±±¾©Èü³µpk10

As some of you may already know, I’ve spent the last 21 of your

earth days in something of a tabloidic two-and-eight. And of all the

advice I’ve been given over this period, the most oft repeated and

strangest so far has been: ’Make sure you’re eating properly, won’t

you?’. This, I hasten to add, coming not from my mother but from a

variety of hardened advertising professionals. What can they mean? ’We’d

love you to join our agency, Trev, but you must stop eating soup off

your fish knife.’ Don’t they know I boast Aldo Zilli as my personal

chef? Maybe they’re just worried I may end up looking like Nigel Lawson

in the new M&G commercials. Whither the fat controller indeed.

This is a great campaign, shot with the same calm sophistication and

simplicity of Mirren-en-Virgin. Still no sign of the Campbell clan ever

putting a foot wrong on the TV front. I can’t help thinking that Nigel

looks like he’s been sucked through a hole in the Space Shuttle,

though.

So. You’re in a pub with a woman. Suddenly, casually and after a

nine-minute silence, she says, ’... Do you find that sort of girl

attractive?’ ’What girl?’ you reply, a bit too hastily. Well, let me

tell you. There’s That Sort of Girl and there’s That Sort of Girl. But

the Thattest Sort of Girl in the whole world is the one called Pamela

Anderson (Lee). The very mention of her name is enough to make most

women strike an expression normally only seen on the face of a Harrier

pilot in a vertical dive.

And that’s why we love her.

Or is it? On the specially packaged PR video for the new Pizza Hut

commercial, Mr Todd Martin (vice-president, marketing, PepsiCo

Restaurants International) adopts a distinctly ’What girl?’ attitude.

’We hired Pamela,’ he says, ’for her flamboyant personality.’ Liar,

liar, pants on fire. Pull the other one, Todd, it’s got a cheese-filled

crust. You hired Our Pammie because she’s got large, round,

world-renowned, fabulously gorgeous gazongers.

And One Of Those Mouths, to boot. And don’t you forget it.

Having got that off my chest, the advert: well it’s highly implausible,

I still miss Hit the Hut, there’s not enough Pamela, she mumbles her

lines and I’m dead stinking jealous of a fellow Midlander going on the

shoot without me. Paul, me invite ... w’happen?

Speaking of Da Midlands, Apache Indian is a sort of Brummie Prince

Naseem Hamed. He’s from my neck of Balsall Heath and he sings MY sort of

music.

In a bhangra ragamuffin stylee, of course. And here he is helping BBH

turn Lynx into gold. If this isn’t the most brilliantly crafted and

craftily targeted fragrance commercial ever made, it would certainly

come Top Three in a Brilliantly Crafted and Craftily Targeted Fragrance

Commercial Competition.

Mighty.

’I saw this and thought of you,’ says the Royal Mail, against a backdrop

of some disarmingly silly music. Blinking bloody heck. The things I

might have sent over the last few weeks. The things I might have

received. What a wonderful, scary notion. Thank God this is only

advertising and not Real Life.

BMW. Big Metal Widgets. Bold Meaty Words. Bit Mundane Weally.

How do they do that? How do people sit for hours in front of them

foreign black-and-white ’art’ films, reading all the subtitles while

simultaneously studying the actors’ facial expressions, following the

plot AND eating their crisps? Can’t be arsed, me. I prefer the adverts.

’Cept now, even there I’m being asked to read the subtitles, study

Ulrika’s flamboyant personality, work out why Gary Lineker’s dressed as

Abraham Lincoln AND find a connection with Walkers Lite. All in 30

seconds flat. ’Bout as easy as underwater soot-juggling, if you ask

me.

Apparently this is a faithful pastiche of classic Ingmar Bergman.

’Course it is. What that will mean to the crisp-gobbling children of

Leicester is anybody’s guess. I know for a fact they prefer Bunuel.

Fin.

Walkers Crisps

Project: Walkers Lites

Client: Michelle McGrath, Crisps director

Brief: Launch Walkers Lites Writer: John Webster

Art director: John Webster

Director: Paul Weiland

Production company: Paul Weiland Film Co

Exposure: Regional then national TV

M&G

Project: PEPS

Client: Rachel Medill, head of corporate communications

Brief: Make M&G PEPS famous

Agency: Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe Writer: Derek Payne

Art director: Gary Monaghan

Director: Paul Arden Production company: Arden Sutherland-Dodd

Exposure: National TV

Royal Mail

Project: Social mail stimulation

Client: Barry Burke, marketing manager, consumer mail

Brief: Nothing gets a reaction like something sent through the mail

Agency: Bates Dorland

Writer: Paul Diver

Art director: Al Morrice

Director: Mark Denton

Production company: Brian Byfield Films

Exposure: National TV

Pizza Hut

Project: Pizza Hut Pan Pizza

Client: Gary Haigh, marketing director

Brief: Communicate just how great Pizza Hut Pan Pizza tastes

Agency: Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO

Writer: Peter Souter

Art director: Paul Brazier

Director: Roger Woodburn Production company: Park Village

Exposure: Regional TV (STV, London, North)

BMW

Project: International branding campaign

Client: Dr Wolfgang Armbrecht, head of marketing communications

Brief: Reaffirm the BMW dynamic driving experience and the philosophy

behind it

Agency: WCRS

Writer: Steve Little

Art director: John Selby

Photographer: Ashton Keiditsch

Typographers: Barry Brand, Leonie Brierley

Exposure: International business press

Elida Faberge

Project: Lynx

Client: Simon Clift, brand development director

Brief: Convey that Lynx increases young guys’ confidence and sex appeal

in a credible, contemporary way

Agency: Bartle Bogle Hegarty

Writer: Brian Cooper

Art director: Jason Stewart

Director: David Kellogg Production company: Propaganda

Exposure: National TV.