MLA ad ‘one of the proudest moments of my life and career’, says director Paul Middleditch
Paul Middleditch, the director behind Meat & Livestock Australia’s Australia Day ad, has told Mumbrella creating the campaign is among the proudest moments of his life.
The ad from creative agency The Monkeys features a barbecue on a beach led by three Indigenous Australians who are joined by European settlers as it becomes a huge party.
Timed for January 26, but avoiding use of the phrase “Australia Day”, the work is arguably Australia’s biggest ever ad campaign with multiculturalism as the central message.
What a great agency and brave client. My hats off to all. Bloody fucking awesome.
I think the ad is sheer genius and Paul and his team are right to be very proud of it. “Trying to put a date or a day to define us as a culture and a people is a very limiting thing.” ~ brilliant.
It’s great work – you should be proud. Congrats to you and your team!
Good ad. I mean, you’re exploiting the near-genocide of a people in order to sell meat to future sufferers of colon cancer, but sure, tell the kiddies. http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyl.....tq9ey.html
Well, I’m prepared to put my hand up and say ‘nicely done’ to the team at MLA, Monkeys and Plaza. I have been speaking up about diversity in our marketing comms and this has been respectfully done and is timely. Let’s hope it sets a tone for more inclusion and respect.
Middleditch said when sitting down with The Monkeys’ creative leadership of Grant Rutherford, Scott Nowell and Mike Burdick, “tone” was a key area of discussion. Perhaps they got some ideas about tone by watching the Kosta Nikas short film ‘Boat People’ on YouTube, SBS on demand and NITV?
Leadership from the most unexpected places. Awesome work Monkeys, Middleditch and MLA.
We’ve had a lack of political leaders laying down a positive and inclusive vision of history building on the great things. It’s sad that it took a brand to do it.
I’d love an Australia wehre a political party ran a campaign like this with policy to back it up. I’d be all over them.
As wonderful as this ad is as a satire on Australian society I wonder why no one is talking about the product itself, not even the director mentions it. Seems to have rather got lost in heaps of self congratulation.
And finally I would ask if lamb farmers themselves will feel as supportive of this view of Australia, its political perspective on refugees, multiculturalism and the dropping of Australia Day.
You ignore the perspectives of your key stakeholders at your peril. Watch this space.
James – agree with your first point completely. It’s a great ad but all the coverage and back-patting is a bit over the top. And no-one is even talking about how good the product is. Fact check; did our first nations people even eat lamb? I didn’t know sheep were a native animal.
On your second point; you are painting a pretty bad stereotype of how people perceive Australian farmers and their perspectives on a wide range of issues.
Finally, I don’t think MLA / The Monkey’s etc are exactly ground breaking in using a multicultural cast in their advertising. Plenty of brands have featured a wide range of ethnicities and orientations in their ads before this, they just don’t go to such lengths to point to out, but I suppose that’s to do with the context of the advertising also – probably more-so than the product they are flogging.
as above
I love this. And I’m a sheep farmer and in media land…weird but true.
It truly is epic.
Best ad ever. Well done to all involved.
Great Content! Best I’ve seen for a while.
HT
A fantastic piece of work and a continuation of great branding. Simply great advertising. MLA creating a legacy of creative work
Doesn’t the 2017 Australia Day Lamb ad look familiar to you?
Industry magazine Film ink think so.
https://filmink.com.au/2017/doesnt-the-2017-australia-day-lamb-ad-look-familiar-to-you/
What do you think Peters?
I mostly like the lyrics of the background music in the end: what is love, baby don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me, anymore…
Is it a reference to the stolen generation?
This ad doesn’t address divevrisity in any way. It only shows how ignorant australian people are overall. If people knew better, they would be offended.
Thanks for rewriting history. I think the brief was: let’s try to do something more controversial than last year without the risk of having it taken offline. You know what? Let’s not mention ‘Australia day’ that’ll do…