Wednesday 8 December 2010, 14:03
Here is a lovely documentary made in 1969 about that year's Christmas office party at a London advertising agency.
I've used shots from it in the past - but I've always loved it as a film - so I thought I would put it up.
It tells the story of the preparations as well as the party - and it beautifully captures the mood that Christmas parties always create in offices.
The firm is called Davidson Pearce Berry and Tuck. I did a bit of research on them and it turns out that the film also captures them at a fascinating moment of change.
The original agency had been around for years and had always done very straight Industrial advertising in trade magazines - aimed at buyers. Their biggest clients were firms like Colt Heating and Ventilation, Wates the builders, and Holman Compressed Air.
Not boutique.
But recently two very ambitious young advertising men had joined. One was called Norman Berry - who had come from Young and Rubicam, the other was called Allan Rich.
They were determined to turn the agency into what Mr Rich describes as "a sexy boutique agency". They were modelling themselves on the new kinds of American agencies that people like Mary Wells had set up in New York.
And they had just scored a great success. The firm had got the account of the Conservative Party and its new modern leader Edward Heath. They were going to do the advertising for the 1970 General Election.
Saatchi before Saatchi.
And they were changing the firm radically. The old patrician world of British advertising was being dismantled and by now much of it had gone from the agency.
The only real remnant of that old world in the film is Mary Crowley from Accounts (along with her unnamed friend from Wages). I love Mary Crowley, she is like a ghost from an older Britain haunting the new "on-trend" flash agency.
But that new world wouldn't last long. The firm would succeed with helping Edward Heath get elected. But very soon an economic crisis would hit Britain - and advertising too.
The firm was bought by the giant US agency, Ogilvy and Mather, and Norman Berry went off to America. And the old agency just faded away.
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Tuesday 16 November 2010, 16:53
Friday 17 December 2010, 13:47
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Comment number 1.
William Arveschoug8th December 2010 - 21:17
Here is yet another rehashing of my work.
Just pulling your leg, the work is always of a high standard & it's useful to have the primary sources up here.
Another televised film would be even better though. I caught some of The Foods That Make Billions which is currently on the BBC & couldn't help noticing the difference in the sources they used. They were getting authors and PR men for their talking heads, as opposed to CEOs and MPs. Was quite sensationalist and inaccurate too. Anyway that's another matter!
Thanks,
-Will
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Comment number 2.
Phil C9th December 2010 - 0:25
Where are they now...
Norman Berry died in March this year:
http://www.ogilvy.com/News/Press-Releases/March-2010_Norman-Berry-Memoriam.aspx
Amongst other things Allan Rich is now in to digital signage it appears:
http://www.espritdigital.com/whoAreEsprit/boardDirectors/
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Comment number 3.
egbert_the_atheist9th December 2010 - 2:41
A party only has one function: to regulate the need for men and women to form relationships. Of course, it's a conceit when dressed up any other way, but it's fascinating to watch and even re-live some of the inadequacies and problems when humans attempt to change one conceited social order for another conceited social order. Everything is regulated and controlled, even cathartic loss of control.
But what I found fascinating about the documentary were the women. I felt a pang of sorrow for some and felt the joy of others, as they sought out human contact. A party is perhaps one of the few human things that go on in an office.
Nice to see the origin of a few scenes from Mr Curtis's other projects. Thanks for sharing this gem with us.
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Comment number 4.
bengoldacre9th December 2010 - 14:01
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2010/12/the_office_party.html
I'm a bit sad about the Ted Heath story, but only because I always enjoyed the one in Jeremy Scott's book "Fast And Louche", where he describes how his firm won the same advertising contract for the Conservative party by spiking Heath and his entourage with small, enthusiasm-generating doses of amphetamine.
It's one of the greatest books ever published - a true roadmap for life - I can't find the relevant section online but here is Scott telling the same story to the Guardian in 2002:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2002/oct/09/redbox
* It is not, he insists, the part of his memoirs that he likes the best. But Jeremy Scott's tale of how, as a vogueish advertising executive, he spiked Edward Heath's canapes with speed, is indeed a high-carat anecdote. "I was really just trying to cheer everyone up," he adds sheepishly. "The quantities I used were minute."
* In the spring of 1970, Scott's agency, the Mayfair-based James Garrett and Partners, was pitching for the Conservative Party's TV campaign for the forthcoming general election. Heath, Willie Whitelaw and entourage were invited to a presentation at the company's offices. Scott served a dry and flinty Chablis, canapes from Fortnum's, and methedrine, "the Perrier-Joüet of amphetamines".
* "The slight hint of bitterness seemed actually to enhance the rich flavour of the foie gras, introducing a certain je ne sais quoi, hard to define in terms of taste yet magical, historic," Scott writes in his book Fast and Louche: Confessions of a Flagrant Sinner. He kept a stock of the 10mg pills in a trunk under his old nanny's bed, along with his Colt .45 and revolver. He had laid down a bottle of 500 tablets in 1966 just before they had become unobtainable when Burroughs Wellcome ceased to manufacture.
* Did it not occur to him that there was anything remotely controversial about his action? "Clearly, but there were many parties that one went to at that time where one started to feel unusually well about an hour later, and it did seemed to have rather a beneficial effect." The quantities were tiny, he re-iterates, although flecks of spittle did begin to show at the corners of Heath's mouth as the meeting progressed. The guests left flush-faced and exhilarated, launched, Scott believes, on a month-long high which would last until election night. His agency won the account, and six weeks later Heath won the election. "It was," he notes with satisfaction, "a very good party."
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Comment number 5.
JT10th December 2010 - 8:12
That is a great little film. The film is of it's time but the behaviour is timeless and universal. Thanks for the seasonal posting.
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Comments 5 of 23