Hasta La Creative!

Leo Burnett and was produced company Prettybird/director Billy Rainey served as creative and production (in addition to media) for the NCAA’s new campaign promoting the importance of education to young athletes, called “2.3 or Take a Knee.”

The campaign introduces the new, stricter NCAA GPA requirements student athletes must meet in order to qualify for Division-I sports, “ensuring their brains are getting the workout they need” (or just driving up the cost of a term paper). To spread the word, and teach high school athletes about the importance of education, LB and Prettybird created a talking bench. 75 high school athletes were caught on eight hidden cameras receiving some tough love lectures from the talking bench, and some of their reactions are pretty funny. That their coaches don’t seem to have been in on the gag only adds to the humor. Whether the prank will translate to the teens taking away a lesson on the importance of academics, however, remains to be seen. See the talking bench in action for yourself in the 2:28 video above, and check out @talkingbench for the Twitter campaign.

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San Francisco-based Pereira & O’Dell were recently invited onto ABC’s Nightline for a segment exploring the recent “hunkvertising” trend, and even created a “hunkvertisement” for the show.

The five-minute segment, entitled “The Art of the ‘Hunkvertisement’” features executive creative director Jaime Robinson and Renuzit director Chris Applebaum explaining the phenomenon to Nightline reporter Nick Watt. After exploring the ins and outs of “hunkvertising” the pair, along with the rest of their team, coach Watt on how Nightline can appeal to more women, and even film a 30 second “hunkvertisement” for the program produced in-house by P&O’D.

It’s kind of fun to watch Watt struggle with the concept of mixing male sexual objectification and humor in ads targeting women, which he at one point labels “bizarre” and then attempt to star (rather uncomfortably) in his own advertisement. Nightline approaches all kinds of reactions to the supposed trend, including the idea that these kinds of ads empower women, that it’s sexist to assume women need a hot guy to sell them kitchen and household items, and the crazies at One Million Moms doing what they do best (being crazy). The segment runs through a number of prototypical “hunkvertisements” in their examination of the phenomenon, notably Renuzit’s “Scent Gents,” which we’ve included after the jump. continued…

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Sausalito, CA-based Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners are rolling out a new campaign today for Raise the River, “an organization that has been working to bring water to the Colorado River and restore it to the Gulf of California.” The new campaign revolves around a series of videos pitting Robert Redford against Will Ferrell in a mock debate about the proper way to restore the Colorado River. Redford plays the straight man, representing Raise the River, while Ferrell thinks the solution is to “Move the Ocean.”

The campaign begins today with a series of videos, first exclusively on YouTube and Funny or Die, and then on Participant Media’s Pivot Channel on March 22nd. Funny or Die released the first clip today, with a series of videos to be released gradually through April. BSSP’s campaign aims to raise 10 million dollars for the restoration of the Colorado River. Redford explains the problems facing the Colorado River and how Raise the River can help. Will, excuse me, William Ferrell chides “Old Sundance” and argues that the real solution is to “several hundred miles inland,” which will help both the river and American surfers. To add emphasis to Ferrell’s cause, he is joined in one of the videos by surfer, Kelly Slater.

“We saw this idea of a fictitious debate between Mr. Redford and Mr. Ferrell as a novel way to generate greater awareness of the very serious issues facing the Colorado River,” explains Jill Tidman, executive director of the Redford Center. “Bringing a sense of humor to the effort opens the door for a much greater audience and offers everyone a chance to be part of winning this campaign—and this is one we are going to win.”

In addition to the series of videos, BSSP has created websites for both Raise the River and Move the Ocean, as well as “a series of sharable social media clips featuring Ferrell to seed a robust social media initiative.” You can see Redford debate Ferrell in the clips above and below, and stick around after the jump to see Kelly Slater join Ferrell for Move the Ocean.

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Back in November, we brought you news of Laser Cat, the giant art-eating cat that projects the art he ingests from his laser eyes. Launched by Hungry Castle and Umbrella and constructed by ADC Hall of Famer and SVA teacher Kevin O’Callaghan, Laser Cat solicited submissions from agency creatives, as well as artists everywhere.

