Hello Friends! Happy new year, hopefully everyone is sticking to their resolutions so far (I'm doing well, I wanted to get more gym time in, get a little more Shaq-diesel) but I wanted to pick up the pen and say hello. Lots popping. Quick bit on "detectives", we're in limbo with the network right now. What makes this great is that at any minute we can get a big fat green light. The bad news is, in order for that to happen, a few more shows need to die. So that's a tough predicament, you never want someone else's stuff to fail so we get our turn. So for now, all I'll do is do exactly what we all do in the ham and cheese line at the grocery store. Take a number, be patient and stare off vacantly for a bit. The good thing is, things are lively there, there's so much love for DETECTIVES, I'm excited to show you all what we've been cooking.
But the reason I picked up the pen today, was because I was pretty excited to have finished filming with long time friend and collaborator Calvin Hill, we'd been talking about doing a project for a bit, and while we were talking, Calvin had a commercial land on his desk, so we decided to join forces and get to work. It was a funs pot, Calvin and crew and I was onscreen with the wonderful and hilarious Valentina Beylina. Whiler the crew started setting up, I grabbed a quick snap of them:
Once we'd wrapped this, I started thinking about other commercials I'd been lucky enough to do. For some reason, when i got into this, I used to think commercial swere like AAA ball, do well enough there, and all of a sudden they give you keys to the vault where you can go have a Tom Hanks-like career. What I did learn is that commercials will get you...more commercials. Grateful for all of it, each one has it's own little flavor. A few months back, the good souls over at Hollydog films put this little clip together, they found about 8 spots of mine, and put them all together which I thought was really nice. I know there are a ton more out there, but these are fun selections here:
While you see these, I realized I do have a fun little story to go with each of them:
Comcast- This was the follow up to WAWA, which was EVERYWHERE. Everyone was like “what are you doing next?” I said “I’M GOING TO WEAR A SUIT AND ZIP MY FLY!” this wasn’t as popular as wawa, but I did get some messages on my voicemail “FLY’S DOWN CHAMP!” This was fun. I always felt like what made this one good is not the guy and his zipper, but the incredible actress who just NAILED the part of the receptionist. I wish she was in this more. Her outtakes were incredible. I wish I got her name. She deserves to be recognized. I hope she’s still working. if my memory serves me, I think I'd been fortunate enough to do about 4 spots for Comcast. The last one I ended up doing ended up getting banned from TV (it's a long story, but has nothing to do with zipping my fly)
Publix-NIGHT SHOOTS! TAMPA! It was great landing in Tampa because I wanted to check out the city. Here’s the thing, Tampa is a big NIGHT SPOT. Which is GREAT. Though I was working nights to film this. When you do night shoots, no big deal, your days are nights, your nights are days. So my days were wide open. I sort of roamed around in a major heat wave, and ate too much and drank too much coffee. We filmed this all night…I wrapped my part at like 8am, jumped in the van, headed to the airport, because it was time to film something again that weekend in NYC. There's a line in a great Foo Fighters song that says "done, done and i'm onto to the next one" That was me during this time! (and no I dont think I got to keep the hat)
Wawa-When it began. I’ll always love this one, but not for the reasons you’ll think. I think I look, sound and act like a cheeseball in it. For me it’s that this STILL get quoted back to me. I get this all the time. My favorite was my friend Krazy Joe Fiore (do you all know Krazy Joe? You should, find him here) a couple years back, I was at a Krazy Joe Krazy Family Function and his Mom who’s the sweetest lady was like “HEY TIM! THAT’S MY WAWA!” I’m aware this will probably be on my tombstone. I’m ok with that. It always means something special to me when people remember any of my stuff, it means that a piece of work resonated with them somehow. So for that, this spot will always be near and dear to me. (SO WILL THIS POSTER!)
By the way, I've seen a few of these posters get defaced. That's pretty surreal. I was like "I DO NOT HAVE A MUSTACHE! STOP DRAWING THEM ON ME! I HAVE FEELINGS TOO!"
Funny bit of trivia, the gentleman who is promoting the meatball sub? Vegetarian. See? That shows what a great actor he is. Also a great musician.
