Michael Gracey

Basking in triple-top-spot glory, the T-Mobile-mass-dance-and-karaoke-Evian-skating-baby man could be forgiven for being a bit puffed up right now. But Danny Edwards finds in Gracey a modest Melbournite who puts it all down to collaboration

What's the current definition of a good year? No parking tickets? Realising that while you may have swine flu, it's not that bad and you aren't going to die after all? At the moment, still having a job probably ranks pretty highly, too. Well, to you and me those things might amount to a 12-month period to be proud of, but Michael Gracey takes the average year, raises the odds and comes out with a royal flush worthy of a 365-day winning streak.

Having three of the most successful spots of the year, one of them an online phenomenon, plus winning a gold Lion at Cannes as well as beginning work on his first Broadway production, means that the 33-year-old Gracey should really be bathing in a tub of triumph that itself rests on a layer of laurels. But this Melbourne native, while wholly appreciative of his achievements, is as far from the stereotype of the vain, self-centred, directorial ego as is possible to get. "You're completely at the mercy of the talent that's in front of you," states Gracey. "That's why I always have such an amazing degree of respect for the people I collaborate with. They're such a huge part of whether something is a success or a failure."

But failure's a word that has been missing from the Gracey lexicon for some time now. 2009 has been a good year; it started in January with T-Mobile's feel-good, foot-tapping Dance spot, segued into the Trafalgar Square-set sequel, Sing-along, before resting on Evian's Rollerbabies, which has so far amassed more than 27 million internet hits (and counting) in a two-month period. "Yeah, it's been a pretty good year so far," comments Gracey with a contender for understatement of the decade.

Gracey seems to be a prime example of someone who's worked diligently for years to become an overnight success. 2009 has certainly been his tipping point but having been involved in the industry for 15 years means there's a whole lot of blood, sweat and tears that have contributed to his triumph. Gracey's father was one of the original developers of Flame software, so he was exposed to the digital world from an early age. Starting off, at just 18, as an animator at Australian post house Animal Logic, Gracey says that he was drawn to animation due to his love of performance. His mother's love for musical theatre and dance also rubbed off on him and dovetailed perfectly with the animation gene. "The art of animation," he states, "is the study of motion and there's no better example of people who have studied the art of motion than dancers."

It was after leaving Animal Logic to work with Peter Webb - "the guru of digital compositing" - at Complete Post that Gracey met and began working with Baz Luhrmann. "Peter had been the visual effects supervisor on Romeo + Juliet," Gracey explains, "and I started working with him just after he'd done that, which is when I met Baz. The work I was doing was sort of coming from this weird place because I could do animation and digital compositing but everything had this theatrical feel to it." Luhrmann, no stranger to theatrics himself, saw what Gracey was doing and invited him to work on his next project, Moulin Rouge. "We worked on what we called 'visual scrapbooks'," continues Gracey. "Baz would shoot some footage of Nicole Kidman singing or something and we'd do little mock-ups, and cut mood reels together."

While working at Complete Post Gracey also met another Peter who was, and still is, a huge influence on his career, Peter Cummins. Gracey describes him as "the quiet guy in the corner", who is equally at home with a pen and piece of paper as he is with complex post-equipment. "He always wanted to be a comic-book artist so there are pages and pages of these incredible designs, but what he's best at is story," explains Gracey. "I've worked with some incredibly talented people but no one comes close to Peter." While Gracey is quick to credit his top-and-tail partner - "he's there at the conceptual stage and the post stage" - it certainly shouldn't detract from Gracey's own achievements.

He says that while directing wasn't necessarily a burning passion when he was younger, story-telling definitely was and that did indeed manifest itself in a childhood behind the lens. "I used to shoot films with a friend of mine," Gracey starts. "I was about 14-years-old and I was like a tyrant. I would have call times at the park for a fight scene at, like, six in the morning because I wanted the sun coming up behind the shot. Of course, no one showed up and I'd be there, in the dark, at six in the morning just fuming. By the time everyone showed up it was noon and other kids had started playing in the playground, which would make me even madder," Gracey laughs. "I think I'm a much better director now because I got it all out of my system when I was 14."

