Pfizer

But there's this cute little girl in this completely innocuous place in the living room, and then playing those contrasts of this very serious documentary voice and this charming little girl having her own little pretend game was where the humor came from. Effortlessly got [Calpull 00:23:25] into it because she eventually gets a fever. Understandably, she's at sea. She's got sniffles. [Calpull 00:23:30] comes to the rescue, she can get on with playing. [291]
And the structure of the commercial just instantly suggested itself, the voice over was really fun to write, fit in 30 seconds, no problem. Had some problems with the client with claims about the medicine and they always try to over complicate messages and that's a big problem. You creatives are very single minded usually, they think very simply, 'cause that's how I do this work best in 30 seconds if I'm talking about TV, similar with press. It's gotta be simple and read very quickly. And clients always want to put more information in it than the vehicle can handle. Then you're suddenly juggling too much information, and that's death to a good idea always. [250]
So that was really very satisfying. Then I got a director in who understood it, shot it really well. [252],[251]
Who came in and we just pitched the idea to him. He read the scripts, loved them, came back with a very simple take on it, which was just to keep them very much like a tableau, just keep them really very sort of almost like a kind of single camera shot, static, watching these kids just almost as if through the keyhole, and it worked perfectly. [292],[253],[254]
So it was like, sometimes it does happen. And the same thing with HSBC. I literally had two hours, had the script in my head, bang. Got a great director, shot it, client loved it. [255],[256]
I think probably the reason I'm most proud of that and happiest about it is because I felt like it came from me. Sometimes when the ideas are really close to you, and they feel like your baby, you get more defensive about them if they start getting compromised. And this one didn't get compromised, so it was just fantastic. It was a real gilette, punch the air moment. [293],[294],[295]
But the [Calpol 00:25:20] thing, I think probably the reason I'm most proud of that and happiest about it is because I felt like it came from me. Sometimes when the ideas are really close to you, and they feel like your baby, you get more defensive about them if they start getting compromised. And this one didn't get compromised, so it was just fantastic. It was a real gilette, punch the air moment. [257]
And half the time, we're dealing with cartoons and animatics to explain a commercial idea, which the director is going to interpret different anyway. And you can imagine these clients just sitting there going "Well, I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about." Even the creatives aren't completely sure. They're completely lost. [296]
Oh, high risk intolerance. [258]
Oh yeah, they were not risk tolerant. [259]
Well, we had to fight them. We had to fight through research. We got through research. We did qual and quant research and we still had trouble with them. They were a very traditional, quite conservative. This is [Visor 00:28:18] we're talking about, so not exactly visionaries in an advertising sense. [299],[261],[297],[264],[260],[262],[263],[298]
And we still had trouble, even when we made the ad, because once you ... We were very clear about what we we were going to do, but it wasn't until they actually saw it that they, again, this is this lack of visualization ability, until they saw it in front of them, they couldn't quite grasp it. [301],[300]
But they got there in the end. And we still had trouble, even when we made the ad, because once you ... We were very clear about what we we were going to do, but it wasn't until they actually saw it that they, again, this is this lack of visualization ability, until they saw it in front of them, they couldn't quite grasp it. [266],[265]
The budget was not really a constraint ever because there was no post production involved, minimal post production, and they were all inside existing houses. We weren't creating any special sets. We were just going into peoples' homes. So it was quite an easy shoot. So that wasn't ... [267]
Well, no, time constraints pretty relaxed. Not too bad. Yeah. [268]
As you can probably tell, I'm a big talker and I dominate the precedings, and she always took a back seat, which to some degree, suited her nature, but I think it made her inherent shyness even worse. PROJECT ID [303],[302]
Yeah. Her background wasn't that, in terms of advertising, wasn't that different to me, but she, as a person, was much more relaxed, I'd say, and more willing to let other people take the lead. As you can probably tell, I'm a big talker and I dominate the precedings, and she always took a back seat, which to some degree, suited her nature, but I think it made her inherent shyness even worse. [270],[269]
But she was quite good at recognizing ... She appreciated good writing, and I think she was one of those people who just instinctively said "Yeah. No." And she didn't muck around too much. [271]
Pretty good. Yeah. And that's basically what partnerships do. That doesn't mean to say you can't work solely. I have been for quite some time for the last month, and you can do it. But the other person is a shit filter. [272]
You need shit filters and you need it, not just in that kind of partnership, you need it throughout your life. [273]
I was just sitting there. We were eating and I just said "Blah de blah." I think I had been talking to my wife about it, and she said "Well, it's great. You just write about the kids." And it was like "Yeah, of course I'm gonna write about the kids." It was one of those obvious things like "Yes, no wonder we were put on the brief. I've got children." [274]
But that kind of didn't matter until I started thinking about it, and then I suddenly realized, "Yes, of course, we draw on my own experience." We were just talking about it and I just said, it was like "They're the children's experts. So experts, it's all about kids. Really, these guys know how kids behave, in other words. They know what they're like and they take these little guys really seriously. They're the experts. And they're not flippant about it." It was something about that word "Serious" that made me think, "Right. It's all about that. Contrast some innocent play and take it seriously." And I love that contrast, and that was where we started talking about it there and it was just like "Yeah, you know, like [crosstalk 00:34:01]." [306],[304],[305],[275]
