The B-Team

Okay, I confess. Those DVDs with the bonus disk — I’m a sucker. I love seeing how movie magic can make Spiderman trapeze from building to building, the trials of bringing a film to the big screen, or to have the chance of sneaking into the head of a Hollywood director.

Most of these bonus disks are useless fodder, but one stands out for me. The Lion King. Not because it was groundbreaking animation or Disney this or Disney that, but because of a 20-minute clip that is tucked deep inside the disk that everyone in the advertising business should watch. It talks about the B-Team.

At Disney’s animation studios, they often have multiple projects going on at one time. During this particular time, they were setting teams for the production of Pocahontas and The Lion King. Of course, everyone was jockeying for position, but a little known fact is that The Lion King was considered the B-movie, and there was talk of it going straight to video. No one wanted to work on a low-budget film about a lion cub that unintentionally kills his father and goes into exile. Pocahontas, about a heroine and American icon, was set to smash the box office and win Oscars.

Teams were chosen, egos were crushed and the lion crew sulked. This is where the creative spirit began to prevail. Those involved decided that if this were their fate, they would make the best B-movie that they possibly could. Though the cards were stacked against them and the chances for success were small, the B-Team started producing
A-Team work.

The opening sequence of The Lion King is one of the most beautiful pieces of animation and artistry I have ever seen. It was also the first clip from the movie that was produced and shown to the Disney executives. With this four-minute clip, budgets were increased and the mere thought of straight-to-video was tossed out the window. The intro was also used as a trailer in theaters to promote the film.

During The Lion King’s run in theaters, it became Disney’s top-grossing animated film of all time and won two Oscars and three Golden Globes. Not bad for a cartoon that was “doomed” before the first cell was even drawn.

Every day, things pass across our desks that we perceive as B-work. Get it done, and get it out the door. I just wonder how many opportunities are lost in this thinking. In creative departments throughout the advertising business, art directors and copywriters complain of not getting the juicy assignments. They fret that the budgets can’t support great ideas, the client doesn’t get it, or that a one-color ad will never win awards. Some agencies even consider themselves as B-level shops, taking what they can get as opposed to getting the accounts they want. This amounts to giving up before the first marker comp is drawn or any headlines are written.

The Disney honchos had considered The Lion King as a second-rate film and set budgets accordingly. I wonder how many clients have done this? If shown greatness, I wonder how many would change the parameters of the job for a shot at truly brilliant marketing? I have seen it happen. The budget on an airport duratran for an international manufacturing company went from $500 to $5,000 when I showed them some ideas that went beyond what they had thought would be a routine corporate message.

When Crispin Porter + Bogusky won the Mini account, what it got was a car account with a $53 million budget. Meager by industry standards. How could an agency launch a car brand and meet sales goals on a budget that wouldn’t support a television rotation necessary for an automobile no one had heard about? Many in our industry would say that it couldn’t be done. Not CP+B. The creative team came up with innovative ideas and media placements that exceeded sales expectations. But, the client also understood the obstacles the company was facing and was very open minded when it came to some of these ideas that had never been seen in this segment, or any other for that matter.

Next time a job comes across the desk, let’s think like the B-team. Let’s be problem solvers. Let’s change the landscape of our industry instead of doing what has already been done. Let’s be brilliant. Anything above the expected is inching towards brilliance and brilliance is colorblind, it costs very little, and I assure you people will get it — and, best of all, the A-team will wish they’d thought of it.