That's right friends. The shortlist came out this morning and it's all very exciting. I'm so proud. Boys, dad works in advertising by day and makes TV ads which you love. Noah your favorite are the Lemon & Nada ones with the 'naughty lemons' and you love the Castle Light ones with the 'Dancing Yeti / snow monster' and the 'pengwinz'.
He (and his writers) has two shortlists for The South African Poultry Association. If you didn't see the ads: It's basically these parents in a car and the 'GPS' keeps giving directions in that monotone voice "Turn right now. In one hundred meters, turn left. Dad. Dad. Turn left" and the camera moves to the back of the car and you realize it's their kid giving the directions, not the GPS at all. And the line is "Eggs make kids smart" and there were a few of them. They're very cool indeed! "Cannes Lions Cool", if I may.
The other two shortlists are for Kalahari. Graeme and his writer, Rod made these very cool clips for Valentine's day. They took really heavy 'boy' movies and created trailers to make them look like romance movies instead. Like, they did a 'romance' trailer for Bloodsport and Rambo. They're a bunch of clevers. I do think it's because they play table tennis / ping pong most of the day. Gets that creativity going. Their offices look more like a kids indoor play park than an office, but hey.
It doesn't matter if the finalists don't convert to awards. I am just so proud. I know that he was very passionate and excited about these campaigns, so it means the world to him. Let me put it this way. There are only eight South African shortlists in that category. Four of them are Graeme's. High-fives of course to Robert Selmer-Olsen and Roderick McCall and The Jupiter Drawing Room and JWT. Everyone gets an 'awesome' stamp for making finalists!
Also, I am quite keen on 'any' excuse to buy a bottle of bubbly, so here it is. Well done Daddy. From all of us. You are rocking! Here is the list of all the Cannes Lions finalists if you're in to advertising. I'm going to go make pom poms now.
