72CKhcNguqEAtynQ2s1YgEOSlo9zWa-CaNZvLmv3gWCY9zSWrT1PpRPn55VEKfMCn8QnrIGz7g9LokKA3bfc/s320/Arrow%20Shirts%20Ad_1951_rev.jpg" width="248" /></a></div></div></span><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As I said, I wanted to like this ad, I really did. So let’s take another look at it. But now imagine the ad with a headline like these (incorporating other brand names of the era):</span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: large;">“Is it really a diamond from De Beers?”</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: large;">“We’re flying to Paris on TWA?!”</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: center;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: medium;"> </span></o:p></p><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">“I love the smooth shave you get with Gillette.”</span></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"></p><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You feel the difference, can’t you? You can feel the emotion. You can see the whole image in your head. And what’s more, you can believe it. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When the right product gets the right advertising … that’s what sweeps people off their feet.</span></div><p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-23530491058247080522024-01-03T22:30:00.007-06:002024-01-06T12:57:10.328-06:00Rebranding a movie<div style="text-align: left;"><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It’s not unusual for a product to undergo rebranding. In fact, one of the most successful was covered on <a href="https://craigmcnamara.blogspot.com/2008/02/is-this-greatest-ad-campaign-ever.html" target="_blank">this very blog</a>. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But in this case, the product in need of a new image wasn’t found on a store shelf. It was projected on the silver screen.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In 1973, United Artists released its movie, <i>The Long Goodbye</i> to theatres in Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia and Miami. The movie re-teamed director Robert Altman and star Elliot Gould of the box-office hit <i>M*A*S*H</i> three years earlier, in an adaptation of the Raymond Chandler noir novel. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> <br /></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Nothing says goodbye like a bullet,” the movie poster announced, Elliot Gould brandishing a cigarette and pistol, looking as hard-boiled as Humphrey Bogart’s Marlowe in 1946’s <i>The Big Sleep.<br /><o:p></o:p></i></span></p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><o:p></o:p></i><o:p> </o:p></span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm3zKqPSCeGBjIlVFIvuXvbbp6G7l4sPd4pR9S5Yrodj80pt9wNG-l9JrqyRhbH9Alh6uGKgxcoJbO6bxrIGVxXC_bzcQ1cshHeiFwZ6OkqjccMmFq9cG5Zbs76dTLvJS5O7RA-utWxWutAXwAB7UyrncVG6epJzfw0oNya81khmcJMc6-cRe-x3dshoQ/s2431/Long%20Goodbye_Poster1-1973.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2431" data-original-width="1650" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm3zKqPSCeGBjIlVFIvuXvbbp6G7l4sPd4pR9S5Yrodj80pt9wNG-l9JrqyRhbH9Alh6uGKgxcoJbO6bxrIGVxXC_bzcQ1cshHeiFwZ6OkqjccMmFq9cG5Zbs76dTLvJS5O7RA-utWxWutAXwAB7UyrncVG6epJzfw0oNya81khmcJMc6-cRe-x3dshoQ/w271-h400/Long%20Goodbye_Poster1-1973.jpg" width="271" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And the audience stayed away in droves. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When the limited release ended, United Artists pulled the film from its next opening in New York and, baffled by the apathy of audiences (and the hostility of critics), over the next 6 months, tried to figure out <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1973/11/08/archives/long-goodbye-proves-a-big-sleeper-here.html" target="_blank">what went wrong</a>. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Should it be re-edited? Does it need a new title? Were audiences just tired of Elliot Gould, who was coming off a string of poorly received movies? The first two could be done; the third would be impossible to remedy. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But in the end, it was decided to spend $40,000 on a new ad campaign. And not just a new campaign – a different one. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Altman had moved the story from 1953 to the 1970s, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqGdUIx2r3Y" target="_blank">calling his approach</a> <span style="background: repeat white;">“Rip Van Marlowe” – “</span>We took the position that he’d been asleep for twenty years, woke up, and Elliot just wandered through that film … and was trying to invoke the morals of a previous time.” The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1973/11/08/archives/long-goodbye-proves-a-big-sleeper-here.html" target="_blank">called it</a> a “blackly satiric version of the Raymond Chandler novel.” </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="background: repeat white; font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="background: repeat white;">Yet the original poster reflected none of that, </span>selling it instead as a typical Chandler hard-boiled detective story that was destined to please no one, neither older audiences who remembered the Bogart version, nor younger moviegoers with no connection to the genre. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In spirit, the movie was probably closer to the black comedy of <i>M*A*S*H</i>. Quoted in the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1973/11/08/archives/long-goodbye-proves-a-big-sleeper-here.html" target="_blank">New York Times</a>, Altman said, “Somehow we had to prepare audiences for a movie that satirizes Hollywood and the entire Chandler genre … So I went to Mad magazine and asked Jack Davis, the artist, to come up with a cartoon approach.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">For anyone who read Mad Magazine (or TV Guide) of the era, Jack Davis needs no introduction. Well known for his gangly, expressive caricatures actors and celebrities, Davis was, along with Mort Drucker and Angelo Torres, one of the “go-to” artists for Mad’s movie parodies during the 1960s and ‘70s (and later, the 80s and ‘90s).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">Here’s one he did in 1971 for Mad’s spoof of the Clint Eastwood spaghetti western, <i>A Fistful of Dollars</i> – here called “A Fistful of Lasagna:”</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"> </span></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCoLdru6fsFTs5kijs7Q38hPbzNAvGm6daXFboYQpmYKzqxpm5qsl-6XbSKcNrqNSdmMcd7ceyg3QUo3TBONFupsSSXqUDIEIMiatK_PhyIhGprVDCwH1gJufNwkV2qWDc4HbUs0xWLQWqde4ZDRS0JGbjPulFot4-Sd4yARBU-rM0YhAGllx0BYTQGGo/s1800/Fistful%20of%20Lasagna_1971.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1151" data-original-width="1800" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCoLdru6fsFTs5kijs7Q38hPbzNAvGm6daXFboYQpmYKzqxpm5qsl-6XbSKcNrqNSdmMcd7ceyg3QUo3TBONFupsSSXqUDIEIMiatK_PhyIhGprVDCwH1gJufNwkV2qWDc4HbUs0xWLQWqde4ZDRS0JGbjPulFot4-Sd4yARBU-rM0YhAGllx0BYTQGGo/w400-h256/Fistful%20of%20Lasagna_1971.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And in fact, by this time, Davis had already applied his comedic style to posters for 1963’s <i>It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World</i>, 1969’s <i>Viva Max!</i>, and 1970’s <i>Kelly’s Heroes</i>. Those posters featured the caricatured stars in a mass of frenzied humanity or satirical posing. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPXqYNCMTuHDzaaqioSFt7w8XzI-vn58uRJMvrnEyb9VsZsyG5USe3vLvcnJasFcXZWesgsmE89VMymYwQFjnE209ClfP6zIJ7Zxq_pV2Jmz1dtnYtzmjyeIDioqcEXv5W9nxZ9NSkWgaxOZjOcTXc1xch-myJ3Ki7Y5jNujMPf3WiG0BXMPTGpe5alS8/s2705/Jack%20Davis%20Posters.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1372" data-original-width="2705" height="324" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPXqYNCMTuHDzaaqioSFt7w8XzI-vn58uRJMvrnEyb9VsZsyG5USe3vLvcnJasFcXZWesgsmE89VMymYwQFjnE209ClfP6zIJ7Zxq_pV2Jmz1dtnYtzmjyeIDioqcEXv5W9nxZ9NSkWgaxOZjOcTXc1xch-myJ3Ki7Y5jNujMPf3WiG0BXMPTGpe5alS8/w640-h324/Jack%20Davis%20Posters.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">But for </span><i>The Long Goodbye</i><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">, Davis took his comedic approach a step further, refashioning the poster image into what looked like the opening panel of a Mad Magazine movie parody in which Altman introduces the stars and plot to the audience, with quips galore in the interlacing word balloons that filled the top the page.</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"> </span></span></p><p></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8NL1qMo_V367VQjXtp1mIhyRloBDdOncv6KK4DJRIo-AiSUSqBsXo8BCJSPPEBWyGVN0nK82PAIyqr__KrjlBUCWmyCS1jITPLu8t6X_irL72cqrCOAbHVx3NE_Q6uSvl_qKXIsWZQiqiRvHwB8_h6USWkK_JJiuu-vQ4gMcFJTNKN9hz4cwx9yATRHI/s2283/Long%20Goodbye_Poster2-1973.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2283" data-original-width="1614" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8NL1qMo_V367VQjXtp1mIhyRloBDdOncv6KK4DJRIo-AiSUSqBsXo8BCJSPPEBWyGVN0nK82PAIyqr__KrjlBUCWmyCS1jITPLu8t6X_irL72cqrCOAbHVx3NE_Q6uSvl_qKXIsWZQiqiRvHwB8_h6USWkK_JJiuu-vQ4gMcFJTNKN9hz4cwx9yATRHI/w453-h640/Long%20Goodbye_Poster2-1973.jpg" width="453" /></a></div><p></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Altman says, “The film is full of fun – murder, maiming, drunkenness, infidelity, topless yoga freaks, four-letter words – everything! Like my first big success, M*A*S*H, it’s got the same key ingredient! … Good taste!”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">He continues, “Here’s our star, Elliot Gould! Elliot plays Phillip Marlowe, a hard-bitten, cynical private eye trying to solve an incredible mystery.” </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">Gould: “With so many other actors around, why did you pick me?” Altman: "THAT’S the mystery!"</span></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">And so on. (So perfectly does the repartee follow the distinctive Mad joke structure for their film spoofs, it seems likely that it came from one of Mad’s writers.)</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"> </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"> </span></span></p><p class="css-at9mc1" style="margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">You could argue that the new poster went too far in re-positioning a movie that, while not traditional film noir, was still low-key, slow-paced, and despite the sun-drenched scenes, was actually dark in tone – not the rollicking satire the poster now suggests.</span><span face="-webkit-standard"></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="background: repeat white; font-family: Calibri;">But it would certainly made the feature seem less of an anachronism and more in line with the anti-institutional, anti-authoritarian wave of post-VietNam/pre-Watergate America. Rebranding gone Mad, perhaps.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="background: repeat white; font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So how did it do in the theatres this time? Not much better, apparently. Though the film has grown in critical appraisal over the years – it’s now recognized by the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Film_Registry" target="_blank">National Film Registry </a>of the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" – <i>The Long Goodbye</i> continued to underperform at the box office.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As Madison Avenue could tell you, not every rebranding is a success. For every Marlboro, there's a <a href="https://www.thebrandingjournal.com/2015/05/what-to-learn-from-tropicanas-packaging-redesign-failure/" target="_blank">Tropicana</a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-47235159168695438942023-12-22T10:40:00.008-06:002023-12-22T10:41:35.090-06:00The focus group loses focus<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4X0h5JjcVsbZTt1I9nRe_YJ_9199OpOg9CAxepzc0bhxrM7szWiPd1h92ZlsulK4kTmWlMtgegXWaaHgfiWn6WLGfboOF3Wekq-eAu9AbWQ9w_TBl0U4S92itwWhoiRnt9H1dRnztvQob_dcMuXRbp6UyFvBzd0aXgeE8jU64P_s0EKMQzElKSVZPDwI/s1542/Santa%20Focus%20Group%20art.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1171" data-original-width="1542" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4X0h5JjcVsbZTt1I9nRe_YJ_9199OpOg9CAxepzc0bhxrM7szWiPd1h92ZlsulK4kTmWlMtgegXWaaHgfiWn6WLGfboOF3Wekq-eAu9AbWQ9w_TBl0U4S92itwWhoiRnt9H1dRnztvQob_dcMuXRbp6UyFvBzd0aXgeE8jU64P_s0EKMQzElKSVZPDwI/s320/Santa%20Focus%20Group%20art.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">Although Santa Claus has been around in different forms for centuries, much of how we think of that Jolly Old Elf today was established in 1822 by Clement Clark Moore’s poem, “’Twas The Night Before Christmas.”</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">But what would Santa Claus be like if he was created today? How would today’s culture shape his personality and modus operandi?<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">First, let’s consider Santa himself: an older, whiskered, rotund fellow. This is never going to fly (so to speak). After all, ours is a society that worships youth and is obsessed with fitness. As for the facial hair, well, maybe if you’re Paul Bunyan, okay, but not for someone on whose lap we’re going to place little Dylan and Brittany. He’ll have to lose the beard, a few pounds and a lot of years.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">And isn’t Santa just a little too much of goody two-shoes for today’s tastes? Sure, we still want heroes, but we like them a bit less than pure. Makes them easier to relate to. So let’s give him a rough exterior, but keep the inner goodness.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">The “ho-ho-ho” thing is okay – just pretty unimaginative. Maybe he can come up with something more catchy and distinctive. And while we’re at it, the red suit with the fur trim seems kind of tacky. Leather is much more fashionable these days. As far as riding a sleigh pulled by reindeer all over the world, forget it. PETA would never stand for this. It’s time to get motorized. <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">And of course, that whole coming-down-the-chimney part would have to go. We can’t condone breaking and entering, especially given people’s fear of crime these days. Better he should just use the front door like everybody else.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">So where does that leave us? Basically, we’ve got a young, clean-shaven, leather-jacketed, catch-phrase-spouting anti-hero who rides on a self-propelled vehicle and enters average American homes via the front door.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">In other words, bye-bye Santa. Hello <a href="https://happydays.fandom.com/wiki/Fonzie" target="_blank">Fonzie</a>.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">May your holiday season this year be filled with many ... Happy Days.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> <br /></span><i><span style="font-size: 11pt;">December 2001</span></i></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><br /></span></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: 11pt;">This was one of the holiday messages I sent out to clients during my freelancing years </span></i><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">–</span><i><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> and one of the essays you'll </span><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">find</span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> in my 2021 compilation, "</span><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much: Stories and Essays from a Career in Advertising." </span></i></span></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-41509296322820606212023-12-17T12:09:00.000-06:002023-12-17T12:09:19.900-06:00Making the ad space part of the ad concept<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Yes, yes, I know, print advertising is dead, especially newspaper advertising – but ads still use space in other mediums, so apply these observations as you will.<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p><b>Make the height of the ad part of the concept</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><b><br /></b></o:p>Look how this 1966 Mobil ad really sells the comparison of car collision at 80 mph with the impact of a car dropped from a ten-story building.<o:p><br /><br /></o:p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIIH-4A0ZRlc6nbkl0AD2AbHbR9jDn5Ws3aWzw002FJZn-uaOqkeJ1H7Itqq7M76Y_Rkd3oGSHanKBHBYeHAr4DoqKbzI7xuHdSSvOwO9QbUIMw_9scvh51Gk7fIaKVUX3EhRXbbXnBl8WAyWDkwcvgoQSzYQ6MUvFfFnNd7R1yJ5xwUjB7JjYAMGyaOk/s3000/Mobile_CarDrop%20Ad_rev2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="2136" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIIH-4A0ZRlc6nbkl0AD2AbHbR9jDn5Ws3aWzw002FJZn-uaOqkeJ1H7Itqq7M76Y_Rkd3oGSHanKBHBYeHAr4DoqKbzI7xuHdSSvOwO9QbUIMw_9scvh51Gk7fIaKVUX3EhRXbbXnBl8WAyWDkwcvgoQSzYQ6MUvFfFnNd7R1yJ5xwUjB7JjYAMGyaOk/w285-h400/Mobile_CarDrop%20Ad_rev2.jpg" width="285" /></a></div>You could have used a rooftop shot of the car going over; you could have shown a tighter shot of a car falling past a row of windows; you could have shown the crushed car at the base of the building; but Len Sirowitz of Doyle Dane Bernbach used the height of the newspaper space to show the full size of building, inviting us the imagine the long fall of the automobile and what happens when it hits the ground. And making a static photo feel as dramatic as the same demonstration in the accompanying <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLoy8NZAeUY&t=6s" target="_blank">TV commercial</a>. <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>(The layout is even more brilliant when you consider that the ad was likely encountered by people reading the newspaper by holding it vertically.)<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p><b>Make the width of the ad part of the concept</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><b><br /></b></o:p>You may not immediately know you’re looking at an ad for Acapulco tourism, but the starkness and drama of this eye-stopping, eye-popping layout instantly pulls you in.