Kevin Durant wants you to quit stressing your smartphone bill, and just watch him play.
The Oklahoma City Thunder forward played spokesman for Sprint in a 30-second commercial rolled out during this past weekend's NBA All Star Game (for which he won the MVP title), urging viewers to switch to the telecoms giant's unlimited plan instead of blowing their data allocations on casual games and missing out on clips of his games. The spot is the first from "Team Sprint," the new dedicated Publicis Groupe unit led by Digitas and Leo Burnett that snagged the telecom giant from Goodby Silverstein & Partners last year and began work on the account Feb. 1.
In the commercial, an indignant Durant takes aim at Doodle Jump—a casual game with kindergarten-style graphics where users play a green alien-like creature that has to bounce upwards from platform to platform ad infinitum. "But seriously, you chose to download Doodle Jump instead of streaming my shot?" he balks.
The focus on avoiding "data dilemmas"—the notion that Sprint users don't have to sacrifice any element of the mobile experience for fear of racking up extra fees—marks new positioning for the brand's unlimited data plan, and will be part of an ongoing campaign.
Credits
Client/Ad or Campaign: Sprint “Unlimited" Campaign
Agency: Team Sprint, Digitas & Leo Burnett
Chief Creative Officer: Susan Credle
Creative Director: Michael Boychuck, Kevin Drew Davis, Mark Moll
Executive Producer: Chris Rossiter
Producer: Bryan Litman
Account: Vanessa Mackey and Melissa Wolf
Production Company: Smuggler
Director: Randy Krallman
VFX/SPX: Mass Market
Editorial: Whitehouse Post
Editor: Matthew Wood
Director of Photography: Brian Newman
