January 5, 2009

Something New

I really had to stop and think for a bit when my friend Mark Keas of MDI Marketing asked me a couple of weeks ago whether I’d be interested in playing a reporter on a TV commercial for a local car dealer. Don’t misunderstand: I have no problems with commercials---they paid my salary for about 30 years. And while I gladly took the loot the ads provided I didn’t have to worry about whether they were clever, effective, ethical or actually worked. That was always someone else’s problem. But I quickly concluded that taking a chance and trusting another professional’s judgment was the right thing to do. So now the microphone---a rather large one at that---is in the other hand.

Was it a tough decision? No. I’ve seen Mark’s work, his client is reputable and I was familiar with the production crew. It really came down to whether a former news guy was ready to step back in front of the camera but on another side of the business. I was also curious to see what it was like pitching a product instead of just reporting on one. I’ve been out of the news business for two years now and the spot was not pretending to be part of any identifiable newscast so I had no ethical dilemma. And selling something instead of just talking about it?

The comments have been generally positive---the lighting was good, we had a well written script, the crew was easy to work with, Mark’s idea was clever and the editing was superb. I even had one person say he bought a car because of the commercial. So I’d definitely like to shoot another spot if the client and the agency are happy.

But all through this I’ve kept in mind what my old EWU Professor Howard Hopf said on numerous occasions: “It ain’t creative unless it sells!”

So my question is: Are we creative?

No comments: