"Fletcher's Drive" is the latest entry in AT&T's "It Can Wait" campaign, which warns against texting, web-surfing, emailing and other forms of potentially dangerous smartphone use while driving. ESPN CreativeWorks, the cable network's in-house agency, crafted the six-minute film, which focuses on former high-school football star Fletcher Cleaves. Six years ago, as Cleaves was preparing to attend Lambuth University on a gridiron scholarship, his life was tragically altered when he was paralyzed from the chest down as the result of an automobile crash.
"All I saw was the glow from the phone on the other driver's face," he says in the video.
It's a chilling detail in a production that follows Cleaves via home-movie footage and re-enactments through a physical rehabilitation process far more agonizing—both physically and emotionally—than the hits he absorbed on the playing field. At one point, his father lifts him out of a wheelchair and carries him into a van, a profound contrast to pre-crash footage of the young man catching and carrying the football as a member of Memphis' Cordova High School Wolfpack.
"Fletcher's Drive" takes a more straightforward road to its destination than the campaign's last lauded short film from BBDO, which showed a brutal crash in reverse. That said, this new PSA is no less riveting and succeeds at conveying its heartfelt message.
The story ends on a hopeful note—Cleaves recently graduated from college and now lives on his own. Even so, director Miles Jay's subdued approach, with muted colors and a melancholy soundtrack, reminds viewers how much can be lost and how devastatingly lives can change, forever, in the instant it takes for a driver to check his or her phone.
CREDITS
Client: AT&T
Agency: ESPN CreativeWorks
Writer/Producer: Ata Movassaghi
Creative Director: Jay Marrotte
Account Director: Christina Carey-Dunleavy
Vice President: Carrie Brzezinski
Production Company: Smuggler
Executive Producers: Patrick Milling Smith, Brian Carmody, Allison Kunzman
Producer: Erin Wile
Director: Miles Jay
DP: Jason McCormick
Editorial: WORK
Editor: Ben Jordan
Executive Producer: Erica Thompson
Senior Producer: Sari Resnick
Assistant Editor: Adam Witten
Music: Rob Simonsen, Composer
Produced by: Rob Simonsen and Taylor Lipari-Hassett
VFX: ArtJail
Executive Creative Director: Steve Mottershead
Head of Production: John Skeffington
Compositor: Joey Deady
Compositor: Ben Vaccaro
Sound Design & Mix: Barking Owl
Sound Designer: Michael Anastasi
Creative Director: Kelly Bayett
Associate Producer: KC Dossett
Mixer: Patrick Navarre
Color Grade: Company 3
Senior Colorist: Tom Poole
Producer: Clare Movshon
Online/Finishing: Blacksmith
Flame Artist: Iwan Zwarts
Executive Producer: Charlotte Arnold