The original (unrealistic) goal was to gain one million submissions, allowing Laser Cat to project the art on the moon at this year’s ADC Annual Awards of Art + Craft in Advertising and Design at the Bass Museum in Miami Beach on April 8th. Unfortunately, the moon is out, but Laser Cat will be on hand at the ADC Awards in Miami to project 10,539 artworks onto the Bass Museum. In addition to submissions from many top agencies, Laser Cat was able to garner some pretty impressive celebrity submissions, including those from Banksy and David Lynch. For more, check out the videos above and below, or head on over to the Laser Cat site. And if you’d like to see Laser Cat in person, buy tickets for the ADC Awards in Miami Beach.

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Saatchi & Saatchi LA released the latest online video for their Muppets Toyota campaign yesterday, featuring Kermit and Pepe filling up at a gas station en route to the premiere of Muppets Most Wanted in Los Angeles. The campaign, which began with the Muppets at the Super Bowl and followed them on a schlep across the country as they posted images on Facebook and Instagram en route to their film’s premiere, concludes today as the Muppets pull up to the red carpet at the Muppets Most Wanted premiere.

The new video, one of four released for the campaign thus far (we imagine there may be one more filmed on the red carpet), sees Kermit and Pepe shooting the shit with gas station attendants, and even hitting on some ladies. Notably, when Kermit mentions that Miss Piggy will like it that they get the windshield cleaned, Pepe badmouths her and says she’ll just make the inside dirty anyway. Kermit can’t help but agree. Upon leaving the station, the pair realize they may or may not have actually filled up the tank.

The spot is kind of fun, but leaves a lot to be desired (it doesn’t help that they already did a gas station spot with Pepe). Maybe it’s just that I have high expectations for all things Muppets, but it feels like there was the opportunity for something more here. The other videos released for the campaign elicit much the same reaction, although Rolf and Rizzo’s video is a slight step up. It’s great to see the Muppets in action, and these are far from terrible, but I wish Saatchi and Toyota could have done more with the opportunity. Stick around for a pair of Saatchi LA’s other Muppet spots for Toyotoa, along with credits, after the jump. continued…

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W+K’s trademark nonsensical humor is on full display in their latest, the new spot “Made by Kobe” promoting Kobe Bryant‘s Kobe 9 Collection for Nike, which launched on March 6th.

The spot imagines what it would be like if Kobe Bryant designed a piano: “It will turn piano boys into piano men. It will make Lionel Richie‘s tears cry tears.” Lionel Richie actually appears in the spot, tear slowly rolling down his cheek while he plays the piano, adding to the humorous tone. After talking up the hypothetical Kobe Piano, which looks pretty badass, the narrator introduces the “Made by Kobe*” Kobe 9 Collection. Although the product reveal comes 50 seconds into the 75 second spot, the sidelined Lakers star can be seen wearing his new line throughout the commercial.

The spot is exactly what we’ve come to expect from W+K, calling to mind some of their well-known past hits, like their famous work for Old Spice. The formula may be starting to show signs of age, but W+K still has a big leg up on the countless competitors attempting to imitate this kind of work. “Made by Kobe” will run until March 27th. Now if they’d only release that piano for real. Stick around for credits after the jump.

*Kobe is the name of a 12-year-old Chinese boy who works around the clock to handcraft the Kobe 9 Collection for 2 cents an hour. continued…

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Th1ng director/animator Sylvain Chomet received a personal request from The Simpsons creator Matt Groening to animate the iconic “couch gag” that concludes the opening credits of the show, now entering its 26th season. Obviously, you don’t turn down a personal request from Matt Groenig, so the three-time Oscar nominee Chomet offered up a distinctly French take on the gag, which was just revealed online today.

Chomet joins an illustrious list of individuals invited by Groening to animate the sequence, including Bill Plympton, Banksy, and Guillermo Del Toro. Indeed, in recent years the couch gag has all too often overshadowed the rest of the episode. Executive producer Dominic Buttimore (Bart Simpson would have a field day with that one), a longtime collaborator, “worked closely with Chomet to create and storyboard the concept for the animation sequence, which was immediately met with ‘laughter and appreciation’ by Groening and Simpsons’ longtime show-runner/producer Al Jean. Jean went as far as to call the experience a “dream come true.”

