concept look 10 times better

Paulette Arsenault

Associate creative director,

PALM Publicite Marketing,

Montreal

When a creative production team chooses three to four directors for the preselection, we figure that any of these people could do the job, otherwise we wouldn’t have invited them in the first place. We never ask a production house for a quote just to get a quote. It’s against palm’s principles to have people pitch when they have no chance at all. I’d rather tell the client that, in this case, there are only one or two directors we feel comfortable with.

On a Labatt production a few years ago, we only got one quote – our recommendation – because the director had done such a good job on the pool of commercials the year before we wanted to stick with him. Of course, we didn’t tell the production house it was alone. The client knew he was getting good value for his money even if he didn’t have two other quotes, because we compared the job with two other quotes for similar projects.

How do we choose a director? In general, I would say that the director has to prove to me that he/she has the best understanding of the advertising concept, not just the creative concept. He/she also has to give me the feeling they can actually make the concept look 10 times better.

A recent Loto-Quebec promotion required two special effects spots. In the first spot for the new Super 7 lottery, we had a man coming home from work in a 747 jumbo jet, driving it right into his driveway, with his wife helping him park it. The second spot features a couple in their new home alongside their newly acquired aquarium feeding their latest pet, a killer whale.

The rule was easy. Whoever convinced us of the best technique to shoot these commercials, especially the whale, would be the winner.

Surprisingly, the three Quebec production houses that were experienced in special effects came up with three different ways to achieve these special effects. I guess all would have possibly worked in the end, but the first objective was credibility. If the consumer doesn’t believe for one minute we actually put the whale in the couple’s living room, we’re dead. One director suggested computer animation, the other a mechanical whale, the third wanted to shoot a real whale at Wonderland. We went with the real whale, figuring nobody would accuse us of faking the whale. So in this case, the guy with the best solution to the problem, Jacques Fournier at La Fabrique d’Images, won the job – foolproof, no nail-biting, no crossed fingers.

In another case, a beer commercial, we were looking to recreate the setting of a big rock club – atmosphere and all. We wanted an international look. We chose three directors who could do it well: one from l.a., one from Toronto, and one from Montreal. A lot of directors can do a rock spot, many would say. But we felt the directors we chose had to be rockers at heart and we were also counting on the director’s input on the music track. Toronto director Philip Kates of Radke Films got the job even though the l.a. director had the best reel. Kates came up with many ideas to make the event look even bigger and more real with the same money – exactly what we wanted.

Canadian and Quebec directors are more resourceful with limited budgets. Kates also had some experience with big productions, without being obnoxious about it, like some are. We like to exchange a lot with the director – we want a director, not a dictator. The Toronto guy offered the best ‘guarantees’ to all this criteria.

In a third recent case, an Ultramar Pyrex promotion, Marc. S. Grenier of Fabrique won the job because he proved to us he was the best actor director of the three being considered. He offered suggestions on the way such and such a line should be said, and he is perfectly bilingual, so the end result was two spots, English and French, of the same concept. Being multicultural is a great asset in Quebec.

Like I said, the reason to choose a director varies from one production to another. I think in the end it is the spot that chooses the director – or maybe they recognize each other – something like that.