Mercury Rising: The Cosmopolitan
IDEA
When the Cosmopolitan Hotel of Las Vegas is on the phone, you take the call. The new CMO happened to be a long-time client/friend and asked if I’d work with them on a project creating new lifestyle content for the property. We would be working directly with the brand, as opposed to an agency, and were being entrusted with heading up the creative vision for the project. I was excited and honored to have a voice be at the table.
PRE-PRODUCTION
Being familiar with the Las Vegas marketplace gave us an advantage. Although the client was really only interested in stills initially, we worked video into the shoot as well. I figured we'd be spending so much money on talent and styling we should leverage the production as much as we could. Following three days of casting in London and LA to find just the right looks, we had choices to make. We brought on an amazing wardrobe stylist to pull the visual story together. We had a very rare, exciting and slightly stressful “blank canvas” in front of us. The concept deck we created was over a hundred pages and the team was having trouble narrowing it down far enough so the decision was made to start with a very loose, ambitious script. We broke the production up into two trips so we would have time to take a breath and adjust if need be between the two shoots. I hand-picked our production crew and made sure we had a true dream team on this one.
To ensure we were covered and to appease all the players we opted to do shoot two versions of a lot of the scenes — a racier one and one that was slightly toned down. We needed to find that ideal middle ground, so as not to alienate the Cosmo's core audience, yet still keeping it sexy and provocative enough to captivate the new viewer and pique their interest as well. At the end of the first day, we gave the client a preview of the video and how it was bringing the brand to life. It was a game changer. He loved what he saw and it furthered his confidence in us to deliver the right solution.
RESULT
The final pieces are alluring and visually stunning. The work has a fashion-forward edge with the live action footage taking it to a whole other level with sensual slow motion that gives the brand extra sex appeal.
By pulling all the right pieces together — from the talent to the styling to the vision for every shot — we were able to create a inviting story for the Cosmo that virtually sells itself. By thinking through what was in the best interest of the client and delivering beyond their wildest expectations, we helped to keep the Cosmopolitan in the forefront of people's ideas of what a Las Vegas property is.
