License to killjoy

I don’t know whether to be shaken or stirred by this.

Daniel Craig is tired of playing James Bond on the big screen. And frankly, I couldn’t be happier. A little brushing up on my British accent and this could be my shot. I mean, if you’ve seen any of the movies you probably already know how similar Craig and I are built. When I saw him walk out of the ocean in Casino Royale it freaked me out. I thought I was looking in a mirror.

That sound you hear is my wife laughing hysterically.

Where was I? Oh yeah. So now, after four installments as agent 007 with a license to kill, Craig has naturally decided to bitch and moan about how tough it’s been. How rough it is making millions of dollars playing an iconic character in the most successful movie franchise of all time. Whining about how he’s been injured a couple times on set, and had to spend a few days in a five-star hospital in Monaco. Or the French Riviera. Or Geneva.

And having to cruise around in that Aston Martin DB10 take after take? Don’t get him started.

Here’s the thing: there isn’t a good-looking actor with a rented tux and a not half-bad English accent on earth who wouldn’t trade places with him in a heartbeat. Part of the problem is that Daniel Craig is too far removed from his waiting tables/starving actor days to remember that he’s won the golden ticket, the acting lottery. He doesn’t have to work for the rest of his life.

Unless he keeps making movies like Cowboys & Aliens. Then he might.

Craig isn’t the only actor with a sense of entitlement and a lack of gratitude. David Duchovny spent the last six years of X-Files telling anyone who’d listen how bored he was playing Fox Mulder. Then he had a few years employment on Californication (I’m still waiting to meet someone who actually watched that). But now that his career has cooled, he’s suddenly up for returning to the character that bored him so in the reboot of the X-Files, in the form of a miniseries, airing in January. I’m sure he suddenly realized there were many more facets of Mulder to delve into. That or it was the money. The truth is out there.

David Caruso, long rumored to be the angriest actor in Hollywood, literally walked off the set when his character made his final exit after the first season of NYPD Blue. Then a funny thing happened: no one would hire him. He made a couple of bad movies, then disappeared. Until CSI Miami came along to resurrect his career, he was nowhere to be found. And the only reason he was able to do that was because Caruso, still under contract to NYPD Blue producer Steven Bochco, needed his permission to do another series. In a magnanimous gesture proving Bochco is a far better person than I would've been, he gave it to him.

Katherin Heigl, Chevy Chase and even another Bond – Sean Connery, all decided to to jettison the roles that made them household names. Connery went on to further success in other roles. The other two, not so much. Although if Hollywood ever makes a movie called Box Office Poison, I think they have their co-stars.

I don’t believe in being beholden to something you did in the past. But there is such a thing as gratitude and humility at being given the chance. Neither Caruso, Craig or Heigl were anyone before those roles.

Also, the audience doesn’t really need to know how much Craig hates what he's doing. It’s a slap in the face, and it tarnishes all the goodwill built up over the last four films. I was extremely excited to see the new Bond film. But after hearing Craig’s comments, I’m less interested. I’ll get to it when I get to it.

The good news is the franchise has a built-in loyal fan base around the world, and will continue to be successful even without Craig.

Or as Hollywood calls him, Dr. No.

You're gonna need a bigger box

It never stops.

If you work in an ad agency, you know there's one thing people working there love to do more than anything. SPOILER ALERT: It's not creating ads.

It's complain.

Two disclaimers right off the top: first, there are plenty of valid things to complain about. Second, I've definitely contributed to the culture. I have a reserved seat on the complain bandwagon. Ok seat, could be closer. Armrests don't work as well as they should. More padding wouldn't hurt. SWIDT?

Ad agencies, while sometimes a hotbed of creativity, can also be an unrelenting cacophony (waited 780 posts to use that word) of privileged, overpaid people who have it good whining about how bad they have it. Cue the violins.

They work too hard. Nobody understands them. People just don't get it. The traffic sucks (well, that one's true). There are too many meetings (also true). They should be promoted. That guy should be fired. The food guy always has the same sandwiches. This isn't as fun as it used to be. This coffee is awful. They hated my ideas. They only had an hour forty five for lunch. They had to work the weekend. The client is an idiot.

