A lot of people talk about shooting projects of their own and building a body of work. Unfortunately, that is all that happens: talk. You get too comfortable with that union AC or electrician’s rate and the thought of giving that up for your own career is scary.
I was B-Camera Operator/Gaffer (yeah, it was a hectic show, but a lot of fun) on The Bronx Bunny TV series for the Starz! Network back in September of 2006. One of the production assistants was Rory Kozoll. Not sure how it came up, but he mentioned that he had these ideas for a series of Coors spec commercials revolving around the idea that it is the “Alcoholic’s beer.” It would be a series of spots where different people start their day with a Coors and continue it all the way to bedtime. I instantly loved the idea and vowed to do everything in my power to shoot them.
On November 2nd, 2006, a mere 5 and half weeks after the Bronx Bunny wrap party, we were in production on our three Coors specs. With a whopping budget of $330.40 (where $101.46 went to the Best Western for our motel room location) we shot the three specs on the DVX-100.
Rory and I co-directed the spots and had a great time doing so. We called in all sorts of favors: from shooting at his parents house in Valley Village, to borrowing the camera from a friend (Shaun Mayor), and shooting at my girlfriend at the time’s parent’s house in Calabasas; we had to stretch our dollars as far as possible. While the cinematography isn’t stellar (I’ve certainly learned a ton since shooting these), I’m pretty happy with the campaign. I wouldn’t have wasted my time enhancing them for 16×9 screens (which you can read about here and fix your own films with my tutorial) and writing about them here had I not been.
My fondest memory of the whole shoot was sneaking our grip and electric equipment into the Best Western Carriage Inn (on Sepulveda and Burbank in Sherman Oaks) with my old Bauer hockey bag. It worked perfectly and nobody had any idea that we were shooting there. I will say, for the record, that I made earnest attempts to find a motel that would give us permission to shoot, but apparently I wasn’t THAT good of a producer back then. We certainly couldn’t afford to pay their location fees…and people wonder why nobody films in LA anymore.
Follow the links below to view the Coors campaign. Unfortunately, the third spot didn’t come out as well as we had hoped. Despite strong performances from Rory and his now wife, Ali, the concept fell a little flat once we saw it on screen. Months later (March 18th, 2007), we reformulated the idea and shot the final installment with better execution…
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