Always Leave Room For Accidents
Posted on August 14, 2008 - Filed Under On Ideation
Whenever I go to a party where I don’t know anybody, I try to find the old guy in the room. Why? Because he has the best stories. He’s been around the block. He’s experienced exactly what you’re going through, but in a different age. And there is a great opportunity to learn from the old guy’s stories.
When David Trott wrote “How to Get Your First Job in Advertising” 20 years ago, the landscape of advertising was different. But the fundamentals were the same. Be hungry. Come up with a good idea. Sell it. Make money. Now David writes a blog for CST Advertising, and it’s got some great insights. I have to share with you a great story from an old guy:
John Webster was my creative director for 10 years. He taught me most of what I know. He told me I had one big flaw.
“Your commercials are as good as they’re ever going to get at script stage. You never leave any room for creative accidents.” To illustrate the point he told me a story.
Stanley Kubrick was making the movie, ‘2001’. He was shooting the apes. He had a second unit shooting the space station. Rotating in space: the docking sequence. This was a model, but Kubrick wanted to be sure it didn’t look like one. So he wanted to see the previous day’s rushes.
Kubrick said, “Let’s see them with sound.” The producer said they hadn’t had time to do the sound yet.
“What’s the sound going to be?” said Kubrick.
“The usual sort of metallic space communications.” said the producer.
Kubrick said, “Well I don’t want to watch the rushes mute. So just put some sound over the pictures.”
The producer said, “We haven’t got any sound at all.”
“Just dig around and find something. Anything.” said Kubrick.
So the producer looked around the deserted studios, and all he could find was an old vinyl recording of ‘The Blue Danube Waltz’ by Strauss. So he shrugged and put it on. Then they watched the rushes. The producer cringed at how inappropriate the music was. A 19th century soundtrack with 21st century visuals.
Kubrick simply watched.
Then after a while he said. “Do you know what? They’re going to call me a fucking genius when I use this in the movie.”
Like John said: you have to leave room for creative accidents.
- Christian
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