Author: Me

With the exceptions of ‘The Empire Strikes Back‘ and ‘The Godfather: Part 2‘ follow-ups, sequels and second acts are rarely as good and even more rarely better than their original. Both these films had the same creative forces driving the project and many if not all of the acting talent from the original (even Sir Alex Guinness returned for his ghost scenes in Empire). Occasionally the thrid movie can return the franchise to the limelight as with ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ and ‘Oceans 13’ but abso-fucking-lutely not as with ‘The Hangover 3’; they would have retained more dignity by just asking for donations as people walked out of ‘The Hangover 2’.

Look at the ever increasing train wrecks of one-hit-wonders the music industry forces upon us on what seems like a daily basis.

Originality is a wonderful thing. Its enemy is risk. And it appears to me that the world is becoming a more risk-averse place moment by moment. The chances of getting an original creative production green-lit are getting slimmer all the time. Big production companies invest heavily in sentimentality by rehashing childhood concepts so we get 6 more episodes of Star Wars then we needed, another reboot of Star Trek and for some fucking unknown reason two versions of Footloose with rumours of another spin of the wheel in 2020. FFS!

Years I ago I was told that Sony Films make 20 movies a year knowing only 10 will make money, but they don’t know which 10. With an investment strategy like that, it is plain to see why they have to be very wary of originality and why we get Footloose Part Fucking 2. I hope the towns folk win this time.

It can be even worse in product development. Every year car companies show their wares at car shows around the world. The most technological advanced, aeronautically designed, fucking awesome machines that make you not care about where petrol comes from, how much it costs and what the environment is all about anyways. Then, after all the excitement we get the same old boring shit year after year. And to illustrate my earlier point about sentimentalism, Chrysler gave us the PT Cruiser and now Ford us delivered the latest iteration of the 1960’s mass market Mustang which it appears has become the new bogun-mobile. Apparently, ownership requires sagging testicles, baldness, zero taste and being OK with spending more than an equivalent Mercedes-Benz with far better build quality. And still, Ford almost went bust a couple of years back.

When I look at great creatives there is very little if any repetition in their work. Sure, they have developed their own style which they then overlay on top of original concepts. For example, JJ Abrams has a penchant for lens flare which he uses liberally in his films and TV shows. The stories are vastly different (with perhaps the exception of the Star Wars v Star Trek crossover). Annie Leibovitz’s photographic style will go down in history as singularly unique yet no two portraits resemble each other. Brett Whiteley always painted the female form from a particularly unflattering angle. No two works are the same.

I have struggled with originality since first stepping into an advertising agency. There’s an unwritten adland rule that says, ‘any ad is original if the idea first appeared 10 years ago or 10,000 kilometres away’. I saw that rule deployed many times. I saw creatives pitch ideas using the original concept in a foreign award annual as the rationale for selling the idea! I’ve also seen a guy fired for doing that so all’s fair in love and advertising. I shared office space for a long time with a painter (not of houses) who only painted from photos. And not his photos. After winning a rather prestigious art award with one of his painting (with some serious cash and kudos as the prize) the well-known judge enquired as to whether the painting had been created from life or photo. When he replied from a photo she said, ‘if I had known that you would not have won.’

Originality matters.

I am constantly astounded by people who ask me the most basic of questions about subject matter in which I have, what I consider to be, a rudimentary understanding. I am an expert in nothing. I have a high degree of interest and therefore knowledge in very specific areas which are interest to no one in particular. Want to know how many Marx Brothers there were? And how many made films? Could Harpo really talk? What was the original title for Star Trek and how many productions companies did Gene Roddenberry pitch it before being picked up, and by whom? The nomenclature of Mercedes-Benz cars from 1950 through to 2019. What cmd-shift 4 does differently to cmd-shift 3. Where Steve Jobs got/stole the idea for the computer mouse. How I ever got a girlfriend and then married, twice, remains a mystery to me.

I contend that you dear reader are the same but in different areas. I have a friend who recites details of weapons of war from the trebuchet through to F-22 Raptor. Another who is expert in the history of Australian Men’s hockey from club to Olympic level. Mrs Russell, in her professional capacity as a medical specialist practice manager, can decipher the fine print in both Medicare legalese and health insurance fund PDS. So what? Well if you have ever had anything to do with Medicare rebates and private health insurance funds you’ll know getting the maximum dollars back is not what they are interested in helping you do. So having someone with in-depth knowledge of how to work their systems for your advantage is incredibly beneficial.

Yet none of them places value on their highly specialised knowledge.