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglvyyAN_T-1xElVV6aTmVziiX5JT6F2wwwhGhLovG4ljHHm4OH0L7g-KxZAg66dXdTmHg3kOHFTKrUmV5zSOr1n13GEM4kEz4LUiZp9e5DDIrNoHWbup6-WCkO3knHzs3kMLqBN8fJBPvkaUP3Xfz6qiokWwxLmQICMrQyxRCmOH5dT74dMlQ8aj1r2pI/s1884/EasternAirlines_CliffDiver.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1442" data-original-width="1884" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglvyyAN_T-1xElVV6aTmVziiX5JT6F2wwwhGhLovG4ljHHm4OH0L7g-KxZAg66dXdTmHg3kOHFTKrUmV5zSOr1n13GEM4kEz4LUiZp9e5DDIrNoHWbup6-WCkO3knHzs3kMLqBN8fJBPvkaUP3Xfz6qiokWwxLmQICMrQyxRCmOH5dT74dMlQ8aj1r2pI/w400-h306/EasternAirlines_CliffDiver.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>Produced around 1967 by Steve Frankfurt of Young & Rubicam, the ad uses the story of a man who dives daily off a 160-foot-high cliff. (“Acapulco is like that,” the copy tells us. “A little mad. A little wild.”)<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>You could shown the edge of the cliff and a pair of feet, looking down from the diver’s point of view. You could have shown him coming out of the water, dripping and elated. Or even, like the Mobil ad above, you could shown the height of the cliff, and a tiny diver launching himself into the air.<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>But Frankfurt used a dramatic angle and graphic simplicity to emphasize the grace of the diver in mid-air, his arms splayed to the very corners of the ad. (Appropriately, the ad ran during the agency’s “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdxKJ73jlWE" target="_blank">The Wings of Man</a>” campaign for the airline.) <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p><b>Make the corner of the ad part of the concept</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><b><br /></b></o:p>I could show the well-known “<a href="https://craigmcnamara.blogspot.com/2022/07/advertising-minimalism-when-less.html" target="_blank">Think Small</a>” ad for Volkswagen, with its little VW in the upper left corner, but here’s an even better example (also from Doyle Dane Bernbach, this time by art director Charlie Piccarillo).</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><br /></o:p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hrPkdNeeAva9gGH8FS1kYZ_-ng0B1GQ_48opC2HrzQ64T05u6XbL6cyJ26DlCln68Ib314PgqSwbZLZC66TgD-sx3Q6IBkSLGXUrSAb2J8zEarqeq5zKVnuGKrzQ0Xkfhr-dC7NEuTSkRNZKCpopo0OCaH_6HCiuR0Vas_jqJ3Ld1UnqkMdTE4qBYIg/s765/Ohrbach_BackToSchool.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="765" data-original-width="500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hrPkdNeeAva9gGH8FS1kYZ_-ng0B1GQ_48opC2HrzQ64T05u6XbL6cyJ26DlCln68Ib314PgqSwbZLZC66TgD-sx3Q6IBkSLGXUrSAb2J8zEarqeq5zKVnuGKrzQ0Xkfhr-dC7NEuTSkRNZKCpopo0OCaH_6HCiuR0Vas_jqJ3Ld1UnqkMdTE4qBYIg/w261-h400/Ohrbach_BackToSchool.jpg" width="261" /></a></div>This 1963 ad for back-to-school clothes at Ohrbach’s department store turned the blank space of the ad into a stark wall, and pushed the boy off-center, slumping unhappily against the “side” of the ad. <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>You could have positioned the kid in the center of the page with same pouty expression. You could have put him in a tight closeup. But showing him dejected in the corner gets you not just a visually striking layout, it really sells his frustration at the thought of another school year. And note what he’s wearing (and not wearing). Shorts, tennis shoes, and no tee-shirt – more signifiers of the “summer freedom” he’s soon to be losing.<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p><b>Or just make every square inch of the ad the whole concept</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><b><br /></b></o:p></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Another 1960s ad that can’t help but draw you in from Steve Frankfurt:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPhruLsu5JuO8DPumwi2HWlmuHG5pL8PhrOc11yi8HVi9JSB1Uqu2Ibil8iCxlyjRSqxXRWw8lDXBbhKm2ChdbKlN7Cc8g1uorJpv2H01vqQT_7BGbwWMwq14voEPVSEvnFmRtLmpUhUdAXvqlESrhX2rOLnT7_va_i7Iy3IxD9NIGKpGS9sGrjl_I81g/s1398/Band-Aid_Tool%20Box.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="956" data-original-width="1398" height="274" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPhruLsu5JuO8DPumwi2HWlmuHG5pL8PhrOc11yi8HVi9JSB1Uqu2Ibil8iCxlyjRSqxXRWw8lDXBbhKm2ChdbKlN7Cc8g1uorJpv2H01vqQT_7BGbwWMwq14voEPVSEvnFmRtLmpUhUdAXvqlESrhX2rOLnT7_va_i7Iy3IxD9NIGKpGS9sGrjl_I81g/w400-h274/Band-Aid_Tool%20Box.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">That small bit of copy at bottom right: “… And there are 27 other places in your life where Band-</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Aid Bandages ought to be.” </span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * *</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div>(By the way, you’ll see these and many other classic ads at Dave Dye’s “<a href="https://davedye.com" target="_blank">Stuff from the Loft</a>” web site, where he posts interviews and career retrospectives of advertising's most creative thinkers.) </span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-38775949543738319802023-12-03T21:47:00.002-06:002023-12-04T19:20:53.423-06:00Happiness is a warm television<div style="text-align: left;">Authentic. Genuine. Truthful. These are the qualities above all that modern advertising aspires to – or claims to aspire to. Consumers today are too savvy, too cynical, the thinking goes, to be beguiled by unrealistic depictions and unattainable expectations.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Yet despite this emphasis on realism, advertising largely remains an aspirational medium. Even the earthiest, unadorned people you see in ads still tend to be stylishly photographed and romanticized, still appealing to how we wish to see ourselves, even if that wish is a bit less lofty. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />So unlike the scrubbed, idealized images Madison Avenue sold us during the ‘50s and ‘60s. And that’s largely true – but when it comes to authenticity, nothing I’ve seen in recent years comes close to this mid-1960s campaign for Sony’s new concept of “portable” televisions.</div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in; text-align: left;"><o:p></o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMC-XOV8wIP6I5yft9b8JEopniU9PZV9NYj01y71kZF6mba7B0GitnhpgBIISBti7KMPbI74lphgESxfm1eSUO-Py4ZKk4bDpU6LAimPOev952pYiYm4aKjpFz08yfqEjiwUXGxZBK8bY9pZ1cnziv0EpkliunVa28DYAtgNDYRZ1U-eRjdrMGMHRzRto/s2344/Sony%20TV_Pee%20Wee%20Tee%20Vee_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2344" data-original-width="1800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMC-XOV8wIP6I5yft9b8JEopniU9PZV9NYj01y71kZF6mba7B0GitnhpgBIISBti7KMPbI74lphgESxfm1eSUO-Py4ZKk4bDpU6LAimPOev952pYiYm4aKjpFz08yfqEjiwUXGxZBK8bY9pZ1cnziv0EpkliunVa28DYAtgNDYRZ1U-eRjdrMGMHRzRto/w308-h400/Sony%20TV_Pee%20Wee%20Tee%20Vee_rev.jpg" width="308" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: left;">Created by the celebrated “Think small”/”When you’re number two, you try harder” ad agency, <a href="https://www.commarts.com/features/doyle-dane-bernbach" target="_blank">Doyle Dane Bernbach</a>, these 1965 ads present something that's largely vanished from our current advertising culture – not just a recognition of blue collar, “average” Americans, but an affection for them. <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>These are no romanticized factory workers, farmers, or ranch hands. Consider the guy in “Pee Wee Tee Vee.” Schlubby, Ralph Kramden clothes, smelly cigar in hand – and yet, pictured without an ounce of condescension or pity. </div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8uZ3dSr_zyFImlEWI90NKxcCIO48kb5WW58Pfq5i6nPV8pjJ0npjGKcNidphyphenhyphenmS77o6hlzYK9zEZ-m8Ephv5U5_r7F8MAydi4gmbFs4iMkVBD7n8tjLM7f8KIaObT396R5onnh2f84YKKaWpIc2dDJCLHWP4lYCGet4_logJPHyewXNq1Hc_ryT3kJI8/s2344/Sony%20TV_Tummy%20Television_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2344" data-original-width="1737" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8uZ3dSr_zyFImlEWI90NKxcCIO48kb5WW58Pfq5i6nPV8pjJ0npjGKcNidphyphenhyphenmS77o6hlzYK9zEZ-m8Ephv5U5_r7F8MAydi4gmbFs4iMkVBD7n8tjLM7f8KIaObT396R5onnh2f84YKKaWpIc2dDJCLHWP4lYCGet4_logJPHyewXNq1Hc_ryT3kJI8/w296-h400/Sony%20TV_Tummy%20Television_rev.jpg" width="296" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: left;">The campaign’s art director, <a href="https://davedye.com/2015/03/10/dear-lenny/" target="_blank">Len Sirowitz</a>, explained their strategy as “using an exaggeration of the truth concerning the television-watching habits in America … The ability to take the set where you want it to go — not to have to go where the set is.”<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>All well and good – but even more, he and his copywriter partner, Ron Rosenfeld, understood what would really make the ads stand out: “We wanted warmth and humanity.”<br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>And that’s what they gave us. Along with punchy, punny headlines, and believable product shots, we got a glimpse of people the way you rarely saw them in advertising back then. Or now. Sirowitz was referring to the (then) innovative layout style when he said, “You can spot them a mile off, they looked like no one else’s ads.” But I’d say that goes for the photo subjects as well.</div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij7XSkf1VzBkKJyaxC44D3QXQ4jdOuqbLH3j7bUY-XfYEm8IViVqI-jsQ5aifEL99ktHutNWoenmcAtZOfaeyA9Czw5A00hKOVrd01cYdAYwUKhUIs3Jpp11Cv0VuW1xDzAwEePR6fsiC_Ezh62xNo6zhH1t8FHNABHWUnQitD4nhQJyAwQsHTB_gGaW8/s2344/Sony%20TV_Wash-n-Watch_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2344" data-original-width="1800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij7XSkf1VzBkKJyaxC44D3QXQ4jdOuqbLH3j7bUY-XfYEm8IViVqI-jsQ5aifEL99ktHutNWoenmcAtZOfaeyA9Czw5A00hKOVrd01cYdAYwUKhUIs3Jpp11Cv0VuW1xDzAwEePR6fsiC_Ezh62xNo6zhH1t8FHNABHWUnQitD4nhQJyAwQsHTB_gGaW8/w308-h400/Sony%20TV_Wash-n-Watch_rev.jpg" width="308" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;">The best advertising, it's been said, is aspirational. Usually that means appealing to the desire to be something you're not. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">These ads, however, tell us that happiness is possible being just who you are.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg52cpXfPPclJtuFgeFSvhKvK5MjA_IhS8w_LJ2yKt4QJ0CobC84oSvuaEl6TSnESsnFUPuUe9FY6ZDsG6bDdZzKRffnYgSA9sMGSueAXfc2ANMXUdsBwgFGxsFqa5m7uo8DhYs4y8XMeaRRdEXwiGN6A4bGVyoNcURT13IJwCqRMPYS7a8PE94XtsO99k/s2344/Sony%20TV_Walkie-Watchie_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2344" data-original-width="1692" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg52cpXfPPclJtuFgeFSvhKvK5MjA_IhS8w_LJ2yKt4QJ0CobC84oSvuaEl6TSnESsnFUPuUe9FY6ZDsG6bDdZzKRffnYgSA9sMGSueAXfc2ANMXUdsBwgFGxsFqa5m7uo8DhYs4y8XMeaRRdEXwiGN6A4bGVyoNcURT13IJwCqRMPYS7a8PE94XtsO99k/w289-h400/Sony%20TV_Walkie-Watchie_rev.jpg" width="289" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><i>This is an expansion of the very first post on this blog, back on January 2, 2008.</i></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-807556206662599552023-11-25T15:29:00.005-06:002023-12-08T22:07:21.324-06:00Who's at the door? Who's at the sleigh? What animals come after A?<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGwp7Ov_QmV-o2N426fJ6vbL7Kbrk0fqRq-bu5d2D1abmMhdDXVncCjMJAdCDPezg3ajatdLuxKd_F8VJMIJczFIYAF-N0cdEO-9LXp7TZrBKc3sbT_r_urQftLGcpuIv-vKVSXjGWX5g7acnxKi34LV0xzIHF1JQKoWQtMFyI-ucFxm5eSZ0nM-5-DMc/s1080/3%20Books_Instagram%20Ad_craigmwriter.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1080" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGwp7Ov_QmV-o2N426fJ6vbL7Kbrk0fqRq-bu5d2D1abmMhdDXVncCjMJAdCDPezg3ajatdLuxKd_F8VJMIJczFIYAF-N0cdEO-9LXp7TZrBKc3sbT_r_urQftLGcpuIv-vKVSXjGWX5g7acnxKi34LV0xzIHF1JQKoWQtMFyI-ucFxm5eSZ0nM-5-DMc/w400-h400/3%20Books_Instagram%20Ad_craigmwriter.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;">Bigger sizes and smaller prices for my two previous children's books </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">–</span><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"> plus a new book also featuring fun animal illustrations by noted Hamm's Bear illustrator (and my father-in-law) Bill Stein. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;">Preview and order via </span><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a class="x1i10hfl xjbqb8w x6umtig x1b1mbwd xaqea5y xav7gou x9f619 x1ypdohk xt0psk2 xe8uvvx xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r xexx8yu x4uap5 x18d9i69 xkhd6sd x16tdsg8 x1hl2dhg xggy1nq x1a2a7pz xt0b8zv x1fey0fg" href="https://www.craigmwriter.com" rel="nofollow noreferrer" role="link" style="border-color: currentcolor; border-style: none; border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--blue-link); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: currentcolor; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0" target="_blank">craigmwriter.com</a> or <a href="https://www.blurb.com/user/craigmwriter" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></span></div><p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-39532176309559247192023-11-24T15:11:00.008-06:002023-12-08T22:16:38.212-06:00Red-Nosed Drunk<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "New York", serif; line-height: 12pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMfHHQ4TUc8DC_n9Ya7cFWFs28uhEvWZn8ZpjS4jCFUWpPuv10jzNzYyWr-J_bmGgvrKPS8IoeUkXIn_ugbndjITHyIau71AXyKBTiy8z58zfJE2H_NQb9sK2rHqpWYGC9OuLT0RJHte6lSCGdeSucc5hsg5cDBWv98fxDIIzvhntNvSNo5elttuHyeZ4/s1688/Rudolph_Cocktail%20Lounge.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1570" data-original-width="1688" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMfHHQ4TUc8DC_n9Ya7cFWFs28uhEvWZn8ZpjS4jCFUWpPuv10jzNzYyWr-J_bmGgvrKPS8IoeUkXIn_ugbndjITHyIau71AXyKBTiy8z58zfJE2H_NQb9sK2rHqpWYGC9OuLT0RJHte6lSCGdeSucc5hsg5cDBWv98fxDIIzvhntNvSNo5elttuHyeZ4/s320/Rudolph_Cocktail%20Lounge.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span>A hoof banged on the bar. “Hit me again, Joe.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Don’t you think you’ve had enough for one night, pal?” the bartender replied coolly. “I can smell the nut meg on your breath from here.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Hey, my nose always is always red,” Rudolph snorted back. “I can handle my egg nog.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Something bothering you, Rudy?”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>The reindeer lowered his dewy eyes to the bar. “Sorry, Joe. It’s the holiday, you know? Sometimes, it just gets me down. All this rampant commercialism, the runaway materialism. I mean, where’s it going to end?" <br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Isn’t your attitude a little hypocritical, Rudolph? You know, given where you came from.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“What are you talking about?” the reindeer snorted. His nose momentarily flared bright red in the smoky dimness of the bar, as if inflamed by his annoyance.<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>The bartender considered his next words carefully. “You know about Montgomery Wards, right? The department store? Some copywriter there made you up for a giveaway booklet back in ‘39.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“What is this? Some kind of reindeer game you’re playing?”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Rudy, come on, I’m giving it to you straight. Think about it. You weren’t part of the original eight. Didn’t you ever wonder why you’re weren’t mentioned in “The Night Before Christmas?”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>The reindeer chewed on the thought carefully, like bitter cud. “So what are you saying? That I’m part of the problem?”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Hey, lighten up. You may have begun as marketing gimmick, but you’re part of Christmas folklore now. You’re as much a part of the holidays as ol’ Kris Kringle himself.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Maybe you’re right.” Rudolph nodded, the bells on his harness jingling brightly. “That reminds me, the old man’s probably getting the sleigh hitched up right now. Listen, thanks.” <br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>He headed out the door, twisting his head slightly so his antlers would pass.<br /></span><span> <br /></span><span>“Just the same,” he mused to no one in particular, “I wonder if General Electric would be interested in the naming rights to my nose.”<br /></span><span> <br /></span><i><span>December 2003</span></i></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span>This was one of the holiday messages I sent out to clients during my freelancing years </span></i><span face="Calibri, sans-serif">–</span><i><span> and one of the essays you'll </span><span>find</span><span> in my 2021 compilation, "</span><span>Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much: Stories and Essays from a Career in Advertising." </span></i></span></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-75107259180838769782023-10-01T12:31:00.002-05:002023-12-08T22:07:52.235-06:00A playwright for one minute<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKxVJYwUKfI7fM4dJDHfZsbuU2FZyj79JF57F4j51pWhXEv1s3Oznamp-nvaA_hFI9KiBJrvB_cBbX2FIVAhUhI6dbjPrOpxmP8uLcQrtupCJgePPl_Wixcly_QhEIOkrneCyNXBtXexxPX4FPM22-A5KT3qPUYj5kkpUjIG72RoRHgsCb3N4Sw_qQXj4/s2030/Thinking%20of%20Elephants%20Title%20Image.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1120" data-original-width="2030" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKxVJYwUKfI7fM4dJDHfZsbuU2FZyj79JF57F4j51pWhXEv1s3Oznamp-nvaA_hFI9KiBJrvB_cBbX2FIVAhUhI6dbjPrOpxmP8uLcQrtupCJgePPl_Wixcly_QhEIOkrneCyNXBtXexxPX4FPM22-A5KT3qPUYj5kkpUjIG72RoRHgsCb3N4Sw_qQXj4/s320/Thinking%20of%20Elephants%20Title%20Image.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Back in the late ‘80s, a Minneapolis screenwriters' group sponsored a couple of public readings for a movie script I’d written. It was small performance, for maybe 40 to 50 people, but it was professionally done, with local stage actors volunteering their time and talent to act out my words. And though the script never amounted to much beyond that, I still remember the thrill of hearing my characters come to life, hearing my jokes getting actual laughs.