Creative Briefs

Déjà VuHard-Core The time has come for Snapple's fruits to learn the facts of life. The sex analogy, says Cheryl Van Ooyen, group creative director at Deutsch, New York, is a good way to illustrate the client's blended fruit flavors. So in a recent spot, young fruits get "the talk" and are encouraged to experiment. If they're like most human teenagers, they've already learned about sex from television. And their first exposure to the seedy world of fruit sex could have come from Fruitopia spots out of Leo Burnett, Chicago. In them, fruits get it on in hotel rooms and on the seashore. Sex on the beach for Snapple's fruits was more of a challenge since they were portrayed by actors, says Van Ooyen, who also directed the spots. Inside costumes, they could hear but not see the waves coming. "They were terrified," she says. Fallon, BMW at the Movies CHICAGO—Working from action-packed five-minute screenplays and using A-list directors and the Internet, Fallon's latest work for BMW was a plum assignment for creatives. "This is absolutely a dream project because of the talent involved and because it was groundbreaking," says Bruce Bildsten, associate creative director at the Minneapolis agency. "If anyone thought the 30-second commercial was the be-all and end-all, this should really open their eyes." The project was the brainchild of Fallon art director David Carter and group creative director Joe Sweet. Carter wrote two scripts, Sweet penned one, and two were written by Hollywood writer Andrew Kevin Walker (Seven, Sleepy Hollow). The shorts, directed by such notables as Ang Lee, John Frankenheimer and Guy Ritchie, tell stories of different drivers for hire, and can be viewed at bmwfilms.com. The site is packed with information about the films—and the cars featured in them. The directors interpreted the scripts as they liked—"I'm not going to tell Ang Lee how to do this shot," says Bildsten—and the results are intended to push the boundaries of art and commerce. For instance, the directors' commentaries on the site manage to sing BMW's praises. "The car doesn't do much shaking at all; it's very comfortable," Lee says as he explains his choice of a Baroque music soundtrack. Though stressing that the art was put before the commerce, Bildsten said the balance is an important part of the campaign's success. "We wanted it to be equally attractive to the car buff and the film buff," he says. Fallon, BMW at the Movies Monkey Business The Blame Game People Monkey BusinessJamie Lee Curtis, the face of Voice Stream since 1998, has temporarily been replaced—not with another celebrity, but with monkeys. The client, based in Bellevue, Wash., last week launched two TV spots created by Publicis in Seattle to promote its new Ping Pong text messaging service. By taking a more lighthearted, humorous approach, it appears Voice Stream is attempting to set the service apart from other offerings hawked by Curtis. In both spots, a monkey named Phil communicates from the jungle with a hipper counterpart named Hank who lives in an urban setting. The first ad shows Hank, very bored at the symphony, sending messages through his phone to Phil's pager to see how he's enjoying his banana. In the second spot, Hank contacts Phil from a coffee shop, proudly announcing that "the streak is over" and his dry spell has ended. He then flirts with an attractive woman at another table. Kevin Kehoe was the creative director/art director on the campaign, Jim Lemaitre served as the writer, Jan O'Malley was producer and Hank Perlman of Hungry Man Productions in Los Angeles was the director. The Blame Game With a nod to the great American tradition of passing the buck, Harpell has created a self-promotional piece that promises to help clients deal with the economic slowdown. The Maynard, Mass., shop sent a direct mail piece to more than 20,000 marketing directors across the U.S. featuring an audio CD with a turn-of-the-century-style song titled "Let's All Blame the Marketing Director." The piece includes period art with a picture of a barber-shop quartet and a letter from "Darren Stevens," the fictitious adman from the 1960s TV show Bewitched. Harpell offers "a one-hour brainstorming session. A white paper loaded with tips. The enclosed song performed by trained professionals. All free." As for the song, an old-time singer croons to a player piano, "The leads dried up and the phones wouldn't ring/ Cash wouldn't flow and we felt the sting/ Of an economy gone south and the CEO's scream/ "Who's to blame for this state of distress?"/ It's the marketing director, we all confessed." People Wieden + Kennedy, Portland, Ore., named Carlos Bayala creative director for Nike Latin America. Bayala, 31, a native of Argentina, joins the agency from Mother in London, where he was a creative director on accounts including Coca-Cola, Costa Coffee and Kiss TV.

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