We all seem to take for granted the acquired knowledge built over the course of our lives. It may not directly serve us professionally or even socially now or any time in the future. But it does serve to make us unique. No matter when we’re all being sheep and buying the same iPhone (with minor changes to give the illusion of choice) or watching the same TV so we can relate to the rest of the tribe, I believe our individual knowledge banks coupled with experiences only garnered individually are what makes me, me. And you, you.

All that is to say, Roy Batty is right.

The same is true for those of us somewhere in between. Alec Baldwin said while being interviewed in one of the earliest episodes of Jerry Seinfeld’s ‘Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee‘, “I’m almost 60 now so the things I need to do, I really need to do.”

I’m almost 50 now so the I need to do, I really need to do. And watching Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee is not one of those things. Or Game of Thrones or House of Cards or much TV at all, even though I love the medium so much. I’m pretty sure on my death bed I will not be wondering how Dexter or Mad Men ended? Anyways, finales’ are really hard to make. Remember how ‘Seinfeld‘ ended? Need I say more.

I’m not talking about bucket lists; seeing the sunrise over the Taj Mahal or swimming with dolphins in the Indian Ocean. Things that matter to me. Creating something worthwhile and of value beyond dollars and sense. And just as soon as I figure that I’ll let you know.

I’m not suggesting I’m giving up entertainment in all forms but certainly leaning towards much more creating and a lot less consuming.

Also, global warming! We may all be facing fewer laps of the sun than we expected. Who knows when our time is up but when it is there are no deals to be made to stretch it a bit longer. I might not make 50. Louis CK once said (when he was still considered to be funny instead of a creepy, pervy misogynist), “If I die at 45 people will be like, ‘oh, that’s too bad’. But if I die at 50 people will say, ‘oh yeah, that makes sense.’ There are no candlelight vigils for 50-year-olds.”

I hope I make 50. You should I make 50 too or you won’t find out how this series ends.

To be continued…

Also, this “Tick. Fucking. Tock”

*Apologies for the gender-specific terminology but that’s how I first heard the quote. I kept it the way I heard to indicate the age from whence it came.

This took me years to learn. How often do you see blokes behind the barbie with massive flames erupting from all corners, flipping steaks and rolling snags over and over and over again and still you end with a plate of cancer?

As an enthusiastic amateur in the kitchen, I found the real joy to be in the preparation. The discipline and skills required with a knife take years to master. Sushi chefs don’t touch fish for the first ten years of their training.

Actual cooking where I’m interacting with the food is relatively short. Eating is longer but not by much.

And I found this is different places starting with Lego. Model builders will tell the same story; the joy is in the building not the playing or displaying. Hands-on being creative using skills and talents, experimenting, failing and trying again is the real fun. Pushing a toy train around – not so much.

Building a business, working on campaigns, creating stories, making movies is where the joy lies. Not sitting in a corner office, seeing an ad on TV or watching your film because seriously, after the first screening it’s all just an existential wank fest. Move on.

Again I say, the journey is the important part of the trip, not the destination. Because how many people do you know end up where they wanted to be? I wanted to be an astronaut, chef, carpenter, cinematographer in that order. I ended up a creative director in advertising agencies and now a consultant.

I did not see that coming.

Literally, you know what I mean. Figuratively (pardon the pun) just because the solution fits doesn’t mean it’s the right solution. Everywhere I look there’s government wasting money doing the popular, not the hard thing. Businesses trying to sell to everyone and end being noticed by no one.

These solutions are usually the first idea someone had to solve the problem. This is why I use the ’25 Box Method’ for coming up with ideas. First ideas are rarely the right ones. As a junior copywriter, I was introduced to the method and I’ve adapted it to fit any project requiring a solution. It’s pretty simple; take a large piece of paper and draw 4 equidistant lines vertically and repeat for the horizontal plane. You have 25 rectangles and have defaced the page thereby overcoming one of the biggest psychological blocks to creating; soiling a clean piece of paper.

Now write your first idea in box #1 (top left-hand corner). Chances are it will be rubbish. Write your second idea. Better, but not great. Write your third idea. It’s crap too but all of sudden idea #2 looks better. Here’s the challenge. Do not stop writing ideas until all 25 boxes are filled. Most people stop at #3 because it’s better than #2. Great ideas start to come around the middle of the page and tapper off again towards the end. I’ve created headlines, tagline, layouts, logos, designs and strategies using this method.

Fans of The West Wing will remember this scene which illustrates my point, in Latin. (No, not the one in the Cathedral where the President yells at God, mostly in Latin.)

And if you’ve stayed this long you deserve a treat, from Monty Python.