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I didn’t go on to become a screenwriter or TV writer, but last year, I started thinking about the possibility of again having something I wrote performed on stage, this time via those 10-minute play competitions that are popular with theatre groups. I had a story that I’d started to tell in a movie script 40 years ago, but never finished; I lifted a sequence from that screenplay, and through a lot of rewriting, turned it into ten-minute, two-person play.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Twenty-five submissions later, that play remains unproduced. But in the process of seeking out potential play festivals, I came across a call for submissions for one-minute (yes, one-minute) plays for the Minnesota Shorts Play Festival, presented by the Merely Players Community Theatre in Mankato, MN.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxjVuWG6-cjMeqDZKC7xYMNqedgJJ4HUxHoE6i-4olAfnXsMuVe_hZESHOxmq9lXwjqHoacOdGnJVMuhNT4ZHRNjz8X2ZTvU9iogmWFs1X-bSbP1YCn5j4z0ur1aiiwxwE_IARIUjzQD5hyZmlIlP6uJgMofw5jgRdlnGKqnOfEPikQMfSF1eU1c_WjUM/s749/Minnesota%20Shorts%20Play%20Festival%20Banner.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><img border="0" data-original-height="590" data-original-width="749" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxjVuWG6-cjMeqDZKC7xYMNqedgJJ4HUxHoE6i-4olAfnXsMuVe_hZESHOxmq9lXwjqHoacOdGnJVMuhNT4ZHRNjz8X2ZTvU9iogmWFs1X-bSbP1YCn5j4z0ur1aiiwxwE_IARIUjzQD5hyZmlIlP6uJgMofw5jgRdlnGKqnOfEPikQMfSF1eU1c_WjUM/s320/Minnesota%20Shorts%20Play%20Festival%20Banner.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-family: Calibri;">Besides the length (basically two pages), the only other requirement was that the play be set in a laundromat. I could instantly imagine the creative potential – the only real problem was the deadline. By the time I saw this announcement, the deadline was just two days away.</span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Still, I’d spent a good chunk of my advertising career writing 60-second radio commercials, and usually in less than two days, so it seemed doable. And for once, I could just do the comedy part and leave out the selling. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So I quickly came up with a premise, banged out a draft, revised it a couple times over the next day and a half … and I had my play, <i>Thinking of Elephants.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As I summarized it, “A chance encounter at a laundromat leads to an uncomfortable conversation on an ‘unmentionable’ subject.” (Hence, the <span face="Arial, sans-serif" style="background: repeat white; color: #050505;">analogy one character makes about not being able to unsee something in a coworker's laundry basket – how if you're told not to think of elephants, that's all you can think about.) <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span face="Arial, sans-serif" style="background: repeat white; color: #050505; font-family: Calibri;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span face="Arial, sans-serif" style="background: repeat white; color: #050505; font-family: Calibri;">I thought it was pretty funny with a good payoff, but then, I’m often my best audience.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A month or so later, I received an email from the Minnesota Shorts Play Festival coordinator, saying my play made the list of 15 semi-finalists (narrowed down from 42 plays submitted). That seemed promising, but we were still vying for just 5 spots, so I really didn’t know what my chances were.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Then, after a second round of judging, I learned my script had been chosen as one of the plays to be produced for its fall festival. A director would be selected in June, and actors would be cast by July, with rehearsals in August – all leading up to performances on Thursday, Sept. 7, and Friday, Sept. 8, at the Mankato West Theater.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Y8UIoTdtwls" width="320" youtube-src-id="Y8UIoTdtwls"></iframe></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">It was only a minute-long play, true – but hey, I was getting something produced on stage, even if it wasn’t the 10-minute play I had originally set out with. And it was fun to be recognized for writing something other than clever advertising. I had actually fulfilled a dream, if only in a small way.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I talked to my wife about us going to Mankato for a night to watch the Friday production, but this was still April. Over the next 5 months, I barely thought about it at all. Eventually I remembered and thought I’d better check the date so I don’t miss the production … and realized that the festival had taken place the previous weekend. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I’d missed my chance at seeing <i>Thinking of Elephants</i> performed live for an audience.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But wait – The festival recorded the one-minute plays and posted them online – so I got to see my play after all. I was surprised to see it performed by two women – the subtext of sexual tension was less obvious than if it’d been a woman and a man – but I liked their line readings and they did get the laughs. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And since the actual production clocked in at about two-and-a-half minutes, now I’m thinking, hmm, I just need about seven-and-a-half more minutes to turn this into a ten-minute play, and I can start submitting it to more festivals, and … <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Well, maybe.</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></p></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-7168664843785714102023-05-06T11:12:00.000-05:002023-05-06T11:12:36.349-05:00Being seen versus being clutter<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIWzqZA8n2GPI9EvRHOuKilXfOnXincw4HOhWiP6GAIYvPxr7eJvc9HUO_TozxSp57ipoPgLuYC-yJZ2W41g87RtB08-XXpiQ_hDpZ6eEzmWPRygQt4qYjZpNYc4GpFENHyrsCUvsS8a_LNY_T4wJqQOnzl14lmQM7jMpGvfeJL44lnmRr1GW9ER1W/s2389/Billboard-phone_rev3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1147" data-original-width="2389" height="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIWzqZA8n2GPI9EvRHOuKilXfOnXincw4HOhWiP6GAIYvPxr7eJvc9HUO_TozxSp57ipoPgLuYC-yJZ2W41g87RtB08-XXpiQ_hDpZ6eEzmWPRygQt4qYjZpNYc4GpFENHyrsCUvsS8a_LNY_T4wJqQOnzl14lmQM7jMpGvfeJL44lnmRr1GW9ER1W/s320/Billboard-phone_rev3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><p><b style="font-weight: bold;">"How can outdoor advertising avoid clutter and visual pollution in public spaces?" </b>asked LinkedIn for a recent <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/advice/0/how-can-outdoor-advertising-avoid-clutter-visual" target="_blank">collaborative article</a> on their site.</p></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">"Be creative and context-aware," they advised. "Find ways to integrate your ads with the environment, the culture, and the audience … make your ads more engaging, memorable, and respectful, while avoiding the risk of being intrusive or offensive.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As one of the "select group of experts" who were invited to contribute, I added this to the discussion:<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 40.5pt;">By definition, you want your ad to be noticed; disrupting the environment is pretty much how it happens. Merging into the background means you’re not being seen. Yes, engaging viewers with a clever idea or visual can make the intrusiveness sting less. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 40.5pt;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 40.5pt;">But maybe the question we should be asking is how much the potential for attracting eyes justifies the potential for distracting drivers. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 40.5pt;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 40.5pt;">I was once tasked by a highway safety group to write outdoor messages alerting drivers to the dangers of distracted driving. Realizing that my billboards would potentially be contributing to the problem, I decided the only responsible solution was very short, very direct messages: “Get off the phone. “Put down the coffee.” “Stop checking your makeup.”<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">You can see all more of this ad campaign <a href="https://www.craigmwriter.com/work#/safe-communities/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-55770232996165741612023-04-05T08:33:00.001-05:002023-04-06T19:15:52.305-05:00"Hosting" a recording session – 3 things I learned from Garry Marshall<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFuSqgnufer1PGyLkZC0YFTNHFs6sa7Q3ELli-3ri2z-O0iH-CVDzWC00yVIgz-btVnQ4RL5bLO629JLOI9Wd4qFiwThR1pchTpunqUCuLopECF5dEuKNm_YuB8i7dlwJo2qbIzR4oKhrusJMVAdTckd0UEmM_Sb0NcDpS_xjxJDfPKW3e47bqpSLH/s2152/Garry%20Marshall%20Triptych.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="826" data-original-width="2152" height="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFuSqgnufer1PGyLkZC0YFTNHFs6sa7Q3ELli-3ri2z-O0iH-CVDzWC00yVIgz-btVnQ4RL5bLO629JLOI9Wd4qFiwThR1pchTpunqUCuLopECF5dEuKNm_YuB8i7dlwJo2qbIzR4oKhrusJMVAdTckd0UEmM_Sb0NcDpS_xjxJDfPKW3e47bqpSLH/w400-h154/Garry%20Marshall%20Triptych.jpg" width="400" /></a></div></span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Recently, I was re-reading <i>Wake Me When It’s Funny</i>,<sup>1</sup> the 1995 memoir by <a href="https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/garry-marshall" target="_blank">Garry Marshall</a>, famed sitcom creator/producer (<i>Happy Days</i>, <i>The Odd Couple</i>, <i>Mork & Mindy</i>) and movie director (<i>Pretty Woman</i>, <i>The Flamingo Kid</i>, <i>Beaches</i>). Along with anecdotes from shows and films throughout his career, Marshall dispenses little bits of pragmatic advice on working – and surviving – in show business. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">But I’ve found his advice often applicable to working – and surviving – in advertising, too. Especially when it comes to recording voices for commercials and videos.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p><b>Tip #1: "Host" the recording session</b></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p><b><br /></b></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">“I want everyone to get along while they're working because I hate tension while I'm working,” Marshall wrote. “One way to do this is to make each person feel as if he's one of the most important players on the team.” That’s why Michael Eisner, former Paramount and Disney CEO, said that "Garry Marshall doesn't direct a movie. He hosts a movie.”<sup>2</sup> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">I’ve tried to bring Marshall’s attitude with me to the recording studio – “I’m not just directing the voice talent, I’m <i>hosting</i> a recording session.” </span><span face="-webkit-standard"></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">What this means in practice is that, like Garry Marshall, I’ll try to set a tone where everyone feels comfortable, especially the voiceover talent. I’ll encourage a little chit-chat to keep the atmosphere loose. I’ll give the talent a lot of encouragement and praise so they know I’m on their side and have faith in their ability, especially when the scripts have complicated passages in them. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Though I’ll start with an idea of the type of read I’m going for, I’ll be open to suggestions from the talent, my creative partners, and the sound engineer. I rely on my sound engineers in particular, not just for their technical expertise, but for their keen ears and judgement. (They’ve saved spots, and me, more times than I can remember.)<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">At the same time, as Garry Marshall says, “just because I listen to everyone doesn't mean I always take that advice. Ultimately, a director must of course make his own decisions.”<sup>3</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><b>Tip #2: Take the blame</b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Of course, the downside of making decisions is sometimes making the <i>wrong</i> decision, usually asking for a specific reading of the script that turns out to be not at all what I was going for. Or bringing in a script that has an awkwardly worded sentence that can’t be read smoothly. Or choosing a wrong take in editing. When that happens, I am quick to take the blame and own up to my bad direction, hoping that buys me enough good will to keep everyone on board while I scramble to fix the issue.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">That’s a version of this Garry Marshall insight, going back to the first TV show he worked on in the late 1950s: “On <i>The Joey Bishop Show</i>, whenever anything went wrong I would say, “My fault," just to move things along. Joey once said, ‘You're just saying that to move things along.’ And I said, ‘You're right.’”<sup>4</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Setting aside ego and making everyone comfortable has enabled me to get through hundreds of recording sessions over the years, usually leaving with the voiceovers and music I needed. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><b>Tip #3: Keep self-pity to a minimum</b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Despite my best efforts, once in a while, sessions go awry<span style="color: red;"> </span>– the script was flawed and I didn’t realize it in time, the talent was a mismatch for the project, I missed a glitch or mispronunciation, I picked the wrong music. Usually, I can see the problem in time and get to a solution – but if it slips by me?</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Well, Garry Marshall had a solution for that, too, drawn from how he and an early writing partner dealt with rejection: “We would devote one half hour of each day to self-pity. We pledged to sit in our cold fifth-floor apartment for thirty minutes each day and say things like ‘No one will hire me. I will never work. I will fail. I am sad.’ However, at all other times, we had to maintain an air of supreme self-confidence.”<sup>5</sup> <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I’m going to close here, because I have another voiceover session coming up and I’ve still got to get in that half-hour of self-pity before I put on an air of supreme self-confidence. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">* * *<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup>1</sup> <i>Wake Me When It’s Funny: How to Break into Show Business and Stay There</i>, Garry Marshall with Lori Marshall, Massachusettes: Adams Publishing, 1995<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup>2</sup> ibid, p.184<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup>3</sup> ibid, p. 184<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup>4</sup> ibid, p. 125<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup>5</sup> ibid, pp 47-48<o:p></o:p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-91726149089217411062023-03-25T11:19:00.003-05:002023-03-26T18:16:18.501-05:00Bob & Ray, Ad Men Extraordinare<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLOW54jm6jc-0UwV4cYwGkCnYI8tJKHjLX6Xd4JDP7LR_vnUwl9lEJhv4EU8Gg3TpK1iCkpi3V_9c7EW7Ddm1EyAmgR71vp5QC8krHoiV9hAb1o-wQXA0QjCBAjYrORh63PDOqlZQDxv-2iwqrmp0mjQMoRZY7I5ilyP0XWUEmFuLVYzg3Pd9RlhTV/s350/Bobandray.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="234" data-original-width="350" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLOW54jm6jc-0UwV4cYwGkCnYI8tJKHjLX6Xd4JDP7LR_vnUwl9lEJhv4EU8Gg3TpK1iCkpi3V_9c7EW7Ddm1EyAmgR71vp5QC8krHoiV9hAb1o-wQXA0QjCBAjYrORh63PDOqlZQDxv-2iwqrmp0mjQMoRZY7I5ilyP0XWUEmFuLVYzg3Pd9RlhTV/s320/Bobandray.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator"><br /></div><div>During their 5 decades of performing together on radio and TV programs, Bob Elliot and Ray Goulding have portrayed befuddled newsmen, quirky interview subjects, didactic soap opera characters another media mainstays. </div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gZEyvwhjcFk" width="455" youtube-src-id="gZEyvwhjcFk"></iframe></div><div><br /></div><div>But of all the targets of their deadpan, underplayed style, one the best has been their commercial parodies. </div><div><br /></div><div>Sure, that sounds like faint praise, what with the glut of commercial parodies all over TV and the internet these days, but Bob & Ray appropriated the language of advertising with an insightfulness that's easy to miss while you're laughing at their off-kilter dialogue.<div></div><br />Their commercials for fictitious sponsor Monongahela Metal Foundry -- <font class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">"Casting Steel Ingots With The Housewife In Mind" </font>-- make a mockery of advertisers' attempts at consumer relevance. </div><div><br /></div><div>Their Einbinder Flypaper slogan -- <font class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">"The Brand You've Gradually Grown To Trust Over The Course Of Three Generations"</font> -- was a typical heritage-hyping appeal and yet resonated with a candor ("gradually grown to trust") few companies would dare to use. </div><div><br /></div><div>And their message from the Croftweiler Industrial Cartel --<font class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"> "Makers Of All Sorts Of Stuff, Made Out Of Everything"</font> -- skewered GE-style corporate umbrella branding.<div><br /></div><div>You can learn a lot about writing copy from these two. Or at least learn what <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">not </span>to write.</div><div><br /></div><div> </div><div>By the way, Bob & Ray are not to be confused with Bert & Harry, another comedic team that appeared in commercials for Piels Beer back in the '50s (and who just happened to be voiced by Bob and Ray).</div></div><br />
