Of Snowballs, Easter bunnies, and Insanity
By Alan.
Prior to my lengthy stint at MTV Networks, I spent about 2 years on and off working for the producers who made the commercials for the regional electronics chain, Crazy Eddie’s.
If you’re over 30 and grew up in the New York area, you’ll probably remember Jerry Carroll, the Crazy Eddie’s spokesman ranting into camera and ending each spot with “his prices are INSANE.” The spots were occasionally memorable, but totally unavoidable if you spent any time watching late-night television.
I would find myself preparing crew lists one day, and up in the studio rafters the next, dumping bushels of artificial snow on Jerry while he carried on about Christmas in July. If a take got botched, we’d all climb down, sweep up the mess and reload for the next try. When extras were needed, we were elves, Easter bunnies, or whatever the particular season required. The pay sucked, but it was the one job where I could actually turn on the TV and see something I had worked on.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but the experience shaped my way of thinking about promotion. Crank ‘em out, make ‘em cheap, and make ‘em iconic and recognizable as all hell. Crazy Eddie’s was out of business by the late 80’s, but nearly 2 decades later we still remember the commercials. How crazy is that?
June 11th, 2007 at 11:54 am
I adored Jerry Carroll, first as the Crazy Eddie guy, then, when I got a shock as I found out he was a professional voice over guy with a much much wider range than I would have given him credit for. My then-partner Alan Goodman and I liked him so much he became our announcer of choice for promos for two or three years, until he moved out of town and it became harder to book him.
June 11th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
I’ve seen one of those commercials before, and many cartoons such as Futuruma, the Simpsons, etc, have spoofed these.
I hadn’t known what specifically from, because I’m such a young’un, but now I know!
Here are some samples from Youtube for those of you who haven’t seen one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiH_Cd8L1co
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCBvw92eKM8
June 11th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
Wow, you worked on these, Alan? You’re even more of a rockstar to me now.
June 13th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
Crazy Eddie’s was the move. They had one on 86th street.
The commercials were funny as hell…. but if you wanted A DEAL, there was only ONE place to go, and EVERYBODY knew it!
June 14th, 2007 at 10:15 pm
I loved those commercials. There was little good humor in the ad world then, and — to my 10 year old consciousness at least — these were astonishing things, better even than some of the tv fare. The briefness of it — 60 seconds — I can see how that influences you with web shorts.