Elliott Lester directs choose-your-own-adventure video for energy drink
Remember your beloved choose-your-own-adventure books from elementary school? A new online campaign produced by Toronto’s The Hive for client Nos Energy Drink (a part of Coca-Cola’s portfolio) has taken the interactive concept and used it for its latest online entertainment venture.
At the core of the campaign is a cheeky short film called Have a Nos Day that follows a day in the life of “Nick,” as decided by the viewer.
When he’s late for work, for example, should Nick borrow his buddy’s longboard or join a group of, umm, “eligible” ladies waiting for the bus? That’s for viewers to choose (clicking on either half of a split screen that appears at the end of each scenario).
“We wanted to have [Nick’s] day progressively need energy based on what he was doing,” said Ren Olivieri, creative director at The Hive. “There were lots of ideas floating around, but the ones we selected for the vignettes in each of the scenarios were realistic enough… Everything he’s doing is possible. It’s not as though Nick becomes a superhero or learns how to fly.” After a beat, Olivieri laughingly added, “Oh, that’s a dig and was totally subconscious,” referring to the competing “Red Bull Gives you Wings” campaign.
Even though the team wanted to communicate that “this is pretty strong stuff,” Olivieri said there’s a lot of paranoia around energy drinks in general. “People are over-consuming [energy drinks] and that’s something that we had to be conscious of going in. We made sure our hero wasn’t over-consuming.”
In a coup, The Hive scored Elliott Lester to direct the short film. In addition to directing tons of music videos and commercials, Lester recently directed Jason Statham of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels fame in the action flick Blitz.
“We sent the treatment out to production houses and when [Lester] came back, I thought, ‘This is too good to be true,’” says Olivieri. “His aesthetic is phenomenal.”
The Nos film was shot in L.A. over three days with two crews and more than 100 set-ups each day. Mike Smith did all the stunt coordination, and Lester oversaw the whole shoot.
This film isn’t the first time Nos has entered the digital content space. Last year, The Hive made a four-week reality series for Nos that saw three dudes outfit golf carts with 600cc motorcycle engines within a 24-hour time limit. The reward? Racing the supercharged carts around an abandoned track.
“This year we wanted to stay within that world of entertainment, but I wanted to make a film,” said Olivieri, “and give the consumers the opportunity to choose what the hero should do next in his day. We talked about POV cameras through the whole thing, but thought this would be more entertaining and more like a film.”
A YouTube takeover campaign will take place on Aug. 24 across Canada. Consumers will also be offered a one-day-only online coupon that they can use at Mac’s, Couche-Tard or Circle K retail stores to pick up a 49-cent, 650-milliletre bottle of Nos Energy Drink.
Universal McCann handled the media buy for the campaign.