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mHroxyoCwV4" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe><div><br /></div><div>(Note: This brief essay is among the humorous pieces included in my compilation, <i>Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much: Stories and Essays from a Career in Advertising</i>.)</div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-5903956124607529702023-03-04T15:34:00.000-06:002023-03-04T15:34:48.017-06:00The lost epic ... found!<div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSZp_qKRDl7ACxt8W_GSjzGD6Ey6KYcv8wzXR_MlNRrx9mS-GNrERoeAfGHe1fqDxFEZ1Y1e4N6UFMrpGoQhCC9nkf1H7lkkrGvC0P5elBmU3SowUVhjBN4YGEggbuBDlwDlV_0ZsC5oaCys_lf_WqjG_FeX-nzIlOirWZzBvPFm_wI8c3pSzUPmUK/s1698/HF_bullet%20strike.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="1698" height="181" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSZp_qKRDl7ACxt8W_GSjzGD6Ey6KYcv8wzXR_MlNRrx9mS-GNrERoeAfGHe1fqDxFEZ1Y1e4N6UFMrpGoQhCC9nkf1H7lkkrGvC0P5elBmU3SowUVhjBN4YGEggbuBDlwDlV_0ZsC5oaCys_lf_WqjG_FeX-nzIlOirWZzBvPFm_wI8c3pSzUPmUK/s320/HF_bullet%20strike.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />The story of this movie has a surprise ending, one that's more interesting the movie itself </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">– and was literally decades in the making.</span></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In 1974, as a ninth-grader enrolled in Film In The Cities, a filmmaking program of the St. Paul school system, I created an animated film starring my ersatz Spider-Man character, The Human Fly. </span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />I had originally planned to draw it in traditional animation style, cell by cell, but when my instructor figured the cost of acetate sheets for even a short movie, it was suggested that I instead use cutout figures against drawn backgrounds. <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>After storyboarding a very simple story – the Human Fly breaks up a mugging – I set to work drawing the necessary figures and poses, and hinging their limbs with threads attached to the back of the cutouts. <br /><o:p> <br /></o:p>Over a couple of months, I animated the figures, edited the film, and added a soundtrack of "action" music and sound effects. At my instructor's suggestion, I wrote and recorded a conversation between two policemen that would play under the credits to set up the story. (I also voiced cop #2.) </span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The finished movie was presented with other student productions at an end-of-semester film festival and reception. My film was lumped in the middle of all the films shown, and frankly, there was nothing special about it. Some of the films were better, some were worse, some were more ambitious, some less <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">– </span><span face="-webkit-standard"></span>but most were a lot more original. </span></div><div><o:p style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">However, my movie was one of the few to be cited in a Minneapolis Tribune column previewing the film festival, mentioning my name and describing how "Bullets Bradshaw's city of fear is stopped by the Human Fly, who does him in with bonks, pows, and thoomps.”</span><br style="font-family: Calibri;" /><o:p style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Apparently, my on-screen sound effects were the most notable thing in the entire film.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * *</span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Over the years, I'd periodically wonder whatever became of the print of my movie. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Film In The Cities had closed in 1993; I assumed <i>The Human Fly </i>must have been boxed up with all the other student films for storage and was probably lost or disposed of at some point.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Jump cut to four decades later ...</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In November 2022, I happened across a local documentary on Film In The Cities. Although my movie wasn't one of the clips shown, I realized that all these student films must still exist ... somewhere. I started searching online and was surprised to discover the FITC student films <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">–</span><span face="-webkit-standard"></span> including mine <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">–</span><span face="-webkit-standard"></span> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">were now in the archives of the Minnesota Historical Society.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All these years, it had been there all along and I had no idea. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Once I verified that I was indeed the creator of my film, the Historical Society was able to make me a digital copy. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The epic was finally mine, 48 years later.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As you might guess, after all the time, the film was a little faded and the soundtrack was in bad shape (a third of it was more or less missing). So I remastered it as best as I could, rebuilt the music track and sound effects, and tightened up a few edits. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Of course, what I couldn't fix were my drawings and my very shaky understanding of anatomy. Those I'm afraid we're stuck with.</p></span></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-52971878121090812342023-03-02T18:14:00.006-06:002023-10-06T18:39:54.323-05:00My friend, Jeff<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKUGMA001FDZ9q2g2FxAvmMFvrypV7uWCOVEAM5V_n7rn8BQytywpmtqTy1sUcQ5oZKClmQsMiZdcBZfJbcHlqoFown-1fwM4iUWRyaC51_CTFc5P_BIr0DbGec695Q865MSkdLF3--A_Vc2ZsFq0xoYK9POTAIA8h7rZZkKj87D3HJ7RmRMzsYy_r/s1200/Jeff_CU_rev2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="991" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKUGMA001FDZ9q2g2FxAvmMFvrypV7uWCOVEAM5V_n7rn8BQytywpmtqTy1sUcQ5oZKClmQsMiZdcBZfJbcHlqoFown-1fwM4iUWRyaC51_CTFc5P_BIr0DbGec695Q865MSkdLF3--A_Vc2ZsFq0xoYK9POTAIA8h7rZZkKj87D3HJ7RmRMzsYy_r/s320/Jeff_CU_rev2.jpg" width="264" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">We all have someone we look up to, someone who inspires and awes you, who motivates and challenges you by their example.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Mine was my best friend.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I met Jeff Vlaming when we both worked in the advertising department of our college newspaper. We hit it off right from the start, and for the next 40 years, we kept each other laughing and endlessly discussing movies, TV shows, books, comics, and music.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I’ve never known anyone else like him, his talent bursting out in all directions at once. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Jeff sold his first TV script while still living in Minneapolis. When he and his wife, Kathy, made the move to California, he beat the odds by getting his first staff writer position on the critical favorite, <i>Northern Exposure</i>. From there, he moved to <i>The X-Files</i> and began a long career writing and producing for many popular sci-fi and horror genre shows, including <i>Weird Science</i>; <i>Xena, Warrior Princess</i>; <i>Battlestar Galactica</i>; <i>R</i><i>eaper</i>; <i>Fringe</i>; <i>Teen Wolf</i>; <i>Hannibal</i>; <i>Outcast</i>; <i>The 100</i>; and <i>Debris</i>.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He was a success in Hollywood, but he could have been an artist, a cartoonist, a musician, a comedian, a model-maker – he was, in fact, all those things at one point or another – and more. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He made super-8 movies from junior high through college – epic movies with costumes and sets he created, and locations cleverly chosen to suggest futuristic structures, medieval times, or jungle and desert landscapes – wherever his story needed to be set.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He was in two different garage bands, and wrote and recorded his own songs. He played the piano like he was born with his fingers on the keys.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He dabbled in standup comedy and performed in an improv troupe.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He wrote a two-act play as the thesis for the Masters degree he earned in 2018. He turned an unsold screenplay into a full-length novel.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He had a movie script optioned, and when the production didn’t happen, he filmed a preview for investors in hopes of making it himself.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Most recently, he fulfilled a long ambition by writing and illustrating a graphic novel that combined his interests in detective stories, monsters, and period storytelling.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">And through everything, year in, year out, there was the doodling – the quirky drawings, caricatures, and non sequitur gags that would gush like a firehose from his pen onto whatever paper or napkin was in front him. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He was fearless in attempting new things and humble despite all of his abilities, with a warmth and good humor and vibrancy that attracted people to him like moths drawn irresistibly to a bright light.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">To know Jeff was to be inspired, encouraged, and supported by him in all the things you attempted. I will always be in awe of him – and never more so than in knowing how hard he fought for every day of the last two years before he was taken from us all by cancer at the end of January.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">I've had, and will have, other inspirations, other role models. But there will never be another one like Jeff. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Thank you for everything, my friend.</p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-48602100031199093772022-10-04T09:50:00.002-05:002022-10-04T17:36:54.345-05:00Lois and Ogilvy on The Big Idea<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4j7YPxPIbCr9yFTGLRnvgJARsgdegDqIkADm76i7Yt5qWE9SomtjHHJTLWU44Os6rSWCfUAO2f0KAqe7eqgItcFJMDvdujcNInkxZdzy_rKkYEb-wazJs9BjQnRycXEj95XL32W9R2suoWQoOTisHn2roYJ715ZppVzr6qPpqB7_hYaRdziQOJ1UC/s1310/Lois%20Vs%20Ogilvy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="771" data-original-width="1310" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4j7YPxPIbCr9yFTGLRnvgJARsgdegDqIkADm76i7Yt5qWE9SomtjHHJTLWU44Os6rSWCfUAO2f0KAqe7eqgItcFJMDvdujcNInkxZdzy_rKkYEb-wazJs9BjQnRycXEj95XL32W9R2suoWQoOTisHn2roYJ715ZppVzr6qPpqB7_hYaRdziQOJ1UC/w400-h235/Lois%20Vs%20Ogilvy.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As a panelist on a TV talk show, ad man and creative revolutionary George Lois was once asked to define advertising. After listening to the more scholarly definitions offered up the other ad execs on the panel, George commented, “I think these guys and me are in a different business,” and offered a more blunt, visceral definition. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “Advertising is poison gas. It should bring tears to your eyes. It should unhinge your nervous system. It should knock you out.”<sup>1</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">That’s George in a nutshell. Visceral. Bombastic. But in a less provocative mood, he summed his approach up this way: <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “The common denominator of all my work is the unremitting quest for The Big Idea, because The Big Idea – a surprising solution to a marketing problem, expressed in memorable verbal and/or graphic imagery – is the authentic source of communicative power … [and] picks up force and speed because its element of surprise changes a habit or point of view.”<sup>2</sup></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><sup><br /></sup></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPxPQ6_ye9j4evbJdEvFnhEFlfBiTdHnsDBOkXC-0mqKvUO56dipAzhBz9gctiVzDtUmIAIvHvKDPNmXQQ6X2EvsPUs_p3EFsAEtX2Z15tF6ESmaLrMuiUKcPlhwelwgufu7umLmU2pEijaVMYXg64HvlUOXNtSRebKaxsTltBkpeo-b1tHRZ7uk-u/s764/Lois&Book.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="598" data-original-width="764" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPxPQ6_ye9j4evbJdEvFnhEFlfBiTdHnsDBOkXC-0mqKvUO56dipAzhBz9gctiVzDtUmIAIvHvKDPNmXQQ6X2EvsPUs_p3EFsAEtX2Z15tF6ESmaLrMuiUKcPlhwelwgufu7umLmU2pEijaVMYXg64HvlUOXNtSRebKaxsTltBkpeo-b1tHRZ7uk-u/w309-h242/Lois&Book.jpg" width="309" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">He capitalized the term quite intentionally. Ever the branding guru (and self-promoter), Lois credits himself as the originator of The Big Idea, a fresh point of view that he claimed was “a distinct breakaway from the David Ogilvy ‘school’ of advertising with its well-behaved words, benign imagery, and rigid do’s and don’ts.”<sup>3</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “Read Ogilvy’s stifling rules and regulations on art direction in his highly regarded book, <i>Confessions of an Advertising Man</i>, to understand how far apart he and I were on the subject of creativity.”<sup>4</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">While it is true that Ogilvy favored his rules (guidelines, really, formed by research into which techniques promoted the highest readership), Lois might be surprised to learn that David Ogilvy understood the limits of research and testing. As the legendary agency owner and writer later confessed, <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “You can do homework from now until Doomsday, but you will never win fame and fortune unless you also invent <i>big ideas</i>. It takes a big idea to attract the attention of consumers and get them to buy your product. Unless your advertising contains a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night.”<sup>5</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">So yes, David was also a devotee on the power and necessity of the big idea – if not The Big Idea – though unlike Lois (“I never <i>create</i> the ideas that characterize my best work. I snare them from the air as they float about me.”<sup>6</sup>), showed perhaps more humility about the endeavor.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “It’s horribly difficult to recognize a good idea. I shudder to think how many I have rejected. Research can’t help you much, because it cannot predict the cumulative value of an idea, and no idea is big unless it will work for 30 years.”<sup>7</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As for where those big ideas come from, they’re surprisingly in sync on that, too:<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “Big ideas can originate from a variety of sources. They can often generate electricity from that enormous reservoir of popular culture – the arts, sports, politics, history, today’s headlines<sup>8</sup> … I spend all my time feeding the inner eye, the artistic persona that operates, somewhat mysteriously, from the subconscious.”<sup>9</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “Big ideas come from the unconscious. This is true in art, in science, and in advertising. But your unconscious has to be <i>well informed</i>, or your idea will be irrelevant. Stuff your conscious mind with information, then unhook your rational thought process.”<sup>10</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As proof, Ogilvy cited his first commercial idea for Pepperidge Farm baked goods, which he was told was lacking in imagery.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “That night I dreamed of two white horses pulling a baker’s delivery van along a country lane at a smart trot. Today, 27 years later, that horse-drawn van is still driving up that lane in Pepperidge Farm <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4M-6X9iUjw" target="_blank">commercials</a>.”<sup>11</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Piqued by a photo of America’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, Lewis Douglas, wearing an eye patch due to an injury sustained while fly fishing, Ogilvy impulsively placed an eye patch on the model in a photo for Hathaway shirts. As his biographer, Kenneth Roman, later explained, “He knew he had to have something unorthodox. The patch was there to imbue the advertisement with what Ogilvy called ‘story appeal.’ The reader wonders how the arrogant aristocrat lost his eye.”<sup>12</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “As soon as we saw the photographs, we knew we’d had something.”<sup>13</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p><br /></o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg08_dYqREELHE3-jWchsymK3m5pK0CQuKUh_-whEhc3yUsMtQBjeVtvK1XKej3xq_1S6fayTOWvALsEDS4WS0tPceDppkE02l7n4QOhyzyPQak4BXRzSbWq6hKJUy-tOsoNqjc70AG6XtOKtclBCcniU9v0YHpZW42rxf38QkNPu_tM1gqX3yErYDQ/s1311/LewisDouglas_HathawayMan_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="866" data-original-width="1311" height="264" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg08_dYqREELHE3-jWchsymK3m5pK0CQuKUh_-whEhc3yUsMtQBjeVtvK1XKej3xq_1S6fayTOWvALsEDS4WS0tPceDppkE02l7n4QOhyzyPQak4BXRzSbWq6hKJUy-tOsoNqjc70AG6XtOKtclBCcniU9v0YHpZW42rxf38QkNPu_tM1gqX3yErYDQ/w400-h264/LewisDouglas_HathawayMan_rev.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Despite being critical of much of Ogilvy’s output, Lois hailed the campaign as a masterpiece. Perhaps The Man in the Hathaway Shirt, an aristocrat stiffly posed amid the trappings of elegance, reminded him of the fine art from which he so often drew his inspiration.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> I drink in that art created by generations of mentors who have been the antennae of human sensibility, artists who have kept faith with the past without being captive to it.”<sup>14</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">In fact, Lois went so far as to publish a <a href="http://www.georgelois.com/08.-creation-of-the-big-idea.html" target="_blank">book</a> linking his Big Ideas to what he believes were their specific influences. In his hands (and mind), high-brow art was scaled down (and sometimes up) to the masses: <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Called upon to help differentiate UniRoyal’s leathery vinyl, Naugahyde, from its copycat competitors, Lois traces his inspiration to a tiny Japanese sculpture of a snarling lionesque beastie.