It’s amazing what ‘Small Balls’ can do in the right hands.
Created via McCann Tech, directed by KNUCKLEHEAD’s Rob Leggatt, and edited by Chris Walker of Marshall Street Editors, “Small Balls Big Game” will mark the Super Bowl debut of Papaya Global, the lone Israeli tech firm participating in this year’s broadcast. The ad features a duplicating CFO lobbing multiple self-powered ping-pong balls to highlight Papaya’s AI-powered platform. ‘Billions’ DoP Jake Polonsky shot the mind-bending spot, which features VFX from OkayStudio. The message is clear: other technologies do not meet CFOs’ needs, but Papaya Global automates workforce payments and payroll, delivering the output of multiple CFOs.
The creative team includes Emmy Award winner Matt McCarron, Webby and Cannes winner Jonathan Vingiano, and Alon Seifert, who is the client creative director for Papaya (and a Super Bowl ads veteran). A 10-second teaser, ‘Crushing the Big Game,’ has also been released ahead of the Super Bowl, which takes place Sunday, February 11th.
“This was a really fun film to work on,” says Walker. “We had a great shoot out in Warsaw, courtesy of the mighty Tim Katz of Knucklehead, directed by the absolutely lovely & incredibly skilled Rob Leggatt and shot by top DOP Jake Polonsky. It was a pleasure also to link-up again with exec producer Kobi Hoffman of Jiminy Creative, and a great introduction to McCann Tech and a first of many partnerings with the brilliant creative director Alon Seifert.”
One must watch the spot to fully appreciate its whimsical sense of “play,” and as Walker adds, “It’s always fun to get to grips with VFX work in the offline process, which made for a very rewarding edit with Rob. Hats off to Okay Studios for handling all the extra comps I threw at them! All in all a very fun project with a great final product, and I’m very proud that it will be shown during the Super Bowl.''
“Small Balls Big Game” marks a reunion between creative agency McCann Tech, production company KNUCKLEHEAD and director Leggat, who collaborated on 2023’s “You to the Power of Papaya” campaign.
All parties are excited to bring ping-pong to the biggest football event of the year.
The Marshall Street Editors roster is represented in the US through its partnership with Union Editorial. Union also has skin in the Big Game this year with several projects, including CrowdStrike’s entry, “The Future,” cut by John Bradley (Tarsem, dir); and “It’s Time to See Other Sodas,” for Starry from VaynerMedia, starring Ice Spice, cut by Graham Turner (Speck & Gordon, dirs).
About Marshall Street Editors
Marshall Street Editors are a leading creative offline editing company in Soho who specialise in cutting high profile commercials, music videos and online content. They were founded in 1999 by editors Tim Thornton-Allan and John Mayes. Together they have expanded their company over the past 25 years, and now the MSE roster features an excellent array of award winning editors. With their wealth of experience and knowledge, they have edited many high profile campaigns for brands like Apple, Lego, Mercedes-Benz, Hugo Boss, Guinness, Amazon, Channel 4, Under Armour, Instacart, EE and Virgin to name a few. MSE have an affiliation with Union Editorial in New York, Los Angeles and Austin and also specialise in live editing on location around the world.
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