Bombol Comedy Club. Behind the scene #1: the concept
Here two of the 12 comedy videos I wrote and directed for Bombol social media campaign.
The concept
For their social media branding campaign, Bombol, a company specialized in innovative juvenile products, wanted to break with traditional advertising's portraits of family life; the ones where kids are quiet little lords and parenting seems effortless. These telegenic, perfect families don't exist: Bombol aimed to create a bond with the audience by telling it as it is. Admitting that raising kids can be hard, messy, chaotic, exhausting. And one day we will all laugh about it... wait, actually, we can start today! "Stay Sparky!" is the company motto, as in: be the happy person your children will love.
As a parent and comedy expert, I immediately tuned in that idea: Bombol wanted wanted to show, like Matt Groening would say, parenthood in all its beauty and all its horror. And I would use my personal and professional experience to help them realize that vision.
With that premise, it came natural the idea to produce stand-up comedy videos: nothing better than a comedian to highlight the everyday challenges and idiosyncrasies of raising young kids.
The themes
We felt there was a huge potential in that subject and I started writing down some ideas generators and promising topics on which to work.
I thought there was great comic potential in: the contrast between our unrealistic, but oh so sweet, expectations on parenting, from films and social media, and the cruel reality; the contrast between our life before and after the kids, applied to specific situations to mine all possible comic details (holidays, Sunday brunch, movie time...); adults difficulty to understand kids, their priorities and thought process often resulting completely alien to us; using exaggeration to turn the everyday difficulties with kids into battles of epic proportions, so that feeding them, having adult conversation, taking a shower become heroic challenges.
At the time, Bombol's leading product was the Bamboo Bouncer, a stylish, flexible aluminium lounge chair very responsive to kids movements. So I figured we could focus on topics related to that, like kids relentless energy and their impossibility to sit still, their love of bouncing, jumping, climbing. Plus the expensive, noisy, flashy, hard-to-assemble-easy-to-break baby furniture that transforms overnight your house into a cheap, brightly colored, plasticky playroom.
Bonus fun themes: the endless negotiations, children' predilection for breaking (our) things, their tendency to lick stuff, their ability to scream at the top of their lungs... for hours.
Last but not least, I thought it was important to strike the right tone: push situations to the limits and boldly go where no commercial has gone before but never be cynical, depressed, bitter. It should always be clear in the comedy bit that we love our kids with all our heart... despite all the trouble they bring in our life. Underlying all those funny situations, in fact, is the biggest comic incongruity of all: the fact that these tiny people make our life hell and yet we love them so much. That had to be the foundation of Bombol videos project.
Writer, director (on set & post-production), producer.
12 comedy videos
Bombol ltd.
Hong Kong, 2017