by Four decades ago, the Super Bowl became the Super Bowl.
It wasn’t because of anything that happened in the game itself: On January 22, 1984, the Los Angeles Raiders defeated Washington 38-9 in Super Bowl XVIII, a contest that nearly ended before halftime. But during the broadcast on CBS, a 60-second ad loosely inspired by a famous George Orwell novel shook the advertising and technology industry without even showing the product it was promoting. Conceived by the advertising agency Chiat/Day and directed by Ridley Scott, who had then just made the seminal science fiction noir film “Blade Runner”, the Apple commercial “1984”, whose objective was to introduce the new Macintosh computer, was It would become one of the most acclaimed commercials ever made. It also helped start (pun partially intended) the Super Bowl tradition of having the big game serve as an annual showcase for gold-bordered ads from Fortune 500 companies. It all started with Apple co-founder Steve Jobs’ wish, from taking the battle with the company’s rivals to a flashy television broadcast that he knew nothing about.
In recent interviews, several of the people involved in creating the “1984” ad (Scott; John Sculley, then Apple CEO; Steve Hayden, Chiat/Day ad writer; Fred Goldberg, Apple account director for Chiat /Day; and Anya Rajah, the actor who threw the gavel, recalled how the commercial was created, its inspiration and the internal objections that almost prevented it from airing. These are edited excerpts from the conversations.
JOHN SCULLEY On October 19, 1983, we were all sitting in Steve (Jobs’) building, the Mac Building, and the cover of Businessweek said, “The winner is… IBM.” We were pretty deflated because it was the introduction of the IBM PCjr and we hadn’t even introduced the Macintosh yet.
STEVE HAYDEN Jobs said, “I want something that stops the world in its tracks.” Our media director, Hank Antosz, said, “Well, there’s only one place that can do that: the Super Bowl.” And Steve Jobs asked, “What is the Super Bowl?” (Antosz) said: “Well, it’s a great football game that attracts one of the biggest audiences of the year.” And (Jobs) said, “I’ve never seen a Super Bowl. “I don’t think I know anyone who has seen a Super Bowl.”
FRED GOLDBERG The original idea was actually developed in 1982. We pitched an ad (with) a headline that said, “Why 1984 Won’t Be Like ‘1984’” to Steve Jobs, and he didn’t think the Apple III was worthy of being ? that claim.
SCULLEY They said, “A lot of people might want to do something with George Orwell’s ‘1984.’” If we can take advantage of the fact that we’re introducing the Macintosh in January, maybe we can be so spectacular in our ads that no one else will even think of trying to copy us.
HAYDEN We started to imagine, well, what did we think 1984 would be like, based on Orwell’s writings? And we thought it wouldn’t be that different from the world we were in at the time. Russia had invaded Afghanistan. It was impossible for the Russian people to get any kind of accurate information from their own news services about what was happening.
GOLDBERG It was Lee Clow, Chiat/Day’s creative director at the time, who oversaw the creation of the commercial that grew out of that print concept.
HAYDEN Given the cheerful goodness of the average person, wouldn’t this be a great tool for rebelling against government overreach, especially in parts of the world where news is suppressed, manipulated, or controlled so tightly as to be useless to the people?
RIDLEY SCOTT I said, “A computer for what reason? To write the shopping list? What about pencil and paper? They laughed. How wrong I was. Then I should have bought shares.
HAYDEN At the time, Ridley was grappling with a lot of these questions about the meaning of the future and how technologies could be twisted for better or worse, because he was working on “Blade Runner.”
SCOTT I was surprised that the agency was so brave to take a work of intellectual literature to sell a box they never talked about, never showed a photo of, never said what it was for.
HAYDEN We had originally imagined this as a comical situation where drone-like people were intimidated by a loudspeaker, telling them where to go, what to do, what room the meeting was in, etc. (Scott) had a beautiful book out of the movie “Metropolis,” so his inspiration, combined with our original storyboard of people controlled by forces beyond their understanding, really helped us reorient the idea toward technology as a tool. for freedom.
SCOTT I needed a man who was a far-right dictator. I want him on the screen ranting while an objector makes his way through the corridors of power pursued by the police.
