Yep. We're great :)
(by Ted Royer, executive creative director of droga5, New
York)
Producers are great. They are
my favourite people in
advertising. And I want to marry one. Since
every
single person I've met over the last 15 years works
in
advertising or some related industry, I've realized
that I'm
destined to marry an ad person. After a brief
panic attack, I thought about
producers and felt much
better. I want to marry a producer.
I don't
want to marry an account services person.
Sure, they can take lots of
pressure and abuse from
the world, and they're organized (a
definite
prerequisite for my future spouse), but we'd quickly
realize
that while we share many goals, ultimately,
she may not care enough about
my goals. And caring
about my goals, or at least seeming to, is
very
important.
I'm not going to marry a traffic person. They
propel
jobs through the agency and thus are obviously good at
getting
stuff done. But they cry too much. Or they
yell too much. Or they cry while
yelling. There is
crying and yelling at some point in every marriage.
I
wish to keep it to the bare minimum in mine.
Marrying another
creative seems like a great idea. We
would laugh together. We would dream
together. We
would make amazing plans together. But we wouldn't
know
how to get any of those plans done or how to
actually make anything happen.
And then we would blame
each other.
I could marry one of my
clients. We would have a great
initial relationship. She would find me
really funny
and inventive, but over time, she might begin to doubt
my
motives and commitment. And she'd be right. Am I
bored? Am I ultimately
looking to trade up? Am I
looking for a newer, fresher challenge? I'd be
coy and
say no. But the real answer would be... maybe.
No, I want
to marry a producer. A producer listens to
the most batshit crazy idea and
doesn't say yes or no
or ask why, but instantly asks "How?" She could
talk
me out of dumb things with grace and logic, or
conversely show me
what it's possible to do with
virtually nothing. A producer realizes that
just as
business and creativity need each other,
responsibility (her)
and irresponsibility (me) do too.
A producer wouldn't be afraid of
different challenges,
no matter what form they took. A producer would
be
tough, fighting battles I'd neither see nor even know
about. A
producer would plan for a rainy day and not
even tell me she was doing it
and then, when it
started to rain, she'd say, "It's covered, go over
to
the food table." A producer would stay up all night
partying with
me, then make sure what needs to get
done gets done, while I sleep.
Marrying a producer
would allow me to be as self-absorbed,
self-indulgent,
self-congratulatory, naval-gazing and "creative" as
I
want to be.
Of course, I could always date someone outside of
the
industry and see what the rest of the world is like.
But that
would be weird.