I used to work with this art director who liked to quote an old boss of his. He used to say, "You get paid four-times what the average person makes. I expect you to work at least twice as hard."

It's like the kid who cried wolf, and keeps crying. At first it's deafening, then after awhile you don't even hear it anymore. Somebody call a waaaaaaaaambulance.

I know what you're thinking: who the hell are you and what've you done with Jeff? I get it. And I'll be the first to admit, for the second time, I'm as guilty as anyone else - it doesn't take much of a push to get me started. When the complaint wave hits, I want to hang ten just as much as anyone. But when I complain about work, at least somewhere far below the surface - in a quiet little voice only I hear - I'm at least grateful I have work to complain about.

As I crawl at a snail's pace into the office every day on the world's largest parking lot, the 405, I look around at the coffee grinders, rust buckets, rattletraps and jalopies slogging it out in the lanes next to me, and that same little voice tells me to be glad I have a really nice car to wait it out in.

In my experience, complaining about people is a useless exercise. I've found they're not changing on my account anytime soon, so I try not to let them get to me. I make an effort, often unsuccessful but at least I'm trying, to use a little grace in dealing with people I disagree with. And by disagree, I mean they're wrong. At the very least, even when that's true I go out of my way to try and treat them as I'd want to be treated.

Since every agency I work at has open floorplans, maybe the complaining just seems louder because it echoes off the polished concrete floors.

Don't get me started.

But it's become a runaway train. Everyone wonders why it's gotten so, so bad. It's like the person who crosses the middle of the street, gets mowed down by traffic (when it's moving), then denies their contribution to the accident.

My suggestion is we all - including myself - try to dial it down a bit, and focus on the more positive things about agencies (yes there are some) for awhile. Like the fact we don't work in the insurance business. What we do isn't exactly breaking rocks or digging ditches (although I've occasionally watched someone dig their own grave). And that paycheck, at almost every level, is at least twice the national average.

Maybe November will be the No-complaining month. Let's see how that works.

Of course, if you don't like that idea, by all means feel free to complain about it.

Nic and Shirley

A rare Saturday night. The wife and I have the place to ourselves. Of course young Mr. Spielberg is making movie magic in the currently flooded state of Texas, and my beautiful, smart, scary-funny daughter is at a Halloween party then staying overnight at her friends house.

So it's us, the dogs and a big bowl of rapidly diminishing candy (I hope there's some left when the trick-or-treaters get here).

Anyway, the wife and I decided to watch one of our favorite films: Guarding Tess. It stars Nic Cage and Shirly MacLaine. She's the former first lady, and he's the head of the Secret Service detail assigned to protect her. They argue and fight, but it's essentially a love story.

There are a few great things about it, maybe the best among them being that Nic Cage is not the Nic Cage we know today. That is to say he gives a sweet, funny, quiet performance. No explosions. No sleepwalking through the role. No constantly changing hairline from shot to shot. No stealing the Declaration of Independence.

MacLaine is cranky, sweet, tough and ultimately heartbreaking. It's an underrated performance, and I think one of her best and most likable.

The chemistry between the two of them is palpable. Not romantic chemistry - that'd be too Harold and Maude-ish. It's a love and appreciation two people have for each other just for who they are.

And Cage is hilarious.

I was debating putting this in my Guilty Pleasures series (feel free to search Guilty Pleasures in the box to the right), but Guarding Tess doesn't fit the criteria. I don't like this movie in spite of itself, I love it for what it is.

If you haven't seen it, and you're looking for an entertaining couple of hours and the joy of discovering an unseen little gem, I recommend Guarding Tess.

It'll almost make you forget Ghost Rider. Almost.

I have the negatives

Here’s a client comment every copywriter gets – some more than others – about a headline they’ve written at some point along the way.

”It’s too negative.”

I get it a lot. In fact, I got it today.