ANYA RAJAH The only thing we knew was that they wanted to see us throw discus. I used to be a javelin and discus thrower at school, so I kept going. It was pretty good and obviously looked good.
SCOTT In my career I tend to have very strong and powerful women. I looked for an athlete more than a model.
raja Ridley gave me a picture of the hairstyle and color he wanted for me and sent me to Vidal Sassoon in London to have it cut and colored. Although I already had short blonde hair, he wanted it shorter and almost white blonde. He was right: he was perfect for the role!
SCOTT Some people thought it was a million dollar project. It was not. I was very frugal. I tend to stay on budget.
HAYDEN He found a scrapped Vulcan bomber and it had parts mounted on the walls and around it.
GOLDBERG (The budget) was four commercials for $650,000. I estimate the commercial cost $350,000, maybe $400,000.
SCOTT I couldn’t afford the cast I wanted, so I hired a whole group of members of the far-right National Front, all with shaved heads and who tend to be out of work. I had 200 National Front in the studio. I think they were grateful for the work and ate breakfast, lunch and dinner and got paid a little.
GOLDBERG We paid them a total of $10,000 to sit there for three days with smoke in their faces. In the end they were really getting out of control. Security was brought to the studio and production house. They had German shepherds to control these guys because they were throwing rocks at each other.
raja I had to have a bodyguard because they were all real skinheads.
SCOTT I filmed (the dictator) the day before in 16 millimeters, developed it overnight and then we projected it large on the screen, so it photographed poorly, in a good way. I wanted it to look very run down.
HAYDEN The dictator’s speech did not exist in the original script of the ad. Ridley Scott called me and said, “It would be really helpful if you could write a 30- or 60-second text.” I dated my brother, who was actually teaching in China as a law professor. Between the two of us, we came up with little snippets of quotes from Mussolini, Mao, People’s Daily, Goebbels, and Hitler himself.
SCOTT Trying to explain to everyone what I was doing was quite difficult, so I said, “Do what they tell you. There will be a moment when this athlete throws a hammer at the screen. The screen will explode. “I want everyone to say ‘ahhhh.'” And they did it.
raja Throwing a real hammer wasn’t going to be wise, so they ended up making a paper mache one, which I had to work with. It doesn’t look like paper mache, so it turned out well.
GOLDBERG It was a great movie. Everyone at the agency loved it.
HAYDEN Steve Jobs was excited but scared. Steve Wozniak offered to pay to run the commercial himself.
SCULLEY Before the commercial ran, we had to take it to the board of directors. The board watches the commercial and then there is dead silence in the boardroom. They turn and look at me and (a board member) says, “You’re not really going to drive that thing, are you?”
HAYDEN As the closing credits rolled, the president, Mike Markkula, put his head in his hands and bent over the conference table, then slowly straightened himself and (proposed hiring a different advertising agency).
SCOTT I did it. I thought it was pretty good. But I was thinking, “Really? Are they going to post this at the Super Bowl? And we don’t know what it is for?
GOLDBERG I made them do a theater test. We get the results back and it’s the worst commercial they’ve ever tried, in terms of persuasion.
SCULLEY The board said: “We don’t think you should run it. “Try to sell time.”
GOLDBERG And it was Jay Chiat who told us to stall, basically, when they told us to stall at the Super Bowl.
HAYDEN Finally, it was decided that we would air the “1984” commercial one time.
GOLDBERG Every news show had clips of it. The commercial kept running and running for days after that.
SCULLEY It worked for free, over and over again.
GOLDBERG The value of derived advertising is what many advertisers consider the greatest benefit.
SCOTT I think the Super Bowl frenzy started there. So, it cost about $1 million a minute. Now it costs about 7 million dollars per minute. (The average cost of a Super Bowl ad this year is actually double that: $7 million for a 30-second ad.)
SCULLEY When you’re doing something that’s never been done before and has the potential to change people’s lives in terms of how they work, play, and communicate, doing something that seems outlandish is a really good idea, if you do it right.
HAYDEN The tools that were originally intended to help you free yourself are now used as a way to enslave you with conspiracy theories and unproven stories and unsourced news that isn’t really news. We are making Goebbels’ idea a reality, confusing people so much that they have no idea what to believe other than an authority figure. In that sense, we failed.