The new couch gag (featured above) is one of the show’s best, thanks to some great jokes and Chomet’s inimitable animation style. It will air during the episode “Diggs” this Sunday, March 9th. Stick around after the jump for credits and couch gags from Plympton and Banksy. continued…

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Santa Monica, CA-based agency, Secret Weapon, continues the trend of absurd humor they employed in their regional Super Bowl ad for Jack in the Boxwith the new spots.

The first of these spots sees the regional fast food franchise’s creepy mascot introducing the new pesto chicken sandwich while claiming his recent productivity is thanks to the new robot he has “handling the day to day stuff.” We then cut to the robot strangling a man for taking the piece of birthday cake he wanted. “There’s still a few bugs,” Jack admits. It’s a slightly different kind of absurd humor than the cheese Secret Weapon poured on in the Super Bowl spot, although the robot humor falls flat and feels disjointed from the earlier part of the ad introducing the new product.

The other new spot, for Jack in the Box’s new “monster” taco offerings, more successfully combines the product introduction with Secret Weapon’s absurd humor. It imagines Jack in the Box’s new taco offerings — nacho, and bacon ranch (Jack in the Box certainly loves their bacon) — as monster trucks facing off. The spot parodies the classic “Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!” school of monster truck ads, before an unexpected reveal puts everything we’ve just seen in a different context. Stick around for brief credits and “Monster Tacos” after the jump. continued…

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We’re not sure who is behind this one, but DHL pulled a clever stunt and, in lieu of a traditional advertising campaign, had their competitors advertise for them (if the above video is to be believed).

To accomplish this they taped the packages with thermoactive foil and cooled them to below the freezing point. So competing companies like UPS and TNT picked up what appeared to be a black package, but when they went to deliver it (to carefully selected, not so easy to find locations) the box had transformed to reveal the message, “DHL Is Faster.” So employees of competing companies were walking around the city, advertising DHL’s services for free. Assuming this isn’t a hoax, it has to be one of the more clever marketing stunts in recent memory. Video of the stunt, appropriately titled “Trojan Mailing,” has been gaining a good deal of attention on YouTube. It’s already gained over 500,000 views since being added on Wednesday. I think it’s fair to call DHL’s tactic a resounding success.

Update: “This was not something that was initiated by DHL,” a rep for the company told Consumerist in an e-mail. “The video was created by an external agency for their own internal competition. We were aware in advance of the intention to use it for this purpose. We were not aware of any plans to share it externally.” No word yet on which agency was involved.

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Students at the VCU Brandcenter are back, launching a campaign promoting the AICP Show and AICP Next Awards for the 9th straight year.

The campaign takes a humorous route to displaying the lasting quality of an AICP award, showing top creatives like Gerry Graf, Co: collective partner/chief content officer Tiffany Rolfe and Droga5′s Ted Royer waxing on the perceived perks of yesteryear. While these perks may have vanished, their AICP awarded work is in the permanent exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art.

“Every generation hears about the halcyon days when perks were free-flowing – perhaps they were, or perhaps it’s all wishful thinking. But through it all, the one constant is that no one can ever take away your AICP honor and recognition,” explained Matt Miller, President and CEO of AICP.

“Ty Montague of Co:Collective, Susan Credle of Leo Burnett, and Diane Jackson of DDB Chicago (all VCU BrandCenter Board members and either current or past AICP Show Curators)” collaborated with Miller, AICP Director of Events Ileana Montalvo and AICP Chief of Staff Kristin Wilcha in selecting the campaign from among those presented by second year student teams at VCU Brandcenter. The results are pretty funny, with Graf commenting on vanishing drum kits, Rolfe wondering where the prostitutes went, and Royer lamenting the ever-shrinking office. The entry deadline for the awards is March 7. Both the AICP Show and the AICP Next Awards will take place June 10-12, during AICP week. You can check out Graf’s video above, and stick around for Royer and Rolfe’s two cents, along with credits, after the jump. continued…

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