Bud Light is becoming a perennial favorite at the Bessies.

It took top honors in 2001 in the best in show category for the campaign ‘Vikings/Attic Launcher/Figure Skating’ by Downtown Partners and won a best in show in 2002, plus best of series nods for director Martin Granger and writer David Chiavegato for ‘Sin and Sentimentality.’

This year is no exception, with breakout spot ‘Ulterior Emotions’ taking the best in show prize in addition to best of series nods once again for director Granger and writer Chiavegato. The spot also earned a best of series Bessie in the music category for Pirate Radio & Television composers Kerry Crawford and Mark Hukezalie under the direction of Tom Eymundson.

The mock spot, which showcases such immortal love songs as I Love You Dearly Because You Let Me Go Out With My Friends On A Weekly Basis and the ever-popular You Said It Was Okay (I Should Have Known It Wasn’t), was shot in the style of a promo for an album of love songs circa the 1970s. Each song is accompanied by an appropriately cheesy performance featuring guys sporting lots of blow-dried hair, handlebar mustaches and the occasional captain’s hats.

While Chiavegato and partner Rich Pryce-Jones exited Bud Light AOR, Toronto-based Downtown Partners, last year to form Grip Limited, Granger’s name continues to be tied to the campaign, with the director recently completing two new spots for the brand including ‘History’ currently airing nationwide.

According to Granger, who is repped by Toronto-based Avion Films, the success of the campaign is largely due to the broad mix of styles that he and the creative teams behind the spots have been allowed to employ.

That mix is something that has paid dividends professionally for Granger as a director as well.

‘It’s very eclectic and I’m really glad that it’s worked out that way. It’s primarily because the Bud Light campaign is so wide ranging,’ he says. ‘It’s allowed me to not get pigeonholed as a specific kind of comedy director. It’s been really valuable in terms of allowing me to spread my wings.’

Indeed when one considers the mix of styles from the off-the-wall ‘Empathy Mask,’ to the Hallmark-style ‘Wedding Day’ to the cheese-ball ’70s rock stylings of ‘Ulterior Emotion,’ the only consistent thread through the spots is that they are all very funny and each closes with Ted Lange’s, aka The Love Boat’s Isaac the bartender, call to action: ‘This calls for a Bud Light.’

Granger, a native of Winnipeg who now calls New York City home, has been spreading his wings all over the place and his unique comic sensibilities can also be found tracking the happy bouncy men of Viagra spots and trained on that blurry guy in a recent Bell ExpressVu commercial. He has also been busy in the U.S. and Europe.

But it is the spots for Bud Light that continue to earn the director and his work accolades and prizes, including a Silver Lion at Cannes last year for ‘Ulterior Emotions.’

‘When I saw the script, I said to myself, if I don’t fuck this up somehow, this is going to be really funny.’

That said, Granger admits he never imagined the spot would grow in the public consciousness to the point where there would be demand for the Ulterior Emotions CD – which Labatt, Bud Light’s Canadian brewer, made available through its beer.com website – or that people could recall songs from the spot a year after it first aired.

‘You spend a day in the studio shooting your job and you know it’s funny,’ he says. ‘We were all laughing. But you never have any idea that it’s going to become like a cultural icon.’

-www.avionfilms.com