This is the 5th installment of a series of ruminations on radio copywriting that Dick Orkin and I began…uh, four installments ago.
"In Happier Times" — Dick Orkin & Dan O'Day
Living Autobiographically
by Dick Orkin
Most effective, “non-boring” radio commercials are wholly or partly autobiographical.
Ah, having heard that, are you making a false assumption that “autobiographical” means what you think it means?
I mean something else — something larger and more encompassing — when I say autobiographical.
When I say autobiographical, I don’t necessarily mean the details of your childhood and teen years, or your married or non-married life, or your work years.
Autobiographical includes that, but it also includes all of the people you’ve met and your experiences with those people.
It means situations that range from your first day of school when you wet your pants to the discovery you just made that you went to the washroom and, while washing, spilled water on your pants you-know-where.
It means the last harsh words you had with anyone today or yesterday and what happened to produce those words.
It also means your worrying, reflecting and ruminating on all of the moments I have just mentioned and many more I haven’t mentioned, songs you’ve heard, books you’ve read, people you have seen on the street — all of which you may have experienced consciously or unconsciously.
Maybe you assumed that these things aren’t really autobiographical.
Maybe this should be called “How To Watch Out For False Assumptions And Achieve Greatness.”
When your commercial is not autobiographical, I’ll bet it’s derivative as all heck.
By derivative, I mean creating a commercial you heard someone else do, or a commercial built around a great gag on Saturday Night Live, or a situation or character line in a play or movie you enjoyed.
How will you know you have achieved that autobiographical place?
Someone who once went to Paris to study French as a language said they knew they had mastered the language when one night they dreamed in French.
How will you know?
You will dream in commercials, that’s how you’ll know.
(To be continued….)
