MEERKAT MOVIES
Compare the Market wanted to make a big new ad for their Meerkat Movies promotion. ‘We want an A-list movie star!’ they said. ‘Budget’s not a problem!’ they said. ‘Perhaps use Leonardo Di Caprio?’ they said. So we came back with an idea that involved a Scouse baker who’d never made a film in his life. ‘It’s great… but can’t we use Leonardo Di Caprio?’, they said.
‘Nah…’ we said and made them a TV and cinema ad featuring the biggest ‘Hollywood’ star around… Paul Hollywood.
… and a cheeky 10’ for good measure.
We hoped for some real world PR, but it got even more than we bargained for, with the tabloids getting wind of Paul’s new role long before the cameras had started rolling. The Sun even did us the favour of getting things wildly wrong to comical effect. How nice of them…
When the cameras did start rolling a while later, little did we know we were being snapped on set by sneaky photographers and within days of the shoot ‘Mr Hollywood’ was all over the papers again…
And when the ad was finally released the Sun and The Mirror went live with a ‘Shocking’ exclusive…
While we made some stupid special builds and stuck them up in London and Manchester…
Then, after everything had gone live and the dust had settled we caught up with our big star again for an exclusive interview about all things Hollywood. It went really well…