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “Designer Kurt Weihs and I spawned the ugly Nauga, a mythical species who shed their hide once a year for the good of mankind (and UniRoyal). The Nauga, taller than a basketball center, became a spokesman for Naugahyde on TV and in national magazines.”<sup>15</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5L3TwVQfQqt_ocvCqCYkvlbopA2sW-ztsYGFpcBOwvZ55O2SyRrXHLZ6xZtYKP2-nQFi5FKqfjPuCc7Kwa20v_7kCvtb1DQuS28iRwrmZbwylhlL9mZSk0Ic98aTxGMp4x41Qp1VG3zNybBycNphCK3_QQ7dF6x0v5bSrwaSwR-J14q1xdBaows7M/s1746/Shishi_Nauga_rev.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="883" data-original-width="1746" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5L3TwVQfQqt_ocvCqCYkvlbopA2sW-ztsYGFpcBOwvZ55O2SyRrXHLZ6xZtYKP2-nQFi5FKqfjPuCc7Kwa20v_7kCvtb1DQuS28iRwrmZbwylhlL9mZSk0Ic98aTxGMp4x41Qp1VG3zNybBycNphCK3_QQ7dF6x0v5bSrwaSwR-J14q1xdBaows7M/w458-h232/Shishi_Nauga_rev.jpg" width="458" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">In another 1960s campaign, this one for Maypo hot cereal, Lois finds echos of the late-eighteenth-century Viennese sculptor, Franz Xavier Messerschmidt and his sculptures of humans in extreme emotional duress. Instead of kids pleading for Maypo, <a href="http://www.georgelois.com/maypo.html" target="_blank">Lois’s commercial</a> showed the anguished faces of the era’s greatest sports stars, including Mickey Mantle, Johnny Unitas, and Wilt Chamberlain.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> “The words and visuals – superstars crying “I want my Maypo!” – gave the <a href="http://www.georgelois.com/maypo.html" target="_blank">campaign</a> extraordinary power. American kids ate it up.”<sup>16</sup> <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">(Twenty-five years later, Lois paid that inspiration forward, adapting his Maypo approach to a fledgling <a href="http://www.georgelois.com/mtv.html" target="_blank">music channel</a>, with Mick Jagger and other music superstars demanding, “I want my MTV!”)<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">A second look at the examples above make it clear that while Lois and Ogilvy may agree in principle on the need for a Big Idea, in execution, they were indeed worlds apart; while Lois was brash and showy in his advertising, David preferred a quieter, more genteel style.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “I have produced my share of advertisements which have been remembered by the advertising world as “admirable pieces of work,” [but hold that] a good advertisement is one which sells the product <i>without drawing attention to itself</i>. It should rivet the reader’s attention on the product. Instead of saying “What a clever advertisement,” the reader says, “I never knew <i>that</i> before. I must try this product.”<sup>17</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">On the other hand, Lois had bigger ambitions, of “creating imagery and slogans that not only sell products and services, but also become part of our popular culture and enter the American psyche.”<sup>18</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Lois:</b> The ethos of my life has been the passionate belief that creativity can solve almost any problem – the Big Idea, the defeat of habit by originality, overcomes everything.<sup>19</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Perhaps, as befitting a man who came into advertising via research, Ogilvy had a more utilitarian view of the process.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.25in;"><b>Ogilvy:</b> “I have to invent a Big Idea for a new advertising campaign and I have to invent it before Tuesday. ‘Creativity’ strikes me as a high-falutin’ word for the work I have to do between now and Tuesday.”<sup>20</sup><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">* * * <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">1</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> George Lois with Bill Pitts, <i>What’s the Big Idea?</i> (New York: Doubleday, 1991), 4<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">2</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, Pitts, <i>What’s the Big Idea?,</i> 6<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">3</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, Pitts, <i>What’s the Big Idea?,</i> 5<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">4</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> George Lois, <i>Damn Good Advice (For People With Talent!)</i> (New York: Phaidon Press, 2012), 78<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">5</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> David Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i> (New York: Vintage Books, 1985), 16<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">6</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, <i>Damn Good Advice (For People With Talent!)</i>,<i> </i>15,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">7</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i>, 16<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">8</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, Pitts, <i>What’s the Big Idea?,</i> 6<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">9</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> George Lois, <i>George Lois on His Creation of the Big Idea</i> (New York: Assouline Printing, 2008), Introduction<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">10</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i>, 16<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">11</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i>, 19<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">12</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Kenneth Roman, <i>The King of Madison Avenue</i> (New York: Palgrave Macmillin, 2009), 90<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">13</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Roman, <i>The King of Madison Avenue</i>, 89<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">14</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, <i>George Lois on His Creation of the Big Idea</i>, introduction<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">15</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, <i>George Lois on His Creation of the Big Idea</i>, 35<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">16</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, <i>George Lois on His Creation of the Big Idea</i>, 56<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">17</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> David Ogilvy, <i>Confessions of an Advertising Man </i>(New York: Atheneum, 1963), 90<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">18</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, Pitts, <i>What’s the Big Idea?, </i>10<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">19</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Lois, <i>George Lois on His Creation of the Big Idea</i>, introduction<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;">20</span></sup><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i>, 24<o:p></o:p></span></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-63580399170453121312022-10-01T15:49:00.008-05:002022-10-01T15:49:43.178-05:00Just re-do it<div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikfKFK0s5UhvWj2mqj3BZDtZJwzMQdOsgzyH7oO1AwXsB5564Czc2niRn_v4gxB9lFv64Qu5tfUWawMsj6vG4iZ-OWTZCa5ePRWnI9v5VdK4sytGd8GGqsnXQDt1Dx7KjZs3HTL4VbM7pNtxTLd01jCiHy5eXDXg0C4QnHKO0SPEva488sDnIP7Hei/s900/Carpenters_SuperStar_45.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="900" height="218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikfKFK0s5UhvWj2mqj3BZDtZJwzMQdOsgzyH7oO1AwXsB5564Czc2niRn_v4gxB9lFv64Qu5tfUWawMsj6vG4iZ-OWTZCa5ePRWnI9v5VdK4sytGd8GGqsnXQDt1Dx7KjZs3HTL4VbM7pNtxTLd01jCiHy5eXDXg0C4QnHKO0SPEva488sDnIP7Hei/w218-h218/Carpenters_SuperStar_45.jpg" width="218" /></a></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">What’s your favorite song by The Carpenters? That would seem to be a simple enough question – but when it comes to the ‘70s sister-and-brother duo, it can be a little more complicated. Because often, you don’t just have to choose a song, you have a choose a version.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />Richard Carpenter didn’t just sing harmony to his Karen’s lead vocals. As producer, <span style="background-color: white; color: #202122;">arranger, lyricist, and composer, he was deeply involved in the production of the tracks – and a bit of a perfectionist. So over the years, as their hits have been re-released, he’s used the opportunity to remix many tracks</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #0f1111;"> to improve sound quality and add new instrumentation and flourishes – on songs like <i>Ticket to Ride</i>, <i>Top of the World</i>, and <i>Superstar</i>.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="color: #0f1111;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(15, 17, 17);"><br /></span></span>And it hasn't been just Richard Carpenter re-doing works long after they’ve been completed. Think of Neil Sedaka, re-recording his 1962 bubblegum hit, <i>Breaking Up is Hard To Do</i> as a soulful piano ballad in 1975. Or the group Chicago, re-arranging their <i>25 or 6 to 4</i> into drum-pounding stadium rock.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the theatre, Neil Simon was legendary for rewriting his plays during tryouts. By the time a performance ended, he’d be ready to dig back into the script to sharpen jokes and even reconceptualize whole scenes. <br /><o:p> </o:p></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="880" data-original-width="1709" height="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUk2Ezo2yUuu8r78tZlx4bne5Wb9VuuxgdMyDeQQynoewBwgVGjR0twkXZ6WDPUegWx8N2aDGU-c-L3cr-MrMcUYF1_Og-lWylv73y2pGRVjek4fyXkLBG-KYZ3pW7yA4SQa4yb-uUh8MJHMfQoXLIOi_uHUI6HUnLe3ymToCHHyuNlUpHqS2Ifp_t/w357-h184/CloseEncounters%20&%20SpecialEdition.jpg" width="357" /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Over in the cineplex, we’ve had Steven Spielberg and his release of <i>Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Special Edition</i>, a re-release of his 1977 sci-fi epic, now with tighter editing and a more drawn-out ending.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />And of course, George Lucas gave us <i>The Special Editions</i> of the original <i>Star Wars</i> trilogy, with improved special effects (and the infamous “Han didn’t shoot first” re-edit). Francis Ford Coppola really embraced the trend by re-cutting his poorly received <i>Godfather III</i> to become <i>The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone</i>; plus his aptly re-named <i>Apocalypse Now Redux</i> and <i>Cotton Club Encore.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><br /></i>Oh, and let’s not forget (though many would like to), The 4-hour Zack Snyder cut of the <i>Justice League</i>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But re-cutting movies is still relatively rare. In TV, however, it’s not uncommon to redo unsuccessful pilots, like the re-tooled <i>Barney Miller</i>, which got a series order only after co-creator Danny Arnold rewrote and recast several parts and refocused the action solely to the detective’s squad room. Or <i>Grapevine</i>, a gossipy sitcom from David Frankel that CBS cancelled after 6 episodes in 1992, then revived with a new cast eight years later (and was cancelled again, this time after 5 episodes).<br /><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1259" height="229" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh30dSH8pm8CZNL2uSO2TSCjSY9BfzzgORA0yT8gEkT62C9uMBaB7CGhBA3KEgKo8sLTr8Lw7ReZwTmaY5JGmiCigPncyaxavkLJjg0gdgeqKAsfeeRF-oM0NHcKviSVbwXrqYL7Wt-St47r3gyZ_BwDSUkPGFJnPg85qG23s_Eo7xubTg5X4UdnuJD/s320/Gravevine%20&%20Reboot.jpg" width="320" /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">All this revisionism may drive purists to distraction – but I can relate. No, I don’t write songs or plays, make movies or TV shows for a living – but as a creator of ads and commercials, I have a similar creative impulse toward dissatisfaction and perfectionism.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />Once I start working on an advertising problem, I find it hard to turn my brain off. Even after the deadline’s come and gone, even after I’ve had to make a decision and move on to other assignments, my back-brain is often still working on a better solution. Which is how I’ve earned a reputation for re-thinking ad concepts and re-writing headlines, even after they’ve already appeared in print or on TV. That’s the great thing about digital online advertising and web pages – you can go back into them and change something even while its running. (And you know I have.)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />Would it surprise you to know that for fourteen years, this blog was known as <i>Deconstruction on Madison Avenue</i> – until I switched it to the name you see now at the top of the page (which incidentally, was the original blog name for its first couple weeks)?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Appropriately, when I assembled a collection of advertising-related essays for a book I published earlier this year, I couldn’t resist going beyond just fixing typos. I expanded on some points I was making. I added an anecdote here and there. Some pieces I began years ago and never got around to finishing until now. At least one essay I rewrote entirely.</span></span></div><div><div style="text-indent: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; text-indent: -0.5in;">So</span><span style="font-size: 11pt; text-indent: -0.5in;"> </span><i style="font-size: 11pt; text-indent: -0.5in;">Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much</i><span style="font-size: 11pt; text-indent: -0.5in;"> </span><span style="font-size: 11pt; text-indent: -0.5in;">turned out be the perfect title, not just for the book, but for me in general. As a friend astutely observed, the number of iterations I did on the title alone justifies the name. (If she only knew how many versions of the cover I created till I got it right.)</span></span></div><div><div style="text-indent: -48px;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14.666667px;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You can find out more about that book (and read some of the chapters I wrote and rewrote) <a href="https://www.blurb.com/user/craigmwriter" style="color: #954f72;">here</a>.</span></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUk2Ezo2yUuu8r78tZlx4bne5Wb9VuuxgdMyDeQQynoewBwgVGjR0twkXZ6WDPUegWx8N2aDGU-c-L3cr-MrMcUYF1_Og-lWylv73y2pGRVjek4fyXkLBG-KYZ3pW7yA4SQa4yb-uUh8MJHMfQoXLIOi_uHUI6HUnLe3ymToCHHyuNlUpHqS2Ifp_t/s1709/CloseEncounters%20&%20SpecialEdition.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh30dSH8pm8CZNL2uSO2TSCjSY9BfzzgORA0yT8gEkT62C9uMBaB7CGhBA3KEgKo8sLTr8Lw7ReZwTmaY5JGmiCigPncyaxavkLJjg0gdgeqKAsfeeRF-oM0NHcKviSVbwXrqYL7Wt-St47r3gyZ_BwDSUkPGFJnPg85qG23s_Eo7xubTg5X4UdnuJD/s1259/Gravevine%20&%20Reboot.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div><p></p></div></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-3367161104316008832022-09-05T11:22:00.006-05:002022-09-05T12:27:24.283-05:00Bill Stein: Critters & Creatures<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i>In 2016, I was helping my father-in-law, commercial artist Bill Stein (1923-</i></span><i style="font-family: Calibri;">2020), prepare for a move by sorting through his flat files of artwork and sketches accumulated over his 60+ year career. Lots of Hamm’s work, naturally, and a drawer filled with Inky Lou posters. But there were other critters and creatures, too – animal and human, whimsical and fantastical. </i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><br />I hadn't realized how many times Bill had to help brand a company through the personality and antics of an advertising mascot. I put together a booklet for him, "Critters & Creatures," that compiled examples of the characters that Bill had drawn (and in several cases, created), along with his brief memories about each of them. This is my introduction to the collection, along with four of the best-known mascots.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />* * *<b><br /></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b>In the world of advertising, they’re known as “critters,”</b> the popular pitchmen of the <a href="https://interactive.wttw.com/chicago-stories/real-mad-men/ten-advertising-campaigns-that-were-born-in-chicago" target="_blank">Leo Burnett Company</a>. The Chicago ad agency was behind such 20th Century marketing icons as Tony the Tiger, Charlie the Tuna, The Jolly Green Giant, the Pillsbury Doughboy, even the Marlboro Man, to name just a few.</span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But Leo Burnett staffers weren’t the only Midwesterners giving animated life to consumer products during the post-World War II era. About 400 miles northwest of the Leo Burnett Company, Minneapolis ad agency Campbell Mithun was having its own success with the Hamm’s Bear. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIjqYsWzc4r5X_15CYcd09Gbjrnzc5OLbCDG5RC80QCP8YZUbtZka9ElcWGxDtrrkApBNI94ipGsq6GUT3XYkXDQap6Zmbo-LuN5ZVbdk9qY9bwf-Vv4v3rY5qopLY9Ij40m7GfG5YxgBfmaflFmjopHClM4BS6wMq2mn0p_H0JKGdaw7yAnPwOBY9/s2100/Bill_Hamms_Spotlight2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="2100" height="458" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIjqYsWzc4r5X_15CYcd09Gbjrnzc5OLbCDG5RC80QCP8YZUbtZka9ElcWGxDtrrkApBNI94ipGsq6GUT3XYkXDQap6Zmbo-LuN5ZVbdk9qY9bwf-Vv4v3rY5qopLY9Ij40m7GfG5YxgBfmaflFmjopHClM4BS6wMq2mn0p_H0JKGdaw7yAnPwOBY9/w640-h458/Bill_Hamms_Spotlight2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><a href="https://www.molsoncoorsblog.com/features/meet-bill-stein-longtime-illustrator-hamms-bear" target="_blank">Bill Stein</a> was one of a handful of artists illustrating The Bear. For 29 years, in ads, posters, brochures and displays, Bill put the lovably goofy bruin through a seemingly endless series of embarrassing situations and beer-drinking brotherhood. