Inside Oreo’s Adorable Triple Play for Father’s Day

An all-animated, musical, 90-second anthem spot in May now gives way to "Bedroom," a 60-second father-daughter story that mixes live action and animation. Set to an original song by Martin creative director David Muhlenfeld—same melody as the anthem, but different lyrics—the new ad points the way forward for the campaign while reveling in a family dynamic that's classic Oreo.

COPYWRITING: Group creative director Jorge Calleja came up with the premise: A girl gives an Oreo to her dad and wonders if he'll let her stay up past her bedtime. Muhlenfeld wrote the lyrics from there. "I have a daughter, so I know the tricks they play," he said.

We see a girl playing in her bedroom in the evening light. She sings in voiceover: "Wonder if I gave an Oreo/To my dad before he made me go/Off to bed. Could we stay up?/ Tell jokes til we got hiccups/And watch monster movies on TV/Just my dad and me …" Line-drawing animation by Psyop is overlaid on the live action, picking out lyrics (in the style of lyric videos, big on YouTube) and adding other playful visuals, bringing the girl's imagination to life. The ad wraps with a smiling cookie, Oreo.com and the single-word tagline, "Wonderfilled," which emerged months ago when several IPG agencies, including Martin, were brainstorming together. "Oreo liked it very early on," Muhlenfeld said of the word. "It's exactly what they're about."

ART DIRECTION/FILMING: The music, live action and animation—what Martin creative director Magnus Hierta called "a triple attack of messaging"—had to work seamlessly together. Psyop/ Smuggler directors Todd Mueller and Kylie Matulick (who shot the live action in their Culver City, Calif., home) did still-frame exploration and developed a boardomatic. Most shots were predetermined, though there are some unscripted ones—including at 0:26, when the girl falls back on the bed, a moment captured by cameras that were still rolling after a scene had been shot.

The bedroom feels half real, half dreamscape—visually evoking "that magic moment when a kid has to go to bed during the summer but it's still kind of light out," as Hierta explained the setting. "You can tell she's not tired but it's still bedtime."

TALENT: The young actress, found in casting in Los Angeles, was "super adorable without being a stage kid," said Muhlenfeld. "She showed up with her hair kind of messed up a bit. She just looked great and very natural." Inherently imaginative, she was also someone "who could play in a roomful of jaded ad people."

SOUND: Oreo didn't specifically ask for a musical campaign, but the "Wonder if I gave an Oreo" line, which Martin was playing around with early on, had a sing-song cadence and led there naturally. Muhlenfeld, who has also written music for FreeCreditScore and other Martin clients, wrote the "Wonderfilled" anthem song first. Subsequent spots, including this one, use the same melody but different words and arrangements.

"The way the lyrics are set up, they're kind of a modular system, where in theory you can plug and play," Muhlenfeld said. "But there's a lot of refining that goes into that." Elias Arts arranged the new song, adding a small orchestral accompaniment to the vocals of an 8-year-old session singer.

MEDIA: Cable, national network and syndication through the third week of June. The ad is also scheduled to appear in cinemas beginning Father's Day weekend.

THE SPOT:

CREDITS

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