LL Bean: Making Christmas

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Released:	November 2008
Advertiser:	L.L. BEAN
Agency:	GSD&M's Idea City, Austin
Country:	USA
Category:	Retail stores & rental companies

Credits:

Title: Making Christmas
Client: LL Bean
Creative Agency: GSD&M Idea City
Creative Director: Mark Taylor/John Trahar/Luke Sullivan
Copywriter: Luke Sullivan
Art Director: John Trahar
Agency Executive Producer: Karen Jacobs
Production Company: Sticks+Stones Studios, Los Angeles
Director: Jerry Brown
Executive Producer: Marlon Staggs
Producer: Gabrielle Yuro
Director of Photography: Eddie Stephenson
Editor: Sam Selis
Editorial Company: Beast, Austin
Visual Effects: James Bohn, Vendetta Post
Music: Valley Winter Song, by the Fountains of Wayne


"Making Christmas" was shot on a 95 degree day in Pasadena. More information on the spot and its production in the Q&A below with Sticks+Stone Studio director Jerry Brown.

What was the creative brief from the agency?

The brief was to capture the genuineness and authenticity of an iconic American brand, LL Bean, by seeing and experiencing a typical LL Bean family Christmas day.

As everyone knows, LL Bean is known for it’s catalogue sales, and the agency wanted to bring a catalogue to life in an authentic way that fit LL Bean. They kept saying, we want this spot to feel like a cinematographer’s home movies, and that resonated with me.


What attracted you to this job?

The creatives, John Trahar and Luke Sullivan, had a clear desire that was in alignment with mine - to create something that was distinctive, felt as comfortable and authentic as worn LL Bean boots, and had a subtle holiday bent without straying into the staid arena of typical holiday advertising. To their credit, John and Luke took the intentional and unconventional route of NOT creating an agency “board.” They handed me a script, and we talked about how we wanted to go about telling a visual story. Their approach required a lot of trust, and I admire their foresight to not predetermine their client’s expectations.


How did you approach this job creatively?

I had heard Valley Winter Song, by the Fountains of Wayne, a year or so ago and thought it captured the feeling of the holidays for me. I sent it to John and Luke, as we started to discuss musical directions, and it really just felt right.

Music inspires visuals for me, and that helped. We sent the music to our editor, Sam Selis at Beast in Austin, and he began thinking about it also. We had specific retail items to include, but no clunky mandate to “model” the items. It was fun to try and craft those items into a story. As for the dog – great dog by the way – I wanted it to seem just a little left out, as though it knew that Christmas Day is for people to experience and dogs to watch. I like the idea of the dog behaving a little “passive-aggressive” and stealing off with a moccasin, only to be rewarded later in the true spirit of holiday charity. I just didn’t want to tell that story in a heavy-handed way. More than anything, what drove the “feel” was a desire to stay true to the brief and shoot like it was a great DP’s home movie.


Anything interesting happen on the shoot? Where was it shot & over how many days?

We decided, for several very practical reasons, to “make” snow and shoot it near Los Angeles. We actually shot in Pasadena and it was about 95 degrees both days we shot. We had scouted Chile, Argentina and New Zealand, because we wanted as much as possible to stay visually authentic and shoot real snow. The problem was that snow was not reliable at that time of year any place. It was either melting, and there was no assurance that the ground would still be covered in snow when we arrived with cameras in hand, or the weather forecasts were so iffy that we couldn’t take the chance of being fogged into high mountain places. Honestly, I was hoping and would have preferred to shoot in the real snow right up to the first day. I’m not ashamed to say I was wrong. It worked out amazingly well to shoot Pasadena.


Anything else I should know?

One just kind of interesting aside is that the young girl in the LL Bean story is Madeline Carroll, who co-starred opposite Kevin Costner in the film, “Swing Vote,” and also recently did a great episode of “Grey’s Anatomy.” I had no idea who she was during casting, or even when I was working with her because she is so charmingly unassuming, and I hadn’t seen the movie. I did notice that she was a very talented young actress with fantastic instincts, and the camera just kept wanting to swing her way. She’s barely in the spot, but I have some really nice outtakes of her that didn’t make the cut. She’s a true talent despite her limited screen time.

One thing that was really different for me on this spot was that the agency encouraged me to be part of the edit. We worked with the supremely talented Sam Selis at Beast in Austin, Texas. Sam really pushed the idea of the music right along with me, and he has a gift for arranging images to tell stories.