Andy Fackrell on Basketball and The Boroughs

Andy Fackrell, executive creative director and writer for Dynamo Auckland, has a life-long passion for basketball, and when New Zealand telecommunications company, Spark NZ, wanted to connect with New Zealand kids in a more constructive and interesting way, the scene was set for an inspired campaign.

The Boroughs sees Auckland sectioned, like New York, into five boroughs. Within these NZ boroughs Spark are building new, hi-tech basketball courts which are paired with famous courts in NY - Rucker Park, The Cage, The Hole, Venice Beach and Downtown OKC - and stylish, short documentaries were then made of each court to explain the attributes needed to be a successful player. 

Below, Fackrell explains the source of inspiration for the campaign and how it all came together. 

There I was being humiliated on basketball’s biggest blog, Dime, by Oklahoma City Thunder’s seven-foot-tell starting center [below]. 140,000 people have seen the viral clip headlined “Steven Adams Schools Middle Aged Man.” My biggest basketball moment was not supposed to look like this.

The Boroughs campaign for Spark NZ, flickered into life a year earlier, with an email to my buddy and basketball scout/producer/agent Nigel Miguel, whom I hadn’t heard from in ten plus years. Nigel had secured talent for my Nike basketball campaigns, The Funk and Play: Tailgating.

A 19 year-old kid from New Zealand had just been drafted at Number 12 in the NBA. I hadn’t heard much about him, except that it was (double Olympic Gold medalist shot putter) Valerie Adams’ ‘little’ brother. Nice genes.

Me: “Nigel. What’s this kid Steven Adams like?”

Nigel: “Andy, this kid is gonna be a superstar. And he’s a really good kid. Oh, and I’m his agent. Call me.”

Anyway it turns out Steven is a great kid, an amazing young man, that not only was about to start his pro career as a rookie for one of the NBA’s premier teams, but wanted to help other kids come through and get given a chance like he did, through a coach in NZ named Kenny McFadden.

The other thing to mention is that my father, a 1950’s English international who got me into the game at age nine, did the same thing as Kenny, pulling kids out of gangs, or out of malls and onto the basketball court (one played for Australia, one for New Zealand). Oh, and Dad also helped build courts in New Zealand, as well as tirelessly coach me to a non-descript career.

This campaign then, goes back decades. Steven and Kenny wanted something that was not just an endorsement campaign for Steven, but an idea that told the amazing benefits of basketball as a community and character-builder. My dad’s mantra that I’d heard all my life.

It all seemed to fall together pretty quickly, as Spark also wanted something more than just some TV ads to run for a month and be forgotten. They wanted substance and content. And connection to Auckland’s kids, who massively love the game, contrary to the established view that anyone there only cares about rugby. In fact, their feet are in Papatoetoe (that’s in South Auckland) but their heads are in Rucker Park (that’s in Harlem). So street ball, pick up basketball, was the way in.

Spark, being NZ’s biggest telecoms company, could provide the tech side to make it relevant to kids and provide the social connectivity to get kids outside and onto the blacktop (that’s onto the court). 

So, Nigel did his magic and eventually the greatest street legend of all, Julius Erving, AKA Dr J, signed up to star in the films along with Steven and his Oklahoma team mate Reggie Jackson. (I first heard the legend of Dr J while reading a teammate’s Sports Illustrated after practice at Wellington’s first proper stadium built, yes, courtesy of Dad).

The Boroughs then was all about sectioning Auckland off into five Boroughs, like New York, with one tricked-up, high-tech street court built in each. To give the courts some gravitas, some soul, I linked each of them to a sister court from the US; legendary Rucker Park, The Cage, The Hole, Venice Beach, Downtown OKC.

That led us to creating the content platform of 90-second documentaries for each court, plus a number of 60-second teasers. The films tell the background stories, sort of scouting reports, of each sister court and what attribute it takes to make it on a street court; the hops (that’s jumping ability) handles (dribbling), hustle (aggression), swag (you’ve seen Guinness Sapeurs) and of course legends (Dr J, etc) that surround each.

We chose Phillip Atwell to direct, his mellow approach mixed with music video chops (50 Cent, Eminem) perfect to make the athletes relaxed and have fun, as it turned out. The last time I felt this work so well was when we did the Beckham and Wilkinson Kicking It for adidas at 180 Amsterdam. The trick was letting the three stars be themselves, and owning the scripts.

Shooting started in April in LA and finished in September in Auckland as the inevitable athlete availability issues came up. So back and forth to the US and NZ, four times in all.

We took our editor, my basketball nemesis, Steve Gulik, to the New York leg and we both got up pre-dawn, every day, to shoot city shots on his Sony and my 5D, to compliment Phil’s stellar on-court work. We came back to NZ with 32 hours of footage. Six weeks of editing later, we had 15 minutes of content over eight films, and some serious eye twitches.

Editing was made somewhat easier as we’d already found a banging track to edit to, before we started shooting. A kiwi, David Dallas, provided a piece that had plenty of nuances and layers so we could sustain one piece of music over the 15 minutes - much like a film score -and mix in and out of the many genres the track is filled with.

So starts a campaign that is very close to my heart, as well as Nigel’s, Steven’s, Kenny’s, Dr J’s and, of course, my dad’s.  It’s about building a pick-up basketball infrastructure in Auckland, and hopefully a legacy that goes way beyond the films alone.

My father, 83 years old now, has serious dementia and for the last year it’s been special  

to see how this game, for which you just need a ball and a good strong hoop (if you can find one) still lights him up. He still remembers Dr J. Bucket List moment. Shooting around with Doc on West 4^th. Yet again humiliated, as I choke throwing an alley oop (that’s a high pass above the hoop, intended for a big guy to dunk) to Doc’s knees.