Despite the fact the second half of the line paid off the first part of the line beautifully and, dare I say it, positively, the client was having none of it.

My headline included the word “won’t.” Apparently that’s on the list of random negative trigger words, along with “can’t”, “shouldn’t”, “doesn’t”, “didn’t” and I’m sure a bunch more I won’t (there’s that word again) know until I present them and they’re shot down.

Mid-level clients are not big picture thinkers. Their tendency is to have crippling tunnelvision, and overthink everything, especially how much of their ass to cover. It’s why they examine headlines on a word-by-word basis, as opposed to taking in and reflecting on the entire line, the bigger meaning, the brand tone of voice and the overall message being conveyed.

Obviously to live in the purgatory that is middle management, one must have their sense of humor surgically removed. I believe they keep it downstairs in the pathology lab, next to the jars of middle manager brains.

I kid. Middle managers don't have brains.

It’d be a great business if clients read headlines and copy, and then reacted as if they were real people instead of what they think they are: experts in the life of the mind.

So my lesson for today, courtesy of this middle-management, ass-kissing, overthinking, boot-licking, water-toting, brown-nosing, apple-polishing, favor-currying, toady little suck-up is to try to be more positive.

How am I doing so far?

Fire drill

At the building where I work – like all office buildings - the management company is required by the city to have annual fire drills. When you least expect it - provided you don't see the firetruck and guys in orange vests outside - building management breaks into your work day and makes an announcement over their static-y public address system. Lights start flashing, it's panic at the disco and everyone's instructed to evacuate the building using the stairs, not the elevator.

Slowly and orderly, everyone saunters out to the parking lot, wondering if there’s enough time for a Starbucks run. Then they check in with their company's point person to prove they weren’t left behind in the faux towering inferno.

It’s an inconvenience that interrupts work for a bit, but the intentions are good and this kind of fire drill can actually make a difference in a genuine emergency. Which is exactly the opposite of the fire drills you usually find in an advertising agency.

Sadly, people working in agencies are well acquainted with the other kind. The pain-inducing, frustration-increasing, time-wasting, resources-draining, brain-numbing, soul-crushing kind.

Agency fire drills are notorious shape-shifters. They can come in the form of an account person yelling in the hall for everyone to “Look busy!” as a new client prospect tours the agency.

They can be an all-hands-on-deck, cancel-your-weekend-plans mandate to try to save an account that’s been going out the door since they got it.

They can even be the creative director’s kids graduation, engagement, wedding or circumcision announcement that has to get done first, before the actual paying work. Don't even get me started on headlines for the circumcision announcements.

"Take a tip from a mohel who does!"

"Is your mohel good enough to make the cut?"

"It's time to put some foreskin in the game!"

The common characteristic of agency fire drills is they’re all, without exception, monumental wastes of time. They’re the original model for the hamster wheel. And the unlucky ones who are "volunteered" to participate are rats in a maze, who manage to find their way out the other side without reward for their effort.

Agency fire drills happen because people high enough in the food chain to call them have placed a misguided sense of importance on whatever the drill is. They’ve entered a state of denial regarding exactly what the results of everyone dropping what they’re doing to do something else will accomplish.

None of this should come as a surprise. Despite how lean, nimble, agile and responsive the agency website says they are, I have yet to work in a shop that runs as efficiently and effectively as they do in their fantasy life. The one that lives in their manifesto on their website.

Anyway, once the real-world fire drill is over, everyone shuffles back into the building, takes a crowded elevator back to their floor, and picks up where they left off.

And if they're really lucky, maybe they get a venti cappuccino out of the deal.

Dangerous words

According to some estimates, there are over 1,025,029 words in the English language.

But to anyone who works in an agency creative department, you know there are four extremely dangerous ones that should be avoided at all costs.

"What do you think?"

Those four little wolves-in-sheeps'-clothing words have caused more unnecessary frustration, anger and heartache, not to mention destroyed more great advertising, than the other 1,025,025 words combined.

Well, maybe not. But go with me here.

