UILT products have always played a supporting role in
the lives of creative people. So when we had the
opportunity to make a short film for the 2012 Tribeca
Film Festival pre-show screenings, we let the most
creative artists, writers, and directors we know give BUILT its
star turn. New Yorkers Casey Spooner, one half of the
renowned art pop project Fischerspooner, and Adam Dugas,
the mastermind behind numerous NYC stage and film
productions, assembled a crew of eclectic downtown
performers for an epic 18-hour shoot. With a small budget
and zero rules, they created a hilarious—and sometimes
head-scratching—short that you can’t watch just once. Here,
the two explain the inspiration behind the most unconventional
bag ad you’ll ever see.
BUILT: “There Is No Tomorrow” is not your standard
pre-show fare. Tell us about the idea behind it.
CASEY: We wanted to make a short film that people would
enjoy watching over and over again. Something packed with
details so you’d see something new every time. We were
inspired by a Japanese commercial Richard Avedon made for
[fashion brand] Jun Ropé in 1973 with Lauren Hutton. I saw it
on a VHS archive reel in the '90s and I never stopped thinking
about it. It tells a fun and glamorous story about creating
a great fashion photo. We wanted to make something about
cinema similar to Avedon's fantastic narrative about fashion.
BUILT: It’s a pretty unexpected film coming from a bag
company. Why did you suggest this direction?
ADAM: It seemed like a smarter way of grabbing an
audience’s attention. I know that I glaze over at the movie
theater when an ad comes on. So the goal with this film is to
take people on a two-minute joyride, make them laugh, and
then point them to the bags. The bags are all over the film,
just not garishly.
BUILT: What’s the story behind the title?
ADAM: “There Is No Tomorrow” came up on the drafting
table and it stuck out to everyone involved. It feels like it
could be the title of a lost Douglas Sirk film. It’s actually a riff
on one of my personal mottos: “There is no LATER.” If you
think you need to do something, do it now.
BUILT: How did you come up with "The Hunchback Of Notre Dame" film-within-a-film concept?
ADAM DUGAS
CASEY SPOONER
