Wednesday Weblog for January 24, 2024 |
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Leading Off: The Real Thing |
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Since this story first appeared, dozens of new subscribers have joined the Wednesday Weblog team. This is one of the most popular blogs and I wanted to take the week off from preparing original material, so here it is again.
In the fall of 1979, my wife and I attended the very first regular season game that Larry Bird played for the Boston Celtics. When he was announced, a creative fan released a dove that flew around the old Boston Garden. Little did I know that less than six months later, I'd be with Larry Bird at a restaurant all night.
This story may not have any real leadership lessons. It may not be one of my best. It may not resonate with you. But it will always be a night I remember.
Some aspect of the evening wore off on me 44 years ago, although I'm not sure exactly what it was. I will tell you that Larry is as authentic in person as he appears on TV, and he doesn't go around thinking he is better than everyone else. He can also really eat.
I guess the thing that I thought about him then, and think about him now, is that he was and is a hard worker, and one of the reasons I say that is that the time we were up all night together must have tested him.
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My All-Nighter with Larry Bird |
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Most people old enough are familiar with the Larry Bird & Michael Jordan commercials for McDonald’s in the 80’s and 90’s but few people know where the inception of the ‘Showdown’ style spots began. You know, where did calling the shot and bouncing it off a building or a truck or anything else into a basket come from? I know, because I was there when it started, sort of.
In the famous TV spots, each all-star legend would shoot a basketball and bounce it off a building or a bridge, hit a sign, have it bounce twice and maybe hit a light pole, and then ‘swish’ through a basketball net. It started on a court, then they moved to the stands and bounced it off the scoreboard and it kept getting trickier. Basketball players recognize this activity as the game of HORSE. After calling and making the shot, they’d then challenge the other to match it. Eventually, they started on the top of a skyscraper and the shots always ended with a ‘swish.’
This is the story of Larry Bird’s very first TV commercial, because I was there. Not only that, my sister and my wife were in the commercial as two of the "extras."
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Larry’s first commercial took place in April of his rookie year in a McDonald’s near Fenway Park that is now the site of a 12 story multi-use building.
It started one day, in the winter of 1979, when the Operations Director for the franchisee I was with, Peter, came to the store and indicated that the advertising agency was going to use the store to film a commercial with Larry Bird, about to wrap up his first year with the Celtics, and already quite a celebrity in Boston.
Because it would be his first TV spot, everything had to be perfect. He was going to film the spot for a brand-new product: a McChicken Sandwich. Up to that time, believe it or not, McDonald’s had spent 25 years testing fried chicken, and it just didn’t catch on. The introduction of the McChicken was hoped to be the breakthrough product for the 5,000 stores in the system, to be tested in the New England market.
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Because I supervised the restaurant, my job was to find the extras, make sure the restaurant was clean, direct all non-union staff as needed, and then believe it or not, make sure that the HVAC and exhaust system was shut down for each filming sequence to avoid background sound. I guess I was an Assistant Producer, but no one called me that. Usually they just said ‘hey, Ed.’ The ad agency and the local operators were appreciative of the role I played.
Part of the assignment was easy: the full and part time managers of the store, including several college students, plus a sister and a wife would be the extras in the commercial. Nepotism? No, practical. My sister worked there, and we needed a Crew Person in uniform, and my wife was so beautiful, why wouldn’t I start her on the way to Hollywood?
The filming took place in the brand-new McDonald’s, close enough to Fenway Park that when they played the National Anthem at the Park, you could hear it in the dining room.
So, there I was for the first commercial and the first ‘bank if off the _____’ moment in McDonald’s/Larry Bird history. It took place about 3:30 in the morning, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
The restaurant closed at 4 PM for the shoot, and quickly filled up with the real nepotism crowd: friends of his agent, all kinds of marketing and McDonald’s brass. In the 160-seat restaurant, there were probably more than 100 hangers-on in the building. Lots of suits.
A Winnebago pulled up about 4:30 and that’s where Larry Bird would be hanging out between the takes.
Once all the lighting was set, the sound was checked and 12 freshly prepared new, never before seen, McChicken Sandwiches were ready, we shut down the HVAC fans and began shooting. Except, every time Larry Bird squeezed a sandwich to take a bite, the chicken slipped out due to the special sauce and lettuce on the caramelized bun.
For the rest of the night, we made a version of the McChicken Sandwich without sauce to prevent this squeeze-out, which looked bad on film. The sandwiches didn’t taste as good but looked better to the camera and the breaded chicken patty stayed between the bun halves.
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Lights, camera, action! “Larry Bird, what are you doing here?” Stop. Let’s do that again. “Larry Bird, what are you doing here?”
Cut. Let’s try that one more time. Before we were done, over a period of 6 or 7 hours, Larry had bites of dozens and dozens of McChicken Sandwiches. The damn actor hired for the customer part just couldn’t get it right. He was standing on a milk crate leaning over a half-wall staring at Larry Bird. Everyone appeared frustrated, but Larry stayed cool.
On each break, Larry would head to the trailer. And each time the filming started again, as it got later and later, the crowd of onlookers would get smaller and smaller.
By the time we had our union prescribed lunch break at 11:30 PM all of the big shots had gone home, and it was just Larry, the crew and the extras. (Including a six-year-old boy who was sleeping in a booth and who by law, should not have been in the building at that hour on a video shoot.)
Naturally on the break we served, what else, McChicken Sandwiches to the crew and extras and guess who took one? Yep, Larry Bird. I was impressed not only with the stamina of his digestive system, but by the fact that he was putting his mouth where his money was.
The other thing that impressed me about Larry Bird? Once the crowd of spectators left, he stopped using his trailer and just hung out with us in the restaurant dining room, shooting the breeze. That’s right, I sat next to Larry Bird and talked basketball at 1 o’clock in the morning.
Once the incompetent actor who took way too many takes to get “Larry Bird, what are you doing here?” was done with that single line to everyone’s satisfaction, the fun started. The rest of the filming consisted of Larry crumpling up the bag his sandwich came in, shooting it at the menu board, having it bounce off, hitting the top of the register, where my sister Susan looked surprised, and then landing in the hands of the six-year-old boy, who promptly slam dunked it into a trash receptacle.
That segment didn’t take too many tries, maybe only a half-dozen. When the director yelled ‘that’s a wrap’ (yes, they really did say that), everyone was free to leave.
That was right around 4:00 am and we all were tired and worn out, except the six-year-old kid who slept in a booth most of the night.
The thing I always remember about that night was the fact that Larry Bird ate a McChicken Sandwich on the break. After taking bites of dozens of them, made incorrectly for the camera, and many of them cold, he dug into a perfectly made hot, fresh one and finished it, sitting around a large table in the lobby with a bunch of McDonald’s employees, shooting the breeze. For some reason, that had a big impact on me.
He was taking the money to endorse a product and he apparently actually liked the product. In some ways my all nighter with Larry Bird mirrored his eventual hall of fame career: he led by example, was authentic, and did his best. What a great formula for the hall of fame and everyday leadership.
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The guy with the tie and mustache under the Golden Arches logo. |
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Surprise Photo at the End: Page 72 |
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Joe's Positive Post of the Week |
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The Roll Call of states and countries where readers reside: Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Washington DC, Wisconsin plus Canada, Spain, Conch Republic, Australia and the United Kingdom |
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Ed Doherty
774-479-8831 www.ambroselanden.com
ed-doherty@outlook.com
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