When we won the Stella Artois 4% pitch at mother the work we created helped get the main Stella Artois brand to follow. For a few years I was everything Stella - local, regional and global campaigns from big TV spots, to promotions, competitions, social and experimental client projects.
LE APART-O-MATIC - TV
Luckily the heritage of Stella ads and the brand world we created let us work with the world’s best creative minds two of which were Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola, who actually approached the agency after seeing social films we made (smooth originals. see below).
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Wes Anderson & Roman Coppola
PIRATE PAPER BOAT - TV
Stella Artois Legérè is a Canadian version of the UK’s Stella Artois 4% but this North American brief focused on the beer’s lightness rather than it being tripled filtered and smooth, it was light and smooth. Obviously this led to floating a bottle of beer on water, a smooth 60s French pirate and a paper boat battle.
role: writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Bryan Buckley
Cannes Lions Silver film Craft
andy awards
TRIPLE TUNNEL -TV
Stella Artois 4% is triple filtered to be smooth. Triple filtering makes things smoother. That was the premise for the whole campaign so for TV that meant a delivery of chickens was made into a smart, smooth poulet delivery.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Ringan Ledwidge
D&AD Integrated Campaign
Campaign Big Gold Integrated Campaign
LE NOUVELLE 4% - POSTERS
Launching Stella Artois 4% in OOH we wanted to evoke the posters from the era our brand world was set in and make them things you’d want to put on your wall. Posters tended to be hand painted in the 60s, so that’s what we did. In fact we commissioned one of the eras very best artists: Robert McGinnis (who illustrated the Breakfast At Tiffany’s and James Bond movie posters). No retouching, all by hand, even the product and type. Yes it took ages.
role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Illustration: Robert McGinnis
D&AD Integrated Campaign
Campaign Big Gold Integrated Campaign
TRIPLE PIANO - TV
The following year we continued with another Stella Artois 4% smooth outcome ad - a bad piano removal was made into a smooth, jazz piano virtuoso, complete with parrot.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Fredrik Bond
THE NIGHT CHAUFFEUR - EXPERIENTIAL
Thinking ahead our client was concerned about a possible ban on alcohol advertising, so we agreed an experimental brief to launch new Stella Artois Black without using traditional media. We came up with an elaborate 1960s film noir immersive theatre experience set in your local pub. We got the fantastic PunchDrunk onboard - and The Night Chauffeur was born. One night in 12 London pubs. Buying a Stella Artois Black booked seats for you and a friend in one of four chauffeur driven cars. Each car had a different story and each passenger a different part to experience, so returning to the pub everyone had a different story. Pubs ran out of Stella Black, people were turned away on the night, money was found to run it again in Manchester, the client used it as part of their Christmas party and the following year the budget to support Stella Artois Black was tripled.
Role: Writer/Creative Director
Collaborators: Punchdrunk
Dir: Rodrigo Saavedra
SMOOTH ORIGINALS - DIGITAL CONTENT
Hollywood remakes classic but forgotten films all the time, to those who know the originals its infuriating as the original is always more sophisticated, more intelligent, well… smoother than the Americans can do. We decided to turn the tables and use the brand world of 1960s European nouvelle vague cinema to parody famous American movies and shows and say “we did it first”.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Agustin Alberdi
Cannes Lion Gold
one show
HUIT KILOMETRES - SMOOTH ORIGINALS
A young beat poet has one chance to prove it in the jazz clubs of the Cote d’Azur.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Agustin Alberdi
Cannes Lion Gold
one show
DIAL HARD - SMOOTH ORIGINALS
Inspector McLain plays a high stakes game with an unknown nemesis.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Agustin Alberdi
Cannes Lion Gold
one show
VINGT-QUATRE HEURES - SMOOTH ORIGINALS
Jacques has 24 hours to save millions from death.. and not ruin his Sunday.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Agustin Alberdi
Cannes Lion Gold
one show
JACQUES D’AZUR IS DEAD - CANNES 2010 TICKET COMPETITION - TV
This began as an on pack competition for Stella Artois sponsoring the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, but the initial social idea was loved so much it turned into a much bigger campaign including international TV ads. The idea was not just to win any old tickets, but win the tickets of someone famous and the lifestyle they’d have a Cannes. So we created Jacques d’Azur the King of Cannes, then we killed him. Hey presto, amazing tickets. And because he got about a bit in the 60s, you might be in with a chance to inherit his tickets.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Lucas Shannon
JACQUES D’AZUR WILL READING/ENTRY - CANNES 2010 TICKET COMPETITION - DIGITAL/SOCIAL
All comms led to a dynamic Facebook film of Jacques will reading, where your details (location, relationship status, name, friends, etc) were used to tailor many aspects of the video making it seem that you were indeed the rightful heir. At the time it was a first to have so many dynamic elements, we even had someone sing 500 different names to drop in the viewers over the music. Entry targets were hit by the end of the first week of being live.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Anrick Bregman
JACQUES D’AZUR CASTING CALL - CANNES 2011 TICKET/FILM STAR COMPETITION - TV
Stella Artois were still sponsoring the Cannes Film Festival in 2011 and they still had tickets to give away. But to beat the experience of the year before we decided to film a biopic of Jacques life at the Cannes film festival, but we needed someone to play Jacques the the entry became an online casting session. Win the part and not only star in your own film, but go to the premier at the Cannes Film Festival and live it up like a star.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Lucas Shannon
JACQUES D’AZUR CASTING CALL - CANNES 2011 TICKET/FILM STAR COMPETITION - DIGITAL/SOCIAL/CONTENT
Here’s a little round up showing how the entry casting call worked, cut your own trailer to share and get friends to vote for you, and also a few clips of the winning person and them in action in the movie.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Lucas Shannon
THE PREPARATION - TV
Stella Artois developed the reputation of being the “wife beater” beer, the line “She is a Thing of Beauty” was to partly address that and make it some of the take out about women being adored, respected and longed for. It was tough to give up “Reassuringly Expensive” great line (we had loads of fantastic scripts) but when you see Stella in the local offy at 3 for £5 the reality doesn’t live up to it. This ad I think embodies the attempt to address the bad reputation - the woman is the hero, she gets ready, as a beer is prepared, meanwhile the men wait in hope of being the one to spend time with her.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Noam murro
RADIO - TV
We made work across many regions globally, this for LATAM and is similar to the above in that it’s about the preparation of the beer, it has the male protagonist on hopeful tender hooks and links the story of a woman via the dramatic play being told on the radio bar story all in syncing with the barman pouring a pint.
Role: Writer
Agency: Mother
Dir: Noam murro