Rome, 1960. A gangling 18-year-old wins gold at the Olympic Games. Days
later he flies home in triumph and, medal still hanging round his neck,
marches into his local restaurant to order a steak.
‘We don’t serve niggers,’ says the owner.
‘I didn’t order a nigger,’ says the boy, ‘I ordered a steak.’
The boy leaves the restaurant, tosses his beloved gold medal into the
Ohio river and changes his name to Muhammad Ali.
Thirty-six years on and the boy is a man. The Man. In my eyes the
world’s greatest living human being. And now that very same world holds
its collective breath as we watch Ali, entrusted with the task of
lighting the Olympic flame, do battle with his demons before the gaze of
3.5 billion people. Parkinson’s disease versus super-human self-belief.
No contest.
There’s a fumble, an agonising pause and the flame ignites. The Olympic
spirit burns. The Greatest makes his peace with the Movement and the
hateful Deep South. And I cry my eyes out.
Then someone asks me to review a mundane corporate bleat in which Delta
Air Lines claims full responsibility for flying Great Britain’s bunch of
athletic herberts to Atlanta. Couldn’t BA spare the seats? Frankly, my
dear, I don’t give a damn.
You wake up in an intensive care unit. Do you a) wonder how they managed
to find a hospital which still has one? or b) shout ‘Eureka! This is
just the place to shoot a commercial for Vaseline Intensive Care
(geddit?) deodorant’...? So, the tale of a doctor’s personal hygiene it
is. ‘She doesn’t have time to think about her anti-perspirant,’ we’re
told, over shots of nipple-less breasts and some sub, sub ER footage.
It’s all very patronising and about as likely a story as the one which
begins, ‘Well, Doc, there I was vacuuming the stair carpet in the nude
when all of a sudden...’
I had a bit of an op myself, recently. I had to have all my toes
surgically re-straightened because they refused to uncurl after I saw
Cliff Richard singing Bachelor Boy in the rain at Wimbledon.
From St Bart’s to St Elsewhere. Yes, the Workers’ Co-operative
responsible for out-of-the-box planning, total co-ownership, ‘method’
advertising and any number of other high-falutin’ unconventionalisms now
brings you, erm... that smug French bloke off Euro Trash doing his
conventional Franglais routine on the Eurostar to Paris. While the
theory might be Ali, I find the practice an incy bit Bruno.
(I do, however, have a tiny golden mole who reassures me that there’s a
very bright light at the end of the tunnel for this campaign. And I’ve
never had cause to doubt her. Watch this space.)
The next tape was labelled ‘Orange Rough Cut’. ‘Golly,’ I thought, ‘a
marmalade commercial.’ But no. Blow the wind southerly if it’s not the
continuing march of the militant Orange men of WCRS. Last year they
yomped the length of the Ho Chi Minh Trail, this year it looks like
Cuba’s turn for a good kiting. But for all its indulgence (or perhaps
because of it) this remains one of the most original and intriguing
launches of a brand I’ve ever seen. No wonder the future’s bright. The
campaign’s brilliant.
‘Ain’t nobody,’ sang Chaka Khan in her prophetic 1984 hit. ‘I smoke ’em
because my name’s on ’em,’ said Regal Reg a decade later. ‘Hey, perhaps
there’s something in this disembodied head malarky,’ said the creative
team on Dry Blackthorn just the other day. Hey presto. Reg meets Rab in
un homage du tete floating. But it’s not Red Rock and there’s no awards
in it.
It never rains but it pours. First I hear that Tiffany from EastEnders
is pregnant and it’s not my child. Then I see these new AA commercials
from HHCL. They’re radical, they’re different, they’re eminently
watchable, they’ve somehow snaffled a 999 phone number for their Fourth
Emergency Service endline and they’re certain to win shedloads of
gongoloolies.
All this and they were directed by Steve Henry’s pet gerbil, Bernard.
Ain’t life a bitch?
Orange Personal Communications Services
Project: Orange
Client: Sean Gardner, head of campaign planning
Brief: Reflect the spirit and momentum of the growing Orange network
Agency: WCRS
Writer: Larry Barker
Art director: Rooney Carruthers
Director: Jeff Stark
Production company: Stark Films
Exposure: National TV
EPS
Project: Eurostar
Client: Mark Furlong, marketing director
Brief: Popularise Eurostar
Agency: St Luke’s
Writer: Seyoan Vela
Art director: Colin Lamberton
Director: Pedro Romhanyi
Production company: Limelight
Exposure: Central, Anglian and London TV and satellite
Delta Air Lines
Project: Olympic sponsorship tactical campaign
Client: Ian Brocklesby, regional director for Europe
Brief: Create a minor series of strip ads to run on front pages during
the Olympics
Agency: Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO
Writer: Tim Riley
Art director: Greg Martin
Exposure: National press
Elida Faberge
Project: Vaseline Intensive Care
Client: Simon Clift, brand development director
Brief: Promote Vaseline Intensive Care as a highly effective anti-
perspirant which also cares for your skin
Agency: McCann-Erickson
Writer: Toby Talbot
Art director: Jeneal Rohrback
Director: Steve Green
Production company: Rogue Films
Exposure: National TV
Matthew Clark Taunton
Project: Dry Blackthorn cider
Client: Mike Ader, marketing director
Brief: Blackthorn guarantees ultimate refreshment
Agency: Grey
Writer: Alan Curzon
Art director: David George
Director: Mark Denton
Production company: Brian Byfield Films
Exposure: National TV and satellite
The Automobile Association
Project: AA membership
Client: Bob Sinclair, sales and marketing director
Brief: Introduce a new dimension to the AA’s ad campaign and convey that
AA patrols are highly trained and dedicated
Agency: Howell Henry Chaldecott Lury
Project team: John Parkin, Dominic Beardsworth, Ruth Lees and Caroline
Adams
Directors: Big TV
Production company:
@radical.media
Exposure: National TV
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