At press time, Spy Films announced the departure of founding partner William Cranor. Cranor will be joining former TBWA/Chiat/Day Canada president Steve Hancock’s ‘digital based, e-media start-up, adbeast’ on April 1. Cranor will keep a financial interest in Spy, but will have no more involvement in the management of the company.

Earlier, Spy announced Joni Dick has joined the shop as an assistant executive producer. The move follows a long resistance by Spy honchos Carlo Trulli and Cranor to bringing another executive on board.

Trulli explains: ‘William and I have exec-ed the company since 1994. Now we’re expanding into other areas, and we can’t manage the company and look beyond it. [With Dick] our time has been freed up so we can put more effort into other areas.’

The changes at Spy include a move toward online advertising and an expansion into global markets. According to Trulli, Spy wishes to lead the way in the paradigm shift towards online, interactive advertising. ‘Not only do we have a website, but all our reels are online. I think there is only one other company here that is doing it. People don’t know to go to the Web and look at reels. They are still scared, sending out their 3/4-inch cassettes. They’re not embracing [technology]. So we know we have hurdles to get over.

‘People aren’t sure where it’s going to go,’ he continues. ‘Everybody’s looking in different directions. My view is that it is only getting better. So I think our next venture is going to be into the interactive world of advertising. How can the advertising be modified to the Internet medium?’ Trulli asks.

The other change at Spy involves a re-evaluation of their international outlook. Despite some worldwide relationships, Spy has traditionally focused on its domestic roster.

‘When we first started Spy, we had a couple of internationals at our disposal, but we kind of put them on the back burner,’ says Trulli. ‘A few years ago, we realized we couldn’t resist the global market. Not that we didn’t know about it. Not that we weren’t thinking about it. We just weren’t interested in it as much. But we realized that it had become a serious global market and that Canadian directors were being overlooked.’

The company began to re-evaluate itself on a global scale and sought new relationships. Trulli had a clear idea of how he wanted the shift to go down.

‘We didn’t want a mass of relationships. What we’re basically doing is finding real relationships with a really good synergy – and perhaps sharing some of the work with different markets – where we can access our local directors or our Canadian directors in those markets and vice versa. I know there’s a business to be had here, but there are some hardcore relationships and we’re just not interested,’ Trulli says.

Already, Spy has forged ties with Velocity in South Africa, Arden Sutherland Dodd and Stark Films in London, England and Gap in Germany. Spy, whose umbrella also shelters Mad Films, uses its satellite company IQ to manage the international business.

‘IQ has helped us a lot. What IQ represents is an international passport. We’re connecting the dots around the world,’ Trulli says.

All this activity was the impetus for hiring Dick, whose background prepared her perfectly for the position. ‘I was at Toybox as a motion control producer. Prior to that, I was freelancing, assisting casting directors, and, prior to that, I opened up a kids talent and modeling agency. Before that, I was an actress, a model and a ballet dancer and teacher,’ Dick says.

Trulli met Dick in 1999 when she was at Toybox. ‘We worked with her then in a client-supplier relationship. And we’ve always liked her,’ Trulli says. Dick effectively auditioned for the post, doing some consulting work with Spy in January.

Dick describes what she will do in her new post: ‘It’s building relationships and maintaining the relationships we already have and getting involved in a lot of sales and marketing. I’ll be focusing on the domestic directors that we have here and making sure that they’re represented properly, and getting the attention they deserve,’ she says.

‘Joni’s going to give us some ballet lessons,’ Trulli laughs. With a business that is changing at a rapid-fire rate, it seems appropriate Spy has hired a producer who can dance. *

-www.spyfilms.com