It takes a strong pitch man to sell a strong product. As a spokesthing for the new Molson Ultra 6.2% Dry product, MacLaren McCann creative director Rick Davis and writer Ian Kiar conceived a dragon with attitude, loosely inspired by eternal wise guy Joe Pesci.

Toronto’s Cuppa Coffee Animation and Design was consulted early on in the process to bring to life a character that would have a crusty presence in a set of stylized live-action spots.

The first of the three spots, which has been airing since late February, merely insinuates the character via shadow work, done at Toronto’s Mad Dog on Flame; a result of time constraints, but also a teaser for the spots in which the dragon would actually appear.

The second and third spots were shot at a Toronto bar where scaly fire-breathers are usually referred to as regulars, and posted over two days at Spin Productions on, appropriately, the Inferno effects compositing system.

Cuppa producer Adam Shaheen oversaw the creative process and animator Bill Buzadi drew a dragon that only a (legal age) beer drinker could love. (There were minor altercations with the crtc, which was concerned upon hearing the spots’ concept that kids would be lead down the beer-garden path by a lovable lizard. In tests, though, nine out of 10 kids agreed this creature is icky.)

The resultant character bears little resemblance to any public television denizen; it’s easier to picture this dragon extorting Dudley than joining him as role model.

The Grendel meets Goodfellas critter, voiced by Bruno Kirby, wisecracks his way through the spots, while mixing it up with some (deliberately cast) regular humans. The spots have a more than live action, less than hallucination kinetic look (recreations of room spinning inebriation are another crtc no-no).

Shaheen says he wanted to bring the ‘Cuppa Coffee thing’ to the spots, a thing which included an adult-oriented animation sensibility combined with a small-crew, not-necessarily-35mm live shoot, as well as maximize the contributions of everyone involved in the production process.

‘Everything is usually categorized; I want to pull from different sources,’ says Shaheen.

Shaheen says he found the appropriately weird sensibilities in director Justin Stephenson, who has a background in experimental and dance film. Stephenson shot the spots using different frame rates, including stop motion for one of the scenes.

Stephenson says much of the textural look and color of the spots were achieved with the input of the colorist at Medallion pfa, Chris Blacklock. ‘A lot of the colors were sucked out, which came about at the transfer stage,’ says Stephenson. ‘It messed it up a bit and made it look more like animation and less like live action. It has the feel of experimental film.’

The look of the spots is also owed to the Inferno and Inferno master Paul Cormack, with about nine scenes passing through the system. Cormack created a map of scratches and grain and layered it onto the scenes as well as compositing in smoke, light effects and the dragon.

The Inferno dealt with adding another light source to dragon scenes to facilitate his shadow. Shaheen says it almost came down to having a guy in a dragon suit on set to cast the appropriate shadows; to the benefit of everyone’s dignity, they did it in post.