Next gen production company Will O’Rourke brings high-profile creative talent to its roster
CB Exclusive – Today sees the launch of Will O’Rourke, a next generation production company, established to support the creation of unconventional creative projects and challenges.
Based in Sydney, Will O’Rourke combines world-class production skills with access to the best creative talent in Australia across multiple artistic disciplines. Its