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />But Bill’s involvement with advertising mascots went beyond Hamm’s. Impressed by his work on The Bear, others came to Bill in hopes of having him create their own enduring icon, or at least, a warm and humorous character to publicly represent their organization. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYXDIwpCQU2AkUBAmqdnO95pIdBakA44gMn7qO1tn-qXlOyPKuvw-FqMOeANveJRKMUPrj6WHeCROgCrQUwPS5uSUYmH6KNth-MThpzN5CXHdq-XAcXb8KlkGyFsx9N4YFYs-Ng1gsgCL1YmoAJAL63bT4qMEQ5cM2oWGUHaelK9CL_9pClsWMZ1Jw/s2100/Bill_Gopher_Spotlight.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="2100" height="458" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYXDIwpCQU2AkUBAmqdnO95pIdBakA44gMn7qO1tn-qXlOyPKuvw-FqMOeANveJRKMUPrj6WHeCROgCrQUwPS5uSUYmH6KNth-MThpzN5CXHdq-XAcXb8KlkGyFsx9N4YFYs-Ng1gsgCL1YmoAJAL63bT4qMEQ5cM2oWGUHaelK9CL_9pClsWMZ1Jw/w640-h458/Bill_Gopher_Spotlight.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">You could populate a forest with all the various characters that have sprung from Bill’s drawing board over the years. And most of them wouldn’t seem out of place there. Bill’s characters are frequently denizens of the Midwestern region where he’s lived all his life. In Bill’s illustrations, bears, foxes, otters, raccoons, and even a certain gopher can be seen cavorting around pristine balsam-and pine-rimmed lakes, rolling hills and frozen ponds.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />It goes beyond just familiarity with the local flora and fauna. A child of North Dakota ranchers, and a long-standing member of the Izaak Walton League, Bill has a deep love of nature. Investing each character with a little of himself, it was probably inevitable that his creations would on occasion give voice to Bill’s own feelings about responsible stewardship of the environment.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixH84MBgkUXwH_ksTXEXb2Cu4J737xMgYHKjqDuUf6C9v6asdJfDun650w34TYXjaCVB-vKhLiA2hU9Yurd_9eLHD5SrqwzRi9lCctM75blDi_sXHCZVkw3mGTyyQjNRed9aPLYdM8Hm9ac4OI8JHQCI8bkFaDa_9yPUG_XTt08o62RBG1pdkGGEbf/s2100/Bill_InkyLou_Spotlight.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="2100" height="458" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixH84MBgkUXwH_ksTXEXb2Cu4J737xMgYHKjqDuUf6C9v6asdJfDun650w34TYXjaCVB-vKhLiA2hU9Yurd_9eLHD5SrqwzRi9lCctM75blDi_sXHCZVkw3mGTyyQjNRed9aPLYdM8Hm9ac4OI8JHQCI8bkFaDa_9yPUG_XTt08o62RBG1pdkGGEbf/w640-h458/Bill_InkyLou_Spotlight.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">He explains it this way: “Animals have a way of endearing themselves to people, whether they’re wild or they’re tame, and people will listen to words coming from an animal that they wouldn’t listen to coming from a human – I live in the environment. And I want you to take care of it, you’re destroying it.”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />Which is not to say that every critter that Bill drew was a soapbox for his beliefs. Sometimes, they said nothing at all, content with being all fun or all business. And despite their being for a wide variety of companies and purposes, they all share many traits in common. A smiling, friendly face. An impish sense of humor. A big-hearted gusto for life. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNdnkjNcxVlRI9L55lJAdkumgGZc_DoMW-awBZqbUWoFrHENbdvaU0LdnHiJwjVOdMOHEV2IhScnz3WUNN-c4LCi4ibT-gaFFZAodJQPZsCaYDrPGcDsaThCI8Y7waDPd2fO2nGvuD7maa532pLTRoWr59TJGgx5hQzSCOyrqNJmiYZiXPfZfLtKGr/s2100/Bill_GreenGiant_Spotlight.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="2100" height="458" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNdnkjNcxVlRI9L55lJAdkumgGZc_DoMW-awBZqbUWoFrHENbdvaU0LdnHiJwjVOdMOHEV2IhScnz3WUNN-c4LCi4ibT-gaFFZAodJQPZsCaYDrPGcDsaThCI8Y7waDPd2fO2nGvuD7maa532pLTRoWr59TJGgx5hQzSCOyrqNJmiYZiXPfZfLtKGr/w640-h458/Bill_GreenGiant_Spotlight.jpg" width="640" /></a></div></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">When you come down to it, Bill’s advertising characters weren’t really salesmen, they were entertainers. “You have to have public acceptance – that’s the true hallmark of whether they’re going to be successful or not successful.”</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br />“You wouldn’t use a wildebeest to sell beer.”<br /><o:p><br />* * *</o:p></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><br /></o:p></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Quotes are drawn from interviews of Bill by Craig McNamara and by Hamm’s Club member, Peter Slanga.<o:p></o:p></span></p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Text © 2016 by Craig McNamara. <br /></span><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Characters and illustrations © by their respective owners.</span></span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-58519185640178512552022-08-27T18:44:00.004-05:002022-09-01T08:57:03.932-05:00Brooks' look hooks<p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One of the goals of an effective ad campaign is a consistent, identifiable look that’s distinctive of the advertiser and can unify the campaign across different mediums and messages. And that can apply to movie posters, too. (And not just for series like <i>Star Wars</i> and <i>Indiana Jones</i>.)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">While reading Mel Brooks' recent <a href="https://sites.prh.com/mel-brooks" target="_blank">autobiography</a>,</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span><i style="font-family: Calibri;">All About Me</i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, which is illustrated with posters of many of his movies, I realized something that I hadn’t, back when the movies came out years apart. Several of the posters for first half-dozen or so movies had a kind of “house-style” to them.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In fact, the poster for 1974’s <i>Blazing Saddles</i> was the first for designer John Alvin, who would go on to create posters for more than 135 films, including <i>Blade Runner</i>, <i>The Color Purple</i>, <i>Beauty and the Beast</i>, and <i>The Lion King</i>.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYTSm8dpY5yM8motuly3chtEMgQZaVzo-ADTP0wlPZdnTVVLrjOWhyKe0j00PS2zh2hABx6-p89aIb49UbIBXNUA_fQPGDtZEay6p9JJDncOJFDhzW3c-VHOeUdDXemSNeY5x2DdyGBJfh-NVyeWvMrBZallBxdMEPUU62W2UU8yZLE3XwfK5ASQoW/s1681/BlazingSaddlesPoster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1681" data-original-width="1172" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYTSm8dpY5yM8motuly3chtEMgQZaVzo-ADTP0wlPZdnTVVLrjOWhyKe0j00PS2zh2hABx6-p89aIb49UbIBXNUA_fQPGDtZEay6p9JJDncOJFDhzW3c-VHOeUdDXemSNeY5x2DdyGBJfh-NVyeWvMrBZallBxdMEPUU62W2UU8yZLE3XwfK5ASQoW/w279-h400/BlazingSaddlesPoster.jpg" width="279" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Alvin di</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">ed in 2008; today, he’s remembered as a “master of the tease,” the image that sells the movie without the hyperbole and hucksterism of classic movie advertising. (Think of his personal favorite, his art for </span><i style="font-family: Calibri;">E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial</i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, that samples Michelangelo’s painting, </span><i style="font-family: Calibri;">The Creation of David</i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, to inspire a glowing alien finger reaching for the hand of a young boy.)</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And yet, the first movie poster he created was a far cry from this pared-back style for which he’s best remembered. The title, </span><i style="font-family: Calibri;">Blazing Saddles</i><span style="font-family: Calibri;">, came from Brooks combining of two “western” words into one incongruous phrase. “No one ever put them together, and for good reason: They simply don’t go together,” Brooks mused. “However, they cry, “Crazy Western” … the title tells you everything.”</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Well maybe not everything. Alvin helped.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">His <i>Blazing Saddles</i> poster was overstuffed with off-kilter imagery, including Cleavon Little rising up, Lone-Ranger-like, on his horse, and Brooks himself in a headdress (bearing Yiddish characters) over the backdrop of a coin (inscribed with “Hi, I’m Mel, Trust Me.”), all against a twilight western sky with the movie’s title in big 3D letters that looked both overblown and oddly authentic. Oh, and if you noticed, there was a boom microphone dangling down from the top, foreshadowing the movie’s reality-warping ending. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Word-of-mouth made <i>Blazing Saddles</i> a hit, but the poster helped create the buzz, selling the film as both parody and epic. It captured Mel’s vision perfectly.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Making a satiric comedy serves two audiences equally and simultaneously: the audience that gets every film reference and all of the subtext, and the other audience that has never seen or heard of any related film,” Brooks explained. “I wanted <i>Blazing Saddles</i> to work on its own. What I mean by that is even if you’d never seen a Western before, you’d still get it.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Amid the posters for the increasingly darker, cynical movies of “New Hollywood” in the 1970s (Think <i>Taxi Driver</i>, <i>The Conversation</i>, <i>The French Connection, Death Wish</i>), Alvin’s image was colorful and bold, in a way, the last gasp of Hollywood’s Golden Age of “costume” spectacle, glitzy musicals, and epic westerns.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So when Brooks made four more movies based in parody, he returned to John Alvin for posters in a similar vein. <o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Maybe not surprising, as his movies of the era were populated with returning actors and writers, too – and when something works, why change it? </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0in;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAWPsCf72y40P8xVO2NWVYypgpi5JLupayYUmMEGJ78mwq0DhVxLXAekxSrX4BoJ2ifNzCihqLZnavimv2Kp2w5LrQHnRHJClcFtURBUoK_uFqLW8yVfEAVOG8cLv24zNKbpC5Vjs88uHFUN0R3JtFq6mkUKVWCgdPDlJbW8CnuXlE7x-dp4KAFGtI/s1754/YoungFrankensteinPoster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1754" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAWPsCf72y40P8xVO2NWVYypgpi5JLupayYUmMEGJ78mwq0DhVxLXAekxSrX4BoJ2ifNzCihqLZnavimv2Kp2w5LrQHnRHJClcFtURBUoK_uFqLW8yVfEAVOG8cLv24zNKbpC5Vjs88uHFUN0R3JtFq6mkUKVWCgdPDlJbW8CnuXlE7x-dp4KAFGtI/s320/YoungFrankensteinPoster.jpg" width="219" /></a></div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiumEXFc6UV_IQJd3MUC9bKhTrBNa2NnrFtD34SxU6fN3HUL0ZdP_35tygf_3XFkE4HNnSUPR7uQ59pEccxWggq3C5bvvqbP6vLpaqvsZJxMWukMOPJDqzCgjKHc8CR0x3_NkRYzksvRcwROOdfoJyR3Yb6VtIqWp2IIsTgRnWbZM1MSqilv3UgA6tw/s1611/SilentMoviePoster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1611" data-original-width="1119" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiumEXFc6UV_IQJd3MUC9bKhTrBNa2NnrFtD34SxU6fN3HUL0ZdP_35tygf_3XFkE4HNnSUPR7uQ59pEccxWggq3C5bvvqbP6vLpaqvsZJxMWukMOPJDqzCgjKHc8CR0x3_NkRYzksvRcwROOdfoJyR3Yb6VtIqWp2IIsTgRnWbZM1MSqilv3UgA6tw/s320/SilentMoviePoster.jpg" width="222" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiywzbS40fCe59rS3bX_TVIr65IgMhFNuQcGkDaUcDxRuDO0lKqf973apP07A7CvMOGup81lV0uE6xSMewepdixEfB9e2iWemKl0wKGE72FSRXMAueJZ723XFXc7JHhwJfwyMAAl4AchxjWpJ5OTmop8jlArRusqTZanRA7ew3MG5EqebH3VbIp-80O/s1611/HistoryOfTheWorldPoster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1611" data-original-width="1051" height="335" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiywzbS40fCe59rS3bX_TVIr65IgMhFNuQcGkDaUcDxRuDO0lKqf973apP07A7CvMOGup81lV0uE6xSMewepdixEfB9e2iWemKl0wKGE72FSRXMAueJZ723XFXc7JHhwJfwyMAAl4AchxjWpJ5OTmop8jlArRusqTZanRA7ew3MG5EqebH3VbIp-80O/w219-h335/HistoryOfTheWorldPoster.jpg" width="219" /></a></div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSa0ojn7Cp4GxWJ0R1y5vLbP0fQcAHuTMYBxCNKrILrJxHB_Cyo0NSfFsyWwyEjU6tCfcxjZpaGgtHWQ72ZD-EhsSUmfYY0QRAqzSoBaW5fvGDbnU0uob-zl2emUNXEyfmUVB8zLrf4pxAfVR5jn9zfuo62h3EI0mRAZXBry_52r1y1B6bOJ0Zts3q/s1725/ToBeOrNotToBePoster.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1725" data-original-width="1135" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSa0ojn7Cp4GxWJ0R1y5vLbP0fQcAHuTMYBxCNKrILrJxHB_Cyo0NSfFsyWwyEjU6tCfcxjZpaGgtHWQ72ZD-EhsSUmfYY0QRAqzSoBaW5fvGDbnU0uob-zl2emUNXEyfmUVB8zLrf4pxAfVR5jn9zfuo62h3EI0mRAZXBry_52r1y1B6bOJ0Zts3q/w219-h332/ToBeOrNotToBePoster.jpg" width="219" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Just like any successful product, that recognizable graphic style told Brooks fans what to expect from his latest movie. If it wasn’t quality assurance, it was at least the promise of some good laughs.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sticks_Nix_Hick_Pix" target="_blank">Variety</a> might put it, the look was Brooks’ hook.</span></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-4844990960631362642022-08-26T17:36:00.000-05:002022-08-26T17:36:19.110-05:00Ogilvy vs. Bernbach<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">What follows is a completely rewritten version of a post written for this blog over a decade ago; same viewpoint, just better expressed. Appropriately, it's one of the essays in my book, <i>Thinking Too Hard and Rethinking Too Much: Stories and Essays from a Career in Advertising</i>.</span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9nCTALC0HR7VwSuIBht9l2jfqEYIw6xbIdBFC7xr9nuS2J4i6AHwcGa9PEqPc9x5GH9tbpRUsgmocPRPmRuFPPa0LrsGi65FZvkaYWp_na1rnrZq5uI_QtLa68cQmNRBF3nQs1FvUEXjxH1aJTDaI3IGq316CePfR8AW-_chBmLiPA6Lu_UWE9pAp/s800/OgilvyBernbachPoster_Rev2022.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9nCTALC0HR7VwSuIBht9l2jfqEYIw6xbIdBFC7xr9nuS2J4i6AHwcGa9PEqPc9x5GH9tbpRUsgmocPRPmRuFPPa0LrsGi65FZvkaYWp_na1rnrZq5uI_QtLa68cQmNRBF3nQs1FvUEXjxH1aJTDaI3IGq316CePfR8AW-_chBmLiPA6Lu_UWE9pAp/w400-h300/OgilvyBernbachPoster_Rev2022.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">If there was anything new to be gained from the [then] recent passing of advertising legend David Ogilvy, founder of Ogilvy & Mather, I hope it will be a long-overdue re-evaluation by my generation of his ideas and principles about advertising. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Oh sure, the industry press carried the expected pronouncements of admiration from various creative superstars, but in nearly every case, it ran along the lines of “the quintessential ad man, built up a darn big agency” – backhanded compliments that discredited his actual creative accomplishments, if only by omission. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Trust me, I understand. I was here in the 80’s, the decade of <i>Ogilvy On Advertising</i>, the book wherein Mr. Ogilvy codified all his immutable guidelines (okay, rules) on how advertising should be created. In fact, I used to call it the Most Dangerous Book Ever Published, because of the way it made every client or account executive who read it feel like the final authority on creative decisions. Of course, my fellow creative department staffers read it, too, and we just snickered at the non-negotiable commandments he carved in stone throughout the book: Thou shalt not use reverse type. Thou shalt not run ads without headlines. Thou shalt use bullet points whenever possible. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But all of us, account people and creatives alike, had it wrong.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To industry insiders (and now, regular viewers of <i>Mad Men</i>), the business of modern advertising is often thought of as a tug-of-war, with the creative department on one end of the rope and account service on the other. But that conflict is more like scrambling to be King of the Hill.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At the mid-century mark of the 1960s, the real tug-of-war was between two competing philosophies for creating ads – and the creative legends who pioneered and embodied those philosophies.<br /></span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVpPY2M-skvyoDk6XIEBqGY45grXTU3W7J5andiBDKLLkhgeFo_S9HuolvFRwQVj3nVMg5Vv-mW_84fmtBO9Vc7SoH3_JP9K-o-RCXpGF7fu8H21jRbDCakN12tH5Uwuo-CBOuT2WKMaX6_k9e_y0vN2TzKb7QjeEaTVYNIhbEbqgE1-K4aNdgEXll/s410/Ogilvy:Bernbach%20Fight%20Card.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="398" data-original-width="410" height="311" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVpPY2M-skvyoDk6XIEBqGY45grXTU3W7J5andiBDKLLkhgeFo_S9HuolvFRwQVj3nVMg5Vv-mW_84fmtBO9Vc7SoH3_JP9K-o-RCXpGF7fu8H21jRbDCakN12tH5Uwuo-CBOuT2WKMaX6_k9e_y0vN2TzKb7QjeEaTVYNIhbEbqgE1-K4aNdgEXll/s320/Ogilvy:Bernbach%20Fight%20Card.jpg" width="320" /></a></div></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b>David Ogilvy</b> (1911-1999) believed the ultimate success of advertising depended on fastidious consumer research, which he distilled into news- or benefit-oriented headlines. These were usually backed by long copy that was shaped by results from ad readership studies and his own experience selling AGA Cooker ovens door-to-door in his 20s.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Following a stint as employee and acolyte of pollster/researcher George Gallup, Ogilvy formed his own agency, Ogilvy and Mather, based on his principals for consumer-focused advertising that was single-minded in one purpose, <i>to sell</i>. He crystalized this approach in notable ad campaigns for Rolls-Royce (<span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a;">“At sixty miles an hour the loudest noise in this new Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock.”) and Dove Soap (“Only Dove is one-quarter moisturizing cream.”) <br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a;">But he was also capable of </span><span style="background-color: white;">brand imagery that transcended pure rational appeals</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a;">, as evidenced by his work for </span>Hathaway Shirts (built around “The Man in the Hathaway Shirt,” an intriguing aristocrat with an eyepatch); Schwepps Tonic Water (where he created a similar mystique around the bushy-bearded president of the company, Edward “Commander” Whitehead); and the romanticism of his ads for Puerto Rico tourism.<br /><o:p></o:p></span><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Of course, even those flights of fancy were grounded in meticulous, logical copy. As he famously said, “Advertising people who ignore research are as dangerous as generals who ignore decodes of enemy signals.”<sup>1<br /></sup></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But not everyone shared that belief. “We are so busy measuring public opinion that we forget we can mold it. We are so busy listening to statistics we forget we can create them.”<sup>2<br /></sup></span><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">That was <b>Bill Bernbach</b> (1911-1982), founder of Doyle Dane Bernbach, the agency that sparked advertising’s Creative Revolution of the 1960s. For Bernbach, creative intuition, not a slavish devotion to audience research, was the underlying force to be nurtured and channeled.<br /><o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">After cutting his teeth in a distillery’s ad department, Bernbach eventually was hired by the William Weintraub agency, where he worked alongside Paul Rand, the innovative graphic designer. Rand saw advertising not as carefully massaged text that was illustrated almost as an afterthought. Instead, he envisioned copy and images as an integrated whole, text pared back and in the service of simple, bold images that would result in more impactful messages.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Like Ogilvy with Gallup, Bernbach had found a muse who would prove to be deeply influential in his approach to the business of advertising. But that’s where the similarities end.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Rand’s style made such an impression on Bernbach, that after he moved on to Grey Advertising and rose to vice president and creative director, Bernbach found himself at odds with the direction of his own agency. He outlined his philosophy in a 1947 letter to his bosses at Grey, like Martin Luther hammering his theses to the church door. Along with taking aim at “the scientists of advertising,” he almost seemed to have Ogilvy in his sights as well: <br /><o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“There are a lot of great technicians in advertising. They can tell you that people in an ad will get you better readership. They can tell you that a sentence should be this short or this long. They can tell you that body copy should be broken up for easier and more inviting reading. They can give you fact after fact. They are the scientists of advertising. But there’s one little rub. Advertising is fundamentally persuasion and persuasion happens to be not a science, but an art.”<sup>3<br /><o:p></o:p></sup></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Two years later, Bernbach put his ideas into action, forming his own agency with likeminded partners, Ned Doyle and Maxwell Dane. At DDB, Bernbach drove the creation of ad campaigns that were off-beat, unexpected, and distilled to one powerful impression to leave with consumers. Think of Volkswagen with its anti-Detroit, anti-bigger-is-better messaging (“Think Small.”). Or Avis and its scrappy, paradigm-breaking “When You’re Number Two, You Try Harder” campaign; in business, you never trumpeted being anything less than the best. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">See also the agency’s work for The Federation of Coffee Growers of Columbia, which not only created a preference for coffee made from Columbian beans, but introduced a new advertising character into popular culture – Juan Valdez, the coffee grower who harvests his beans “Juan by Juan.” <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Certainly, Juan’s humble, earthy persona was a far cry from the aristocratic “Man in the Hathaway Shirt,” perhaps mirroring the difference between Bernbach and Ogilvy themselves – Bernbach a Bronx-born son of immigrants, Ogilvy the scion of a British stockbroker.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNmCCuE-bLwaQIMXPJNtKHpRJDaTWHNthtMYQVTFN4TtOib9M1s1LSDBJJCYHFPJOYk4UnxtSlqek7qe9sQS3NRHXW1NrRiZMlhc94fMK_VLN6zi7XUpF_r2KFU0Uz-s4mdwPc3RcPnaNL1FbHsvBq6AJKjp5meH2dzH-YaHBZdofaoVfHpTFNK91D/s2680/HathawayMan_JuanValdez.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1800" data-original-width="2680" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNmCCuE-bLwaQIMXPJNtKHpRJDaTWHNthtMYQVTFN4TtOib9M1s1LSDBJJCYHFPJOYk4UnxtSlqek7qe9sQS3NRHXW1NrRiZMlhc94fMK_VLN6zi7XUpF_r2KFU0Uz-s4mdwPc3RcPnaNL1FbHsvBq6AJKjp5meH2dzH-YaHBZdofaoVfHpTFNK91D/w400-h269/HathawayMan_JuanValdez.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But another, less heralded side of Ogilvy was revealed in a 1987 book, <i>The Unpublished David Ogilvy</i>. In a July 18, 1977 memo entitled “Confusion?” he writes: "For many years you heard me inveigh against “entertainment” in TV commercials and “cleverness” in print advertising. When the advertising world went on a “creative” binge in the late 1960s, I denounced award winners as lunatics ...<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Then, two years ago, you began to receive memos from me, complaining that too much of our output was stodgy and dull ...<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“I woke up to the fact that the majority of our campaigns, while impeccable as to positioning and promise, contained no big idea. They were too dull to penetrate the filter which consumers erect to protect themselves against the daily deluge of advertising. Too dull to be remembered. Too dull to build a brand image. Too dull to sell. (“You cannot bore people into buying your product.”)<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“I want all our offices to create campaigns that are second to none in positioning, promise – and brilliant ideas ...”<sup>4<br /></sup></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Yes, you can argue that there’s still a world of difference between what Ogilvy and Bernbach each saw as a “brilliant idea.” But to me, this memo alone should upend calcified notions of Ogilvy’s creative philosophy as somehow inferior and should recast (and for many, redeem) his reputation in creative circles.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">For my generation (and subsequent generations) of creative people, it’s been too easy to pass off David as more account man than creative person – too rational, too rigid, too formulaic, and too slavishly devoted to the principles of selling. Nothing like the more intuitive, more free-wheeling creative decisions of Bill Bernbach. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">After all, didn’t Ogilvy once say this? “Our job is to sell the client’s merchandise … not ourselves. Our job is to kill the cleverness that makes us shine instead of the product. Our job is to simplify, to tear away the unrelated, to pluck out the weeds that are smothering the product message.”<sup>5 <br /></sup></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Actually, that wasn’t David. That was Bill.</span><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></i><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * *</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><sup>1</sup> David Ogilvy, <i>Ogilvy on Advertising</i>, (New York: Crown Publishers, 1983), 158<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><sup>2</sup> Bob Levenson, <i>Bill Bernbach’s Book: A History of the Advertising That Changed the History of Advertising</i>(New York, Villard Books, 1987), 117<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><sup>3</sup> Levenson, <i>Bill Bernbach’s Book</i>, xvi<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><sup>4 </sup>Joel Raphaelson,<sup> </sup>ed. <i>The Unpublished David Ogilvy</i>, <span style="color: #555555;">(New York: Crown Publishers, 1987), 42-43<br /></span></span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><sup>5</sup> Levenson, <i>Bill Bernbach’s Book,</i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> 81</span></span></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-37694422419197561942022-08-11T18:50:00.003-05:002022-08-11T18:59:20.069-05:00Still waiting for that rejection, 40 years later<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I grew up in the WJM newsroom. I had dinners with the Bunkers. I hung out with the wacky doctors of the 4077</span><sup style="font-family: Calibri;">th</sup><span style="font-family: Calibri;">.</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Yes, I was a kid raised on <i>The Mary Tyler Moore Show</i>, <i>All in the Family</i>, <i>M*A*S*H</i>, and so many, many other classic sitcoms of the era. I knew their characters and their dreams, their homes and their workplaces. I knew them like you know family. Which, in a way, they were. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So during college, when my friend, Jeff, who’d written a movie screenplay, pushed me to try writing one too, I didn’t attempt a movie. Writing a movie from scratch – creating characters and a plotline that could sustain 120 pages of story – seemed intimidating. But being a longtime fan of sitcoms, I had both an affinity for and inherent understanding of the form. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And I knew which show I would choose. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hs94FTcNy6dTYibY34NDkN7UK_3nZIdxYT0ccaxs-o6Y3iEpmHVrFM1vqNe7gjNxbwYCF7O69976-fuDx5ad20kX77DYqEtNtk6CH2EH-xIiCCT3TDufA4iofTyAjWeKgQm9RdAszIFEZNcnJJUYnAZbf3-ljvwm868ck-x4SA5aJ7l1uCJTcJ-_/s400/Barney&Cast2.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="270" data-original-width="400" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hs94FTcNy6dTYibY34NDkN7UK_3nZIdxYT0ccaxs-o6Y3iEpmHVrFM1vqNe7gjNxbwYCF7O69976-fuDx5ad20kX77DYqEtNtk6CH2EH-xIiCCT3TDufA4iofTyAjWeKgQm9RdAszIFEZNcnJJUYnAZbf3-ljvwm868ck-x4SA5aJ7l1uCJTcJ-_/s320/Barney&Cast2.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At the time, I was drawn to the nightly reruns of <i>Barney Miller</i>. Set in New York City’s 12<sup>th</sup> Precinct, the show involved a squad room of quirky detectives dealing with one or two crimes (usually with equally off-kilter suspects and complainants), and some interpersonal conflict, typically of a light-hearted nature. I loved the well-drawn characters, the understated humor, and the format of the show, which was very much like a stage play on two sets. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">After a couple of drafts and some input from Jeff, I had my first script, <i>Barney Miller: Burning Questions. </i>(Yep, it's a pun.)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In it, the detectives deal with a woman who was mugged but can’t remember when or where it happened (turns out she was mugged by her hypnotist); a businessman arrested for assaulting an arrogant “ambush” reporter (who drops the charges when he realizes that the TV station he works for is owned by the businessman’s corporation); and a man who believes he’s in danger of spontaneous combustion (but is calmed with the help of the arrested hypnotist). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #202122;">As</span> the first script I ever wrote, for a TV show or movie (oh yes, there would be more attempts), it certainly betrays my inexperience. Among other things, it’s at least a third too short for a half-hour show (I didn’t understand sitcom script formatting well enough), with very stereotypical interactions between the regular cast, and some weak punch lines. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But despite these and other drawbacks, my script did demonstrate my (still embryonic) ability to write for established characters and follow the basic format of a given </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">show.</span><sup style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">1</sup></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Also in retrospect, I should have just put that script in a drawer, chalking it up to learning experience, and a stepping stone to a better next script. But deluding myself that it was good enough for The Big Time, I wrote the <i>Barney Miller</i> producers, at the production company listed in the show’s end <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">credits.<sup>2</sup></span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">(This was naïve in more than one aspect. Few, if any, shows accept unsolicited submissions without an agent. Producers want to avoid amateur writers assuming their ideas were stolen if a similar story appears by coincidence on a show they’ve approached.)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In my letter, I talked about being a fan of the show, teased my script plotlines, and offered to send it to them to read. Amazingly, I received a reply a month or so later, signed by Danny Arnold, the show’s creator and executive producer. I wish I still had the letter, but I well remember the gist of it. The show was in the process of wrapping up its current season and if it was renewed for another year, I was told I could submit my script in the fall.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Despite my aforementioned naivete, I found it hard to believe that Mr. Arnold was really keeping the door open for a future submission; more likely, it was just a way of letting me down <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">easy.<sup>3</sup></span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Barney Miller didn’t return that fall, making the question moot. But 40 years later, I stumbled across an answer of sorts, in a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_ZdWzK97fg" target="_blank">2016 interview</a> of series star Hal Linden by the Archive of American <span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt;">Television:<sup>4 </sup></span> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">At one point, Hal “Barney Miller” Linden says, </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">…the essence of <i>Barney Miller</i> was the script. Danny eventually had a heart attack and he couldn’t spend the energy to oversee it … he wanted to close the show because he was having trouble finding writing sources. He came to us, at the beginning of the year and said, “Gentlemen, I am going to take submissions for “Barney Miller” from <i>anybody</i>. For the next two months, I’m just going to read scripts, from college kids, from amateurs, from anybody who wants to send me a script, I’ll read it. If I can find a writing force that can execute this show, we’ll go on. If not, no. … </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And he disappeared, and two months later, came back and said, “Gentlemen, we’re closing at the end of the year, there’s no way. Of course, every submission was a copy of what we had done, was nothing new, nothing vital, it would be just copies … they were all the same, recycled. And he said, “Why? It was good the first time, leave it alone." And Danny closed the show.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">So had the show been picked up, it’s possible my script could have actually gotten a reading. Of course, it would have been quickly rejected for being another “copy of what we had done, nothing new, nothing vital.” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But one of the hardest tasks for any first-time scriptwriter is just finishing the script, so in that sense, it was a success.<br /></span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * *</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;">(1) One of my plotlines – the man convinced he was in danger of spontaneously combusting – wasn’t just typical of the kind of oddball vignettes the show liked to use to balance out the main story. I later discovered it had already been used on the show.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;">(2) I don’t recall where I found the address for Danny Arnold’s Four D Productions – it may have been from the Writers Market guide, or simply a Los Angeles phone book in the Journalism School library.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;">(3) I suppose that raises the question of why a successful TV producer would bother sugar-coating a reply to a “nobody.” But for all I know, the letter was written by an assistant or secretary, not dictated by Mr. Arnold himself.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;">(4) Hal Linden, Archive of American Television interviews, EmmyTVLegends.org, published July 28, 2016</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p></p>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-32728625284686355612022-08-04T17:38:00.000-05:002022-08-04T17:38:18.965-05:00The Other Legacy of Braniff Airlines<div style="text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Before founding the agency that carried her name, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Wells_Lawrence" target="_blank">Mary Wells</a> (later Wells Lawrence) was part of <a href="http://adcglobal.org/hall-of-fame/jack-tinker/" target="_blank">Jack Tinker & Partners</a>, where she was first recognized for bringing a theatricality to advertising, a more cinematic and story-driven approach to her commercials. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Given the fledgling Braniff account, Ms. Wells re-introduced the carrier to the world by breaking out of the dull monochrome world that air travel was circa 1965. She splashed color outside and inside the planes and outfitted the "hostesses" (sorry, the "flight attendant" name was still years away) in stylish Emilio Pucci designs.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">It was "The end of the plain plane," as the campaign put it, and it kept Braniff in the news for months on end. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JB4Elg_INkX9xJjkjgrynPUq8JewCDefdGSfK9x7Ej8f0P7lL-cWHkMpsXDyL66YXknZE7kVy-WJMKiA_E-7msAuBFOvgzyiJqgzQRfgmjER86LCh8kIPO2xqu7gQ01NztvMVo_XCWbPtWXIzs_wqCo_75f4mOqDRYETPPumXqvMbnLLUpA3QcZj/s2034/Braniff_PlainPlaneExplained.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1294" data-original-width="2034" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JB4Elg_INkX9xJjkjgrynPUq8JewCDefdGSfK9x7Ej8f0P7lL-cWHkMpsXDyL66YXknZE7kVy-WJMKiA_E-7msAuBFOvgzyiJqgzQRfgmjER86LCh8kIPO2xqu7gQ01NztvMVo_XCWbPtWXIzs_wqCo_75f4mOqDRYETPPumXqvMbnLLUpA3QcZj/w400-h255/Braniff_PlainPlaneExplained.