As the pandemic eases–but not nearly enough to let down our guard–reflections on how the challenges of a health crisis impacted production and lessons learned from that experience loom large. Jeff Beverly, EVP, global director of content for Commonwealth//McCann, shared his observations on production in the wake of COVID-19, including for the high-profile General Motors campaign which included a Super Bowl spot, “No Way, Norway,” promoting the automaker’s initiative to have 35 new EV vehicle models by 2025, powered by the Ultium battery platform.
Will Ferrell starred in “No Way, Norway,” joined by Awkwafina and Kenan Thompson. In the Big Game comedy spot, Ferrell informs us that Norway sells way more electric cars per capita than the U.S. He, Awkwafina and Thompson set out for Norway to serve notice that this will soon change due to American innovation. Jake Szymanski of Gifted Youth, LLC directed “No Way Norway” for McCann Detroit/McCann Worldgroup.
Realizing this overall GM campaign in the throes of a pandemic was challenging to say the least. But to say the most, Beverly learned some valuable lessons. “The biggest takeaway was an appreciation for everybody’s willingness to take the threat seriously, accept that production would be very different, and collectively problem solve through it all,” he observed. “This was not just a challenge for production to solve, but something for our clients, our agency and our production partners to be there in the trenches together on. Sometimes our first thoughts or ideas needed iterations to work in a COVID world. Other times it came down to signing overages, cutting costs, and being ready to do whatever it takes. It’s everything we do on a normal shoot, but more and deeper. To quote the line producer, everything back then was hard, very hard. It was all doable, but not without a lot of consideration and focus on the approach. Worth noting that without a client that trusts the agency, none of this would have been possible. Thankfully our clients at General Motors were understanding, flexible and willing to adapt to very fluid parameters.
“Another big lesson,” continued Beverly, “is that the working relationship between the creative team and director was more important than ever. Without a completely clear agreement on the vision and a strong desire to collaborate, mistakes can happen–an isolated video village and limited opportunities for communication add risk. Particularly with professional talent like Will where we are creating on the fly. We were fortunate to work with a great director with a very clear, shared vision.”
As for what practices, approaches, ways of working during the pandemic will continue as we get closer to some semblance of normality, Beverly said, “The idea of sanitation is important. Beyond COVID it shows that a set can be one of the safest work environments if everyone takes things seriously. Instilling good habits now will lead to safer sets in the future.
“Beyond that, COVID makes everything harder, slower, and takes away a lot of the nimble, spur-of-the-moment magic that can happen on set. Finding ways to keep that magic, in spite of everything, gives us no excuse post-COVID. I think it highlights the importance of having your boxes checked so you can find good creative on the day, while also having a solid structure.
“A lot of people on this shoot were remote. That presented challenges but also showed us that with good communication practices, anything can happen anywhere all the time. I think some things are vastly simpler in person, and we’ll of course go back to that. I also think we’ll realize 2nd or 3rd units can splinter off and fill out our dailies with auxiliary content, without much of a headache now that it’s almost a requirement these days. We had an entire team going up and down the California coast capturing footage for different parts of this campaign and it worked out wonderfully.”
Relative to what he missed most during the process of creating and executing during the pandemic, Beverly shared, “We missed the physical closeness during all aspects. You couldn’t be in the edit for 12 hours out of the day. Our color session was remote. Our prep was almost entirely remote, and when it wasn’t it was still heavily distanced.
“When we were on set our team was required to be isolated in video village, to keep any sort of cross contamination with crew at a minimum. We heavily valued these restrictions, because it allowed us to shoot at all, but it made the process that much harder. You have to communicate intentionally and efficiently or else it gets lost in a sea of emails, Zoom calls, and texts.
“Also it’s strange to not see people’s faces that you work closely with for weeks. We would be on the fifth day of shooting and we’d see someone take a drink of water in the distance and go, ‘Oh that’s what they look like…’ after working for days on end with them.
Regarding how pandemic production changed his thinking and potentially way of working now and in the hopefully soon-to-be COVID-free future, Beverly said, “The exercise of altering production for COVID serves as an example that we can still generate strong creative executions while following new and different guidelines. To put a positive spin on it, COVID is conditioning us all to be more efficient, accept change, and know production will continue to evolve.
“As we move to a more sustainable production model, there will be new practices that will also feel uncomfortable at first, but after COVID should seem easy.”
Asked how his approach to the next Super Bowl will be the same or different from the one he just experienced, Beverly replied, “From a production standpoint, it is a bit of a waiting game to see where the world is with health and safety. No matter what, the spirit of flexibility, understanding and trust will follow us to any production in the future.”
