Trunk Monkey - "Baby"

The second Trunk Monkey commercial I directed. The dude in the spot hadn't really been it too many commercials before this. After ... more >

The second Trunk Monkey commercial I directed. The dude in the spot hadn't really been it too many commercials before this. After this one he seemed to kinda blow up. I'd like to think maybe I helped that. There's one shot that I will always remember shooting - you see the monkey open the car door - the woman looks to the guy and he just kind of smiles and shrugs...The agency wanted the guy to say something in this shot. Something like "It's okay, he's a doctor.." or something..anyway, we tried so many lines - so many takes. At around take 19 or 20, I was going out of my mind. Nothing was working. It was starting to get dark and we needed to hurry the fuck up. Then I thought of it - Fletch. I asked the actor if he'd seen "Fletch" He looked at me like I was and idiot. "Of course I've seen Fletch. Who hasn't?" So I told him to think about Fletch and to not say any words in the next take. He nailed it. That take was the last shot of the day and it's the one that is in the spot. I guess this is important to me because Flecth is important to me. < less