Ad Icon: Steve Reeves

Steve Reeves has risen far from inauspicious beginnings in Ilford. The former creative and current director’s fertile career is appropriately represented by a sex-stuffed CV – from the utilitarian health-education stylings of HIV awareness ads to super-steamy spots for Agent Provocateur. But, as Joe Lancaster discovers, Reeves gets really excited about more down-to-earth concerns, from collaborating on set to exercising his uncanny eye for casting

Unprotected sex has doubtless led to plenty of Adland babies over the years, but who’d have thought that made-up tales of such passionate encounters would be responsible for the births of the careers of two of the industry’s biggest creative stars.

In 1987, looking to catch the eye of potential employers, 19-year-old copywriter Steve Reeves and art director Paul Gay wrote ‘love letters’ on pink, perfume-soaked paper with lines to the effect of “our night of passion in a car park in Great Yarmouth led to us having twins who are now grown up and want a job in advertising”, and sent them to every creative director in London. It worked, leading to a bunch of offers, from which the youngsters chose a job at BMP DDB.

It was a moment of vindication for Reeves, born and raised in the “rough and boring” suburbia of Ilford, Essex. After leaving school with poor A-Levels and few prospects, he managed to get onto the prestigious copywriting course at Watford and, on his father’s advice, took a badly paid placement at Lowe instead of a slightly better paid full-time job at 7-Eleven. Soon after, he met Gay and (fictional) romance blossomed.

“I loved writing adverts. I loved the problem-solving element of sitting with a brief that leads you down a tiny dark alley and then coming up with a solution that brings you out into the sunshine,” Reeves remembers fondly. He and Gay had their fair share of sunshine early in their careers, concocting industry-respected and publicly enjoyed ads for the likes of VW and British Rail. The press spotlighted them as creatives to watch and, despite their youth, they were soon made group heads at the agency. But neither was interested in doing print or outdoor campaigns – they only wanted to work on film sets.

Keen to explore directing, they deliberately gave scripts to experienced movie directors in order to learn from them. Mike Figgis (Internal Affairs, Leaving Las Vegas) was the best tutor, says Reeves. “Just watching how he worked hugely influenced me. He’d never go to the first casting sessions – he’d whizz through the recording to the key moment of performance. Not only is this an efficient way of working, but it also means you remain objective and follow your gut instinct without distraction. This is something I have always done when I cast and it has really helped me find some fantastic actors.”

Once again it was tales of promiscuity, but this time with a serious message, that marked a turning point in Reeves’ career. In 1991 he and Gay wrote two mockumentary scripts for the Health Education Authority’s AIDS awareness campaign. The creatives were supposed to make animatics but convinced the client to let them shoot tests instead. With a £4,000 budget they went out with a crew and “faked the whole thing”, even getting Reeves’ mum to do a voice-over. “I was in my early twenties and we knew nothing about filmmaking – we just knew how we wanted our scripts to come across – which I suppose is all any director ever needs to know.”

The resulting films, Geronimo and Mrs Dawson, did so well in research that the client ran them on TV, saving £196,000 from the budget and striking a chord with the public. The OAP character in Geronimo, Fred Brewster, even entered the zeitgeist, getting parodied on comedy sketch shows, and the ads – apparently the first docu-style spots ever made – picked up rafts of awards. This was also the first time that an unwrapped condom had ever been shown on TV, in an era when sex education was struggling to catch up with the rampant AIDS epidemic – tragically late.   

From sexy shoots to shocking shots

It was a great start to careers behind the camera and Reeves and Gay went on to co-direct ads for brands, including Marmite and Terry’s, through Stark Films while still working at DDB. In 1995 they quit their ‘day jobs’ to direct full time as a partnership at Blink, but decided to go their separate ways a year later. Gay became the first director to sign with new company Outsider (and forged a successful career that’s still in full swing today) while Reeves embarked on a journey to become one of the most dependable commercials directors in London, with over 400 spots to his name to date. But don’t read ‘dependable’ as safe or boring; his work includes films that are anything but, such as Proof for Agent Provocateur and Sunday Lunch for Southwark Anti-Gun Crime – both incendiary for different reasons. The former is likely Reeves’ best-known spot and features Kylie Minogue dressed in sexy underwear, riding a mechanical bull. Although it was made for cinema and released in pre-YouTube 2001 (also the year that Reeves founded Another Film Company with producer Tim Marshall), it went viral before viral was even really a thing, with excited viewers calling to ask to buy a copy. It’s since racked up a reported 360m views and won a poll of the best cinema ads of all time.

Although his taste in films is “embarrassingly diverse; from an art-house Michael Haneke film to something a bit less sensitive featuring Danny McBride,” the majority of Reeves’ own work incorporates a signature feeling of realism. Whether it’s drama (a mother shooting her young son in the head in the aforementioned Sunday Lunch), or comedy (like The Office-style sketch in Meeting Room for Flora) or a straight-up product demo (his most recent ad with Jeremy Clarkson promoting the Amazon Fire Stick, taking a cheeky potshot at the BBC in the process), everything in a Steve Reeves film feels authentic. You never question whether his characters, or the situations they find themselves in, are real.