It was while working at Complete Post that Gracey got back behind the camera to helm a music video. A friend's band needed a promo for no money, so Gracey pulled in post-production favours from "everyone I knew" and the resulting video for 1200 Techniques' Karma saw him, as an unsigned director, pick up that year's Aria award at the national music awards show. That was in 2002 and he hasn't looked back since.

Next up was a smart bit of sibling strategy that culminated in Gracey shooting a promo for UK pop act, Sugababes. "That was thanks to my sister," Gracey smiles, "she's in music management and there's no way anyone could have convinced a successful British pop act to shoot in Australia with a guy who'd only done one puppet-based video clip." The resultant video meant that Gracey ended up signing with Partizan for directorial representation everywhere except Australia, New Zealand and Asia where he's repped by Prodigy.

Fast forward a few years to 2009 and, with a successful career already established, things got even rosier for Gracey when he was brought onto T-Mobile's Dance campaign at a very early stage by Rick Dodds and Steve Howell at Saatchi's London. Gracey likened the idea to one of his favourite scenes in Terry Gilliam's The Fisher King. "I love the idea that you can look around the world and see the theatre of life," Gracey says. "See the magical and imaginative happening every day, even in the mundane."

Dance was a massive job that involved huge planning and not a small amount of worry. "I'd gone to Liverpool Street station and everyone was just so sad, looking at the ground and not at each other and I thought, 'no one's going to be dancing'." In the end though, the Brits defied expectation. "It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen and people's responses were amazing," Gracey continues. "There was footage we couldn't use because it looked too set up. A guy came along on crutches and threw them in the air and just started dancing."

Before going on to win a gold Lion at Cannes this year, Saatchi's and Gracey embarked on Sing-along, Dance's 'sequel', the 13,000-strong, open-air karaoke session set in Trafalgar Square. "Michael's love of dance and experience of directing musical-style ads made us want to talk to him. He's also worked on directing live shows, so when it came to making Sing-along, after Dance, it just had to be Michael," says Dodds. Was there much concern about following up the success of Dance? "It was the second album syndrome," says Gracey. "Even though they sound similar - one's dancing and one's singing - Dance was a spontaneous event where no one knew they were being filmed.

I was really intrigued by what would happen in Sing-along because everyone knew what they were there for and it just became this thing of playing to camera. I had a harder time with it because even when people were being genuine, the moment the camera was on them they would just scream. It got to the point where I had to tell the crew to stop putting people up on the big screen. I didn't think there would be that level of sheer aggression to be in front of the camera. It was crazy! I said to someone afterwards that in the outtakes I could cut the most amazing zombie film. But the actual film itself, the moment where the crowd's all singing a Beatles song, that was special."

Next up for Gracey was Evian's Rollerbabies. Changing tack and going from huge, theatrical scripts to the intricacies of a heavily post-led spot is, says Gracey, something he revels in; "I love going from animation to film to theatre and I think the strength of the work I do is based around the fact that I can draw on those three worlds." Marking a hat-trick of amazingly successful spots, Rollerbabies was a huge campaign in a different way to T-Mobile. Three months in post, it required a whole lotta babies - "standing on set with around 140 babies," reveals Gracey, "is the best form of contraception in the world."

Gracey is currently working on a Broadway musical about speed-dating called Fast Love, which will hopefully open at the end of 2010. That's between other commercial projects. Does he ever rest? "Each project is like relaxation from the other project," he says. "It just takes your head out to a different space and that's relaxing."

Whether he's on set with multiple babies, corralling the public in Trafalgar Square or auditioning speed-daters in New York, Gracey is passionate about his work. Howell at Saatchi describes him having "an infectious energy; if he's into it, he's completely into it and that rubs off on the people involved. He's got really strong ideas but he also really listens." Gracey's quick to state that he's simply heading up a talented pool of people. "Directing for me is like conducting. You're the conductor, and if it's a little too fast, people don't understand it, if it's a little too slow, people are bored. You've got to get everything to happen right on time and you've got to give people what they need when they need it," he concludes. So far, so good.