Australia & New Zealand Special: Fiona McGee

Sydney-based Goodoil Films director Fiona McGee has a talent for bringing out the awkward black humour in everyday encounters, cutting out the waffle and usual bullshit – which comes in handy when helming award-winning spots. It also helps her stay sane, she tells Carine Buncsi, when faced with yet another script for female hygiene

More beer. More cars. And fewer tampons. That’s what Fiona McGee would like to see when it comes to the scripts landing on her desk. This kind of casual gender stereotyping could make a modern woman weep, but McGee and her fellow female directors treat it as a running joke instead. “We say we get sent each and every feminine hygiene product and nappy spot ever written,” quips the Sydney native, revealing the dry, offbeat humour that’s become her stock in trade.

McGee’s career path into commercials is an interesting one, encompassing arts, advertising and documentary making. As a youngster, she had an inquisitive mind, a keen eye for human behaviour and a general desire to create: when she wasn’t capturing funny moments with her pals on her trusty Sony Hi8 camcorder, she was dreaming up fanciful product designs: “I wanted to design and build swimming pools for my toys. Who knows, perhaps after this comedy director gig, that’s something I’ll go back to later in life – but for fully-grown humans.”

Continuing to dabble in film while studying at Sydney’s prestigious College of Fine Arts, McGee got a gig as a runner for Cherub Pictures in the early 2000s. There, she came across director Vikki Blanche, whose work piqued her interest in commercial craft. “[Vikki] had a completely unique and authentic point of view,” McGee recalls. “From that moment on, I realised there was an opportunity to do something really different in advertising.”

That lightbulb moment led to McGee enrolling on the course offered by Australian advertising association AWARD, though she continued to make documentaries and shorts, inspired by the documentaries of Errol Morris, Lars von Trier’s Breaking The Waves, and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights. A two-year stint in London followed, working as a creative-cum-director and shooting spots for MTV and Nickelodeon, but the sunny climes of Oz soon lured her back Down Under and into full-time commercials directing.

Since signing to Goodoil Films in 2009, McGee has cemented her status as one of Australia’s foremost comedy directors, thanks to her willingness to embrace the awkward reality of the human condition. “Usually the comedy scripts I receive are dialogue-based. I look for a sense of newness to bring to the piece and unravel its authentic, awkward humour,” she explains.

“I particularly love awkward silences and bringing real life to commercials. Observing humans, finding the beauty and black humour in everyday life. So often commercials are over-glossy, full of bullshit and waffle. Australia and NZ have a strong ad industry but we tend to repeat the same gags and ideas again and again.”

A lack of originality isn’t an accusation that can be levelled at McGee’s standout body of work, which includes: the 2011 bronze Lion-winning spot for Selleys 3 In 1 – part of the DIY store’s Do It Yourself campaign, which illustrated the pitfalls of letting a hunky handyman into your home; The Advisors for CarAdvice, showing the lengths to which the magazine’s journalists go to test the latest autos; and ING Direct’s recent, brilliant Monologue and Shout Out, featuring the comic talents of ex-Home And Away actress Isla Fisher.

Working on the multi-million-dollar ING Direct campaign was a big deal for McGee, who directed the spots in LA. Not only was it “a blast” working with Fisher – who plays a slightly deranged version of herself as the bank’s reluctant celebrity ambassador – McGee had a pinch-yourself moment when Fisher’s husband, comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, sat beside her on set. “During takes, Sacha was in total dad mode with the kids,” McGee says, “but I kept thinking – what’s happening here, could this all go pear-shaped, is he going to come up with a new idea?”

Getting serious for a moment

She was also fortunate enough to work with one of her heroes, Steadicam operator Andy Shuttleworth, who was responsible for the incredible long takes in Boogie Nights. “I was more excited about working with him than any LA celebrity sighting – apart from Christopher Walken and his cat, of course,” she laughs.

It’s all much more glamorous than the diaper ads that agencies keep sending her. Does she ever get fed up with the ad industry’s entrenched gender norms? From a personal perspective, McGee says sexism has never held her back: “There’s never been a focus on whether I’m a female or not. I haven’t really delved into that conversation too often.” However, she’s well aware of the industry’s shortcomings. “It probably needs to be braver at times and represent more diversity, whether it’s females directing or in the casting of characters. It’s so boring seeing yet another woman wearing chinos in the kitchen.” Fiona McGee: serious when it counts.