Here’s the thing: the vampire at your doorway at midnight, hungry with fangs bared, can’t come in. He can’t simply cross the threshold and suck the life out of you, even though that’s what he wants to do more than anything. You're safe inside and he's stuck outside.

Unless you invite him in. “What do you think?” is that invitation.

It gives people without jurisdiction, judgment or experience the opening they’re waiting for to – as Albert Brooks said in Broadcast News – lower our standards bit by bit.

Now, not all opinions are unwanted. But you can be sure the people who need to chime in, who have a dog in the race, will do it without being asked. They’re the ones that'll see what you’re trying to do, offer ways to keep it on track and true to your vision and, more often than not, make it better in the process.

Next time you're in an internal review, in the big conference room, and the chairs are filled by people who don't have more than a glancing relationship with the work being presented, do yourself and your career a favor.

Instead of asking "What do you think?", ask something that'll do a lot less damage and might actually put you in everyones' good graces right from the get-go.

Something like, "Are those bagels for everyone?"

Are you the gatekeeper?

Once upon a time, when it came to getting into an agency, whether for a full time position or freelance, hopeful creative people sent their books (portfolio of their work in layman's terms) or promo piece (remember promo pieces?) to the creative director. That's because in a kindler, gentler industry, creative directors usually carved out some time - an hour or so a week - to go through books that'd been submitted.

They returned the ones they didn't want with a nice, brief thanks-but-no-thanks note. They called in the owners of the ones they liked for an interview or a meet-and-greet.

They were obviously the most qualified people to do this for a few reasons. For starters, they were creative people themselves. They understood what goes into coming up with an ad, the obstacles encountered in shaping and crafting it to make it great and the hurdles involved in getting it presented and produced. They spoke the language.

They were the first stop on the job tour.

Fast forward to today, where they're the last.

In today's fully-integrated agencies, with their manifestos on their websites, granola in the kitchen next to the Starbucks Via envelopes and planners offering their "insights," there's a position called Creative Resources Director. Or Creative Services Coordinator. Or Talent Relations Supervisor. Or Creative Concierge. However, that's not what they're called by the actual talent.

They're called gatekeepers.

These are the people who make or break you by getting you - or not - into the agency, and getting your work in front of the creative director.

Gatekeepers usually have the full trust and endorsement of the creative directors, even though most of them have never actually worked as a creative in a creative department. Yet there they are, judging on some criteria only they know which books get through and which don't. I imagine it's a carefully worked out formula of quality of work, reputation, freelance budget and have I had my coffee yet.

Gatekeepers, like creative directors (and freelancers), come in all flavors. There are absolutely great ones out there (like the ones at all the agencies where I work - you know who you are, and thank you). These are the ones that return your email, maintain a friendly attitude, negotiate a rate you're both happy with when they bring you in and let you down easy when they don't.

They keep the lines of communication open, and make it clear it's alright to check in every now and then to see what's going on.

Then there are the other kind of gatekeepers. They're what I like to call the meter maids of gatekeeping. They have a uniform so they think they're real policemen. But they're not.

Every creative person has or will run into one of these. They almost go out of their way not to have a relationship with the very people they will at some point want to work for them. They will never answer any emails, yet they will fully expect you to negotiate your day rate to the basement for them when they call you in two hours before they need you. They'll make sure you know how lucky you are they even considered you.

They'll check your availability, and then they'll never check back with you.

In the same way creative people establish reputations around town, so do the gatekeepers. It's well known in the freelance community who the great ones are, just like it's known who the um, less-than-great ones are. Like the French resistance, there actually is a freelance underground where the community has its ways of sharing their gatekeeper experiences with each other. It's a way of looking out for each other even if everyone's competing for the same jobs.

At the end of the day, gatekeepers are something you accept and work with. If they're the good ones - and I can't say this enough, like all the ones I work with - it's always a pleasure dealing with them. If they're the bad ones, you find the grace to muddle through while holding your ground.

By the way, if you happen to be a gatekeeper and you're reading this, you know the meter maid crack wasn't about you, right?