“I love working with actors and I love great performances. I suppose that leads to a sense of realism. When I watch someone acting I have to relate to it and believe it,” explains Reeves. “My work is very British and I like understated humour and gently observed moments. If I can get the viewer to empathise with what they see, I’m happy.

“This type of feeling is achieved from the casting up. I don’t always cast the best actor. I’ll often go for someone simply because I immediately like something about him or her. It could be a small mannerism or just the way they hold themselves. Some people just have faces that make them likeable. It’s a gut instinct but I think following that is the reason that I tend to find actors that generally people warm to.” It’s worked well for him. Reeves shot commercials with Sacha Baron Cohen, Martin Freeman and James Corden before they were famous.

Finding a way to keep Jeremy Clarkson happy

A technique Reeves picked up from his hero Mike Figgis is to clear the set and run through rehearsals with his actors before setting up the cameras and lights. “It leads to a very natural, collaborative way of working that can get you very convincing results,” he explains, and adds that, though it’s not always possible on tightly boarded commercials, it certainly comes in handy when working with celebrities. “People like Jeremy Clarkson won’t stand in an awkward position just because it makes the shot look good – you have to work with them right from the start and find a way to keep them cooperative while still making a great-looking film.”

Reeves employed the above technique to masterful effect while making his debut feature, 2014’s Keeping Rosy, a thriller he co-wrote with Mike Oughton (creative director at McCann London), in which a woman’s career-driven life comes crashing down around her one morning, instigating a journey of danger and self discovery. The leading role is played adroitly by Maxine Peake and, despite the customary small budget and tight schedule for a British indie movie, Reeves’ storytelling prowess and knack for realism make the far-fetched premise feel frighteningly plausible. It’s not a perfect film, but it’s damn good for a first feature, so it’s disappointing that some reviewers were overly critical. “It got mixed reviews. One week The Guardian gave it two stars and the next week a different writer in the same newspaper gave it four stars,” recalls Reeves, who remains philosophical about it all. “The producers said it’s good when a film divides people because it gets talked about more and it’s true, Keeping Rosy got an amazing amount of press coverage – especially since it had zero marketing budget.”

What does seem to irritate Reeves is that many reviewers took the film at more than face value. It’s unsurprising as – without giving away too many spoilers – the story concerns a woman whose maternal instincts kick in when her career ends abruptly. “The film was a psychological thriller about one woman’s life but some critics seemed to think it was a sociological thriller about all women’s lives which meant the film got some criticism,” explains the director. “People don’t analyse thrillers starring men in the same way. You don’t watch a film like Taken and think about the role of men as fathers in society. I just wanted to make an exciting, dark and tense film.”

Even though it had a small cinema release and no marketing push, Keeping Rosy flourished in the DVD and on-demand charts and is doing well on the festival circuit. “We were nominated at the British Independent Film Awards and I sat on a table next to Benedict Cumberbatch, Mike Leigh, Helen Mirren and Helena Bonham Carter. It was mental.”

Reeves would love to make another feature but admits that the Keeping Rosy experience has “made me love shooting adverts more than ever. The best thing about adverts is that everyone gets to see them. A great advert will be appreciated by your granny, along with your kid’s mates at school. If you create a great advert, your work can really connect with everyone. It was great that my movie got a cinematic release, but it only ran for two weeks in 40 cinemas, so a maximum of around 11,200 people could have seen it. My Agent Provocateur advert was watched by over 360 million people.” 

But that’s not to say there aren’t bad days for a commercials director. “It’s so frustrating when a senior client that you have never even met changes your casting or edit – you feel completely powerless,” says Reeves.

But you don’t make 400 ads under the often-totalitarian whim of CMOs without developing strategies for successfully crafting the best films possible. Reeves has found that looking back to his former profession helps. “Much of what a director achieves is down to the original idea that the creative team came up with and managed to nurture and protect for all those months before you got involved. So in reality, the director’s greatest asset is invariably the creatives.”

It’s a fitting reflection of Reeves’ grounded and affable nature that he finds collaboration is key to bringing out the best in a commercial shoot. “I remember being a 20-year-old creative working with some very wound-up directors. I wouldn’t dare approach with any comments or ideas. There’s no way I would let that happen on one of my shoots. I actively make sure that the creatives are up near the camera with me, looking at my monitor. Also, if an actor feels relaxed on set, he or she is more likely to have the confidence to push their performance. If the DOP feels that they can suggest a different way of shooting a scene, then I want to hear it. You don’t always have to act on people’s suggestions, but sometimes you can get some great stuff by doing just that.”

Still creative after all these years…

Maybe it’s because he works so collaboratively that Reeves is still so enthusiastic about his art, even after being in the business all this time. “Filmmaking and writing is not only my work but also what I love doing most. I can’t see myself ever stopping.”

And it seems he will be just as happy whether his filmmaking future lies with features or commercials. “A great advert is just as credible to me as a piece of theatre, or film. All that people watching adverts want is entertainment.” A long look at Steve Reeves’ distinguished showreel certainly provides plenty of that.