Sprite- I’m in this for a second. But there’s a lot of reasons this is a biggie. First, look! Gentle and kind Kobe! This was before he got jailhouse tats, buzzed his head and changed his number from #8 to #24. But as a Sixer fan, it didn’t matter to me. What mattered is a huge influence, Spike Lee directed this, and working with him was excellent, I met him at the screen test and we hit it off and it went from there. I did try to get him to pop on screen with me as his character MARS from SHE'S GOTTA HAVE IT. Aside from Spike, this commercial made some decent money, which is good, because with commercials, the pay is feast and famine. The residuals are nice, but you have no idea when they’re coming (which makes paying bills a task) however this commercial was so big, I could actually afford to buy an engagement ring. The ring my now-Wife wears. Everytime CLOCKERS or DO THE RIGHT THING is on TV, I say “that ring wouldn’t happen without Spike!” This was a blast. Also, I hadnt slept. I’d been shooting a film all night. Not bad right? I don’t think I slept til late afternoon that day. (Don’t do that anyone, sleep each night, it makes things easier)
ADVANTA-This was fun because we filmed it in Manayunk, Pennsylvania, also, it was the first time I’d ever worked with the almighty Adam Way. We both screen tested together, so I was glad to work with him on this because his humor is unique, it’s really funny and dry and BIG….all at once. Also, he leaves the funniest voicemail messages, after this commercial, he’d leave a few that’d go on for like 4 minutes, all funny. If you all get the chance find Adam Way....give him your phone number. At one point I’d lost touch with him, and I really wanted to get him for LEAF. Eventually I got a hold of his talent manager, and landed him for LEAF and he also got a supporting actor nomination for it! I was glad I dig deep and found the right actor for the right part. After LEAF, Adam joined the cast of WATCHING THE DETECTIVES and my upcoming 2012 film CHARM CITY. You just can't waste Adam Way folks. This commercial kicked all of that off.
Wendys 1-Shot in MIAMI! South Beach! Need I say more? No. But I will anyway. They shot about 4 commercials down here, and they put us all up at hotels on South Beach. So all of the actors hung around for a week in Miami in February. Actually a lot of them you see on TV a lot these days, including Kristen Schaal who was on the brilliant FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS. This was too much fun. It’s funny while I was shooting this, I got a call that I’d booked a DR PEPPER spot, so I boarded my flight after we wrapped shooting, landed in New York, I jumped in a van and shot DR PEPPER all night. When it rains it pours! Though talk about a weather change, beautiful, flawless Miami and within 4 hours I’m filming in freezing drizzling New York City. No complaints. Though I need to try and find that DR PEPPER commercial, I don’t think I’d ever seen that one.
Wendys 2- Another one of those “moments” in time, we shot this on the Hamptons, in November. With no shirts on. For some reason, it wasn’t ice cold. Bill Hudson directed this, and he’s directed me in a few more. The best thing about Bill Hudson was he was always looking to wrap the commercial so everyone could go watch basketball. Late in the day it’d be “don’t worry, I’ll have ya out of here in time for the Knick game” I’m a Sixer fan. But I did appreciate Bill looking out for my best basketball interests. There was a 3rd Wendys commercial I ended up doing. Not on this one, I wonder if I even have it around? Also, I remembered after I wrapped this, I jumped in a van, headed out of the hamptons, jumped on a train, headed out of New York, jumped in a car ended up on South Street, Philadelphia watching a SOCIAL DISTORTION concert with Magic Mike Schoch. I know that must have been a "3 cup of coffee" type of day.
Pepsi- This was too much fun and here’s why, it had this Hollywood style budget, a Hollywood director (Kinka Usher who did MYSTERY MEN) and something like 4 days of shoots on this one, we shot this in New York City, and we ALL had dialogue, needless to say, they only could keep a few lines. But have a look at this spot….there’s me, Geoff Wigdor from so many films (eventually, a few years later, I’d ask Geoff to join the cast of LEAF which I was directing, and he got an Accolade Award nomination out of that!) a guy from that TV show HANG TIME, one guy was spotted as from STRANGERS WITH CANDY, and if you look far to the left, you’ll see Justin Long (I’m a Mac, Jeepers Creepers etc etc ) Justin is hilarious. We goofed off for 4 straight days on this shoot and even on the subway rides back to the city. He’s insanely funny, I’m not sure I’ve seen a piece that’s really shown how funny he is. Don’t count Justin out, he’s as funny as they get. I like living in a world where he's out there and pretty darn famous.
That’s what these all are for me. Just little moments in time. I know not every single commercial everyone will see/remember/care about. But I’m grateful to the good souls at Hollydogfilms for putting this fun clip together. I know there are more out there... I just need to track these things all down!
Thanks for listening, whereever you all are, I hope you’re smiling today.
Take care and be good,
TIM