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in; text-align: left;">This commercial may not be the showiest example of a Mary Wells Lawrence production, but the announcement it made was strong enough to make up for the commercial's deficiencies (though the droll "cha cha cha" is a nice touch).</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AcyVkRXq7QI" width="320" youtube-src-id="AcyVkRXq7QI"></iframe></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Realizing that, in Ms. Wells words, "the advertising had to live up to the planes," follow-up spots got more creative. In one that was a bit edgy for the era (but typically sexist in its view of its stewardesses), the new uniforms were ostensibly highlighted: </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Me5VQDVXKrY" width="320" youtube-src-id="Me5VQDVXKrY"></iframe></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">(Incidentally, that spot first ran during the Superbowl, years before Apple thought of using a provocative spot to hold the attention of the huge audience.)</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb_QQBZW5CFpGp_erryBcobB2POd4rg7qghXGoNyoJSOdBPJUDIK3-VdAdxR9KqpluTeSOMpxXcWmhWeLULDx37Ax98DWWqyJBpws1ongtyyRGUYc3xnPAHZ-3Yx9ttoVR5tnhhTeVAWB8gNhXNw_9YDKk2QlLWfrkEHVzqtlwVPmUVKF5dE6FVmKk/s2092/Braniff_AirStrip.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1312" data-original-width="2092" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb_QQBZW5CFpGp_erryBcobB2POd4rg7qghXGoNyoJSOdBPJUDIK3-VdAdxR9KqpluTeSOMpxXcWmhWeLULDx37Ax98DWWqyJBpws1ongtyyRGUYc3xnPAHZ-3Yx9ttoVR5tnhhTeVAWB8gNhXNw_9YDKk2QlLWfrkEHVzqtlwVPmUVKF5dE6FVmKk/w400-h251/Braniff_AirStrip.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>The success of the campaign and its cultural impact – “Airline advertising and marketing and design would never be the same,” she later wrote – led to Braniff encouraging Ms. Wells to start her own agency, Wells Rich Greene, with the airline as its first client.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">That agency grew to become, for a time, the 8<sup>th</sup> largest ad agency in the world, creating popular ad campaigns for Benson & Hedges, Alka Seltzer, Ford, Sure deodorant, and the “I Love NY” campaign whose distinctive logo, with a red heart standing in for the word love, was an early use of an emoji in advertising.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">And though the airline and the agency eventually parted ways, the success of Mary Wells Lawrence and Wells Rich Greene will always be one of the legacies of Braniff. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">In a roundabout way, I was another. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">But I’d better explain, lest you think I’m placing myself in the lofty company of Ms. Wells. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">It was 1979. I wasn’t working in advertising yet. And becoming a writer – any kind of writer – was probably the last thing on my mind. (In fact, one of my most vivid high school memories is of an English teacher returning a marked-up homework assignment to me on which she had written, “I despair of you ever learning the proper use of commas.”)<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Frankly, those writing skills hadn’t improved much by the time I took freshman English in college. But that spring, to fulfill a course requirement, I signed up for a lecture class called “Introduction to Advertising.” The lectures took you through the usual basics of advertising and marketing – things like the difference between demographics and psychographics, product distribution models, media planning, blah, blah, blah. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">But if the topics were rather dry, the instructor managed to inject a little life into the lectures, mostly by finding places to diverge into complaining about – you guessed it – Braniff Airlines. He apparently flew on them quite a bit, and – their award-winning ad campaign to the contrary – he did not find the airline as enchanting as the advertising promised. I’m sure he felt vindicated when Braniff went out of business a couple years later. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">As for me, I was intrigued enough by the rest of what he taught to sign up for a follow-up class in copywriting. And when I got another A, I knew I’d found my calling … especially since perfect punctuation and grammar have never been essential in advertising copy.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0in;">Don’t tell my high school English teacher.<o:p></o:p></p></div><br />Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-47553170491258614562022-08-04T13:22:00.002-05:002022-08-04T13:22:20.415-05:00The Customers Get the Last Laugh<h3 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">It’s not what you put into your ad, it’s what the audience takes away from it</span></h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqDFwVEG9D66BFx3UsTghpXqEtGmwPAryIbapQVMbkIGAmFP_2vy1fRmMc2M7c-he5eNjl7bw5rW8mDiHjtEzgv5Z3r-PQ5QrnoqBQu_M7y83mWCvIjYDHVCWla1zpJWGo-QlYG6PMW82t2QiS-rdctLbV3pKnPL_77xckRE6OrkuxIiC5Z_I1xH-d/s1210/Clara%20Peller%202.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><img border="0" data-original-height="582" data-original-width="1210" height="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqDFwVEG9D66BFx3UsTghpXqEtGmwPAryIbapQVMbkIGAmFP_2vy1fRmMc2M7c-he5eNjl7bw5rW8mDiHjtEzgv5Z3r-PQ5QrnoqBQu_M7y83mWCvIjYDHVCWla1zpJWGo-QlYG6PMW82t2QiS-rdctLbV3pKnPL_77xckRE6OrkuxIiC5Z_I1xH-d/s320/Clara%20Peller%202.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In his recent autobiography, <i>All About Me</i>, writer, filmmaker, and occasional actor, Mel Brooks, talks about the one fight he had with Gene Wilder on the set of their 1974 movie, <i>Young Frankenstein</i>. It was over the scene where Dr. Frankenstein introduces his creature to the medical community with an absurd <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ab7NyKw0VYQ" target="_blank">song-and-dance</a> to <i>Puttin’ on the Ritz</i>.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“It was Gene’s idea and I told him I thought it was a great idea and very funny, but it was too far out … I insisted it was too silly and would tear the continuity of the movie to pieces. … we almost got into a fistfight because of it.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Finally, Brooks agreed to film the scene and test it on a preview audience. When the audience loved it, Brooks happily conceded, “Gene, you were absolutely right. Not only does it work, but it may be one of the best things in the whole movie … it took the movie to another level. We left satire and made it our own. It was new, different, crazy …”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju5sni4bgzZ_yDtKeJ1gPqERTwt4qXtcpduqfCQkZrsZixix2SArk9Zif8wdib0JQMD-TFNJbEJ4N7OjZEBMZca_bh0lqcswyPYWWyPWwAzWVLfncxwbtESf8eEs3EwbcrHbNa7-GEuesbahbQremAkkHD7kdTENnQyW7llP9ywhX4EXwgdvmer6ey/s1394/YoungFrankenstein_RitzDance.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><img border="0" data-original-height="670" data-original-width="1394" height="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju5sni4bgzZ_yDtKeJ1gPqERTwt4qXtcpduqfCQkZrsZixix2SArk9Zif8wdib0JQMD-TFNJbEJ4N7OjZEBMZca_bh0lqcswyPYWWyPWwAzWVLfncxwbtESf8eEs3EwbcrHbNa7-GEuesbahbQremAkkHD7kdTENnQyW7llP9ywhX4EXwgdvmer6ey/s320/YoungFrankenstein_RitzDance.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A great reminder to those of us in advertising that, despite all our experience, despite our intentions, sometimes things resonate with the public that we don’t expect and certainly don’t plan for.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">Sometimes the audience knows what works more than we do.</span></b></h3><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Wendy’s classic “Fluffy Bun” spot is a great example. What? You don’t remember “Fluffy Bun”?</span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">That was the commercial with three elderly women clustered around a fast-food burger that was more bun and burger. “A big fluffy bun,” as one of the ladies described it – the phrase that ad creator Cliff Freeman of Dancer Fitzgerald Sample was certain would catch on with public.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Instead, it was the third lady’s exclamation – “Where’s the beef?” – that became a pop culture phenomenon. (The actual line in the script was “Where is all the beef?” but with her emphysema, she couldn’t get all the words out.)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/R6_eWWfNB54" width="320" youtube-src-id="R6_eWWfNB54"></iframe></span></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“Where’s the beef?” was quoted at dinner tables, in schoolyards and offices, appeared on tee shirts and TV shows, and was even invoked in that year’s presidential debate. Wendy’s saw a 31% increase in annual revenue. And the woman uttering the now iconic phrase – octagenerian Clara Peller – enjoyed a few years of fame on talk shows, other commercials, even a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZGhGFg-VlI" target="_blank">novelty song</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">"It goes to show you," Freeman later said. "You just never can tell what people will think is funny."</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">And you can never be sure what people will remember about your campaign, either.</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Take the Milk Mustache campaign from the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board. You know this one. Started in 1994. Nutritional facts about milk, delivered by celebrities in milk mustaches, culminating in that memorable themeline … “Milk. What a surprise.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">That’s not the one you remember? Must the one they switched to in the campaign’s second year, when it was clear that the lactose-mustachioed celebrities were the big draw: “Milk. Where’s <i>your</i> mustache?”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Still not it? Despite the success of the campaign in reversing decades of declining milk sales, few people seemed to connect with either of those slogans. Instead, as related in <i>The Milk Mustache Book: A behind-the-scenes look at America’s favorite advertising campaign</i>, the public kept combining the milk-mustache visuals with the themeline of another campaign that was concurrently being run by the California Milk Processors Board.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Eventually, the ad agency gave up trying to fight it. “The public always lumped our campaigns together, explained Jay Schulberg in <i>The Milk Mustache Book: A behind-the-scenes look at America’s favorite advertising campaign</i>. “So why not put the two together in one ad? So that’s what we did.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">And in 1998, the milk mustache campaign sported the themeline that it’s still known by today: “Got Milk?”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpOSdm0SRJXAg8HKphypXvtd2ogz3M9AfXAEzF-KZTm_LNvSXzTt0ejD7xBeGpNqovKzfASXYjzQHHFzBlrx_3BlD_NyPTSnhbeeH4tgsdElGRGEj--SPGoB5bLC6ExiBDZOia3O7rumXyocV-Hm1WcUHTT0vZGyy69R7WKMViY4MY_1R5YI90rBK6/s1232/GotMilk_AlexTrebeck.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1232" data-original-width="920" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpOSdm0SRJXAg8HKphypXvtd2ogz3M9AfXAEzF-KZTm_LNvSXzTt0ejD7xBeGpNqovKzfASXYjzQHHFzBlrx_3BlD_NyPTSnhbeeH4tgsdElGRGEj--SPGoB5bLC6ExiBDZOia3O7rumXyocV-Hm1WcUHTT0vZGyy69R7WKMViY4MY_1R5YI90rBK6/s320/GotMilk_AlexTrebeck.jpg" width="239" /></span></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In <i>Got Milk: The Book</i>, Jeff Manning of the CMPB boiled it down even simpler: “The reality is that customers don’t give a twit about who sponsors what … they either like the ads, find them memorable and compelling, or they don’t.”</span></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">And sometimes, it’s the client that doesn’t like the ad and needs convincing. </span></b></h3><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In the late 1990s, the auto insurer Geico had a market share in the single digits, and was in need of a stronger brand image in consumers’ minds. Early spots used humorous vignettes to draw attention to their message that “15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance.” – but the Geico name apparently wasn’t breaking through.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In fact, people were often mispronouncing (or misremembering) Geico as “Gecko.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But their ad firm, the Martin Agency, saw an opportunity in that mispronunciation, and created a commercial that featured a British-accented gecko lizard clinging to a microphone at a press conference, pleading that, “I am a gecko, not to be confused with Geico … so stop calling me!”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Simple. Effective. Memorable. But not everyone was convinced – most significantly, Geico’s Vice President for Marketing, Ted Ward.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“I thought nothing of the idea,” he recalled in a <a href="https://ourtowndc.com/ted-ward-geico-vice-president-marketing/" target="_blank">2016 podcast</a>. “It was a 15-second commercial and probably would have died a cruel and hideous death, except SAG [the Screen Actors Guild] went out on strike, and we couldn’t use real people for a while, and someone said, ‘Well, let’s use that gecko …’”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9LwASBkp0vo" width="320" youtube-src-id="9LwASBkp0vo"></iframe></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The gecko turned out to be quite sticky, going on to star in over 150 spots, and helping Geico climb to the #2 position in the industry. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">As for Ted? He eventually <a href="https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/advertising/adtrack/2006-07-16-geico_x.htm" target="_blank">came around</a>. “I quickly became much more fond of him as we sold more policies. I’m a big fan of anything that makes our phone ring or website click. He really has helped us brandwise.”</span><div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: large;">Finally, back to Mel Brooks, who’s also learned his lesson about second-guessing creative inspiration.</span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></h3><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">His next picture, <i>Silent Movi</i>e (a comedic ode to the silent pictures of Hollywood’s pre-sound era), included a sequence in a restaurant named Chez Lobster. Accordingly, both staff and diners are played by giant lobsters, and humans are swimming nervously in a tank before being fished out for some crustacean’s entree.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“We thought it was an inspired turn-about-is-fair-play concept. But when we screened it, it didn’t get a single laugh ... So out it went! Because the final judgment was always left up to the audience.”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">* * *</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;">This essay also posted on <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/customers-get-last-laugh-craig-mcnamara/?trackingId=EILM9k9%2BQGWHu9XETsqaXA%3D%3D" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>. </span></p></div></div>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5142046509943882010.post-60779908572608687312022-07-14T19:26:00.003-05:002022-07-14T19:26:16.722-05:00Gorilla or Guerrilla?<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFhQugIwkUwnSmvJdAISCpdJ1qCqEk613vA0CUk8ZDrC_TIZNfN9h-lYApQQuKOY9vOMRypUNd_jku7lsXfWf1fpHz-eQzyLvIo0RSyLQgQnPmeGp_UUDtdMgd3KKBBa8AOj7PZFz_obfP3NFGZV8wNsw20SRs3MGIYZ-7BqAgw4UuzzdgYIGSDznr/s1090/G_rilla.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="516" data-original-width="1090" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFhQugIwkUwnSmvJdAISCpdJ1qCqEk613vA0CUk8ZDrC_TIZNfN9h-lYApQQuKOY9vOMRypUNd_jku7lsXfWf1fpHz-eQzyLvIo0RSyLQgQnPmeGp_UUDtdMgd3KKBBa8AOj7PZFz_obfP3NFGZV8wNsw20SRs3MGIYZ-7BqAgw4UuzzdgYIGSDznr/w400-h189/G_rilla.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">An interesting error I've seen made more than once in this business: </span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">In emails or memos that reference the tactic of "guerrilla marketing" – eschewing traditional media for unconventional, attention-getting, and relatively cheaper message placements – the unknowing writer has misspelled it as <i>gorilla</i> marketing.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">That, ironically, brings to mind the old "800-pound gorilla" designation for the biggest, most powerful brand in a given industry – one whose advertising budgets dwarfed their competitors' miniscule marketing dollars and thus had little for need for the cleverness of guerrilla advertising.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The term, incidentally, was coined by author Jay Conrad Levinson in his 1984 book, <i>Guerrilla Marketing</i>. He based it, of course, on the concept of guerrilla warfare, i.e, small independent groups using ambush, surprise, and mobility to effectively battle against larger forces. <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Going back one step further, guerrilla is derived from the Spanish word for war (hence, "small war") and was how the Spanish described their resistance to Napoleon's French army during the early 1800s.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> <br /></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;">But back to my main point: Guerilla marketing is superfluous if you’re the gorilla doing the marketing.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Of course, there's also this kind of gorilla marketing, but we don't have to get into that right now:</span></div><div><br /></div>
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Q5sEIWlQO7A" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe>Craig McNamarahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07501704518887067119noreply@blogger.com0