Yeah, she was. And we were like "Yeah, yeah, you know, we can talk about documentaries." We were taking about ... At that time, I had seen Touching the Void and I had also read the book and it made a big impression on me and I thought "Great. That kind of very serious narrative over the top of something as silly as a kid on a living room floor," and I thought "Great. Okay. Bang." You already knew that was gonna be good. And that just clicked. [307],[276]
Bang. Easy to write. [crosstalk 00:34:27]. [277]
Strained at times, but ultimately amiable. Certainly whilst we were making the ads. There was a little bit of distrust with one of the senior people there who was just nervous. [278]
On the client's side. And she kind of was on the shoot and didn't really constantly trust us, and that kind of manifested itself as lots of inane questions that were patronizing where it was somebody's just sheer insecurity coming out. Even though they're in the hands of people who know what they're doing. [279],[280]
On the client's side. And she kind of was on the shoot and didn't really constantly trust us, and that kind of manifested itself as lots of inane questions that were patronizing where it was somebody's just sheer insecurity coming out. Even though they're in the hands of people who know what they're doing. PROJECT ID [308],[309]
That was tiresome. But then there was a junior client who was there to balance that. She was kind of cool. She was American actually, and I hit it off with her and she was good, quite a fine mind and seemed more relaxed about stuff. Slightly more risk tolerant. [281]
And then the senior guy was incredibly risk averse and was an absolute prat right the way through, and constantly caused problems and particularly at the end, because he pulled power, rank, and undermined people below him who had taken, what I thought were good decisions, [inaudible 00:36:13]. It's just politics. [312],[284],[311],[310],[282],[283]
And it stinks and at the end of it, in the middle of all of this is your idea, which doesn't give a shit about politics. It just wants to be. [285]
And you can't get rid of it. Clients try to, but you can't. You get attachment. [286]
Pretty good support I would say. Yes. They were there to defend it. Not so good when it came to the product stuff and the extra bit of extra messages that the client wanted to put in. They kind of rolled over, and I think there's often that point where the difference between great and good is usually just a 10% of client interference really, and you get that kind of moment where you've got something that's really quite pure on the paper and then because the client can't see it as an ad, they just add an extra tiny bit of another layer onto what is actually something really simple and then don't realize that what they're ultimately doing when it comes to the finished article is compromising it and that it actually becomes just slightly too complicated or slightly too many words or just a little less charming, whatever it might be. You get to that moment and you just think "Hmm." And the client's pushing for it. And that's when the account team have to say "Hang on a minute, guys. Can we make that decision later?" And usually, if you stall and you come back to it, once you've got an edit, you can then turn around and say "Look, it doesn't work." But on paper, you can say anything you like because you don't really have ... There's no substance there. [288]
They kind of rolled over, and I think there's often that point where the difference between great and good is usually just a 10% of client interference really, and you get that kind of moment where you've got something that's really quite pure on the paper and then because the client can't see it as an ad, they just add an extra tiny bit of another layer onto what is actually something really simple and then don't realize that what they're ultimately doing when it comes to the finished article is compromising it and that it actually becomes just slightly too complicated or slightly too many words or just a little less charming, whatever it might be. You get to that moment and you just think "Hmm." And the client's pushing for it. And that's when the account team have to say "Hang on a minute, guys. Can we make that decision later?" And usually, if you stall and you come back to it, once you've got an edit, you can then turn around and say "Look, it doesn't work." But on paper, you can say anything you like because you don't really have ... There's no substance there. [313],[287]
So in a way, people can take more liberty with just a script. I think even a client will realize that when they actually have a commercial in front of them, they can't take those same sort of liberties, which is why it's so important to try and hold back all that stuff until the very end. [289],[290]
Reference Tags
[291] Empathetic disposition,[250] Communication issues,[252] Communicating ideas across domains,[251] Organizing effectively,[292] Collaborative-Creative Disposition,[253] Communicating ideas across domains,[254] Organizing effectively,[255] Communicating ideas across domains,[256] Organizing effectively,[293] Creative Confidence,[294] Selfish motivation for the project,[295] Solitude disposition when stuck,[257] Ikea effect,[296] Communication issues,[258] Risk compensation,[259] Risk compensation,[299] Alignment,[261] Believes one has a hopeful path,[297] Conservatism,[264] Conservatism,[260] Forceful conflict about ideas,[262] Insufficient Feedback,[263] Risk compensation,[298] Status quo bias,[301] Alignment,[300] Communication issues,[266] Communication issues,[265] Forceful conflict about ideas,[267] Appropriate resources,[268] Balanced workload pressure,[303] Forceful conflict about ideas,[302] Forceful conflict about relationships,[270] Forceful conflict about ideas,[269] Yielding conflict about ideas,[271] Decisive leadership,[272] Trust,[273] Trust,[274] Subjective validation,[306] Believes one has a hopeful path,[304] Believes one has high agency,[305] Empathetic disposition,[275] Subjective validation,[307] Collaborative-Creative Disposition,[276] Overconfidence bias,[277] Overconfidence bias,[278] Trust,[279] Risk compensation,[280] Trust,[308] Alignment,[309] Trust,[281] Trust,[312] Authority bias,[284] Dismissive,[311] Forceful conflict about ideas,[310] Forceful conflict about relationships,[282] Man blaming man,[283] Micromanaging,[285] Ikea effect,[286] Ikea effect,[288] Communication issues,[313] Communication issues,[287] Yielding conflict about ideas,[289] Forceful conflict about ideas,[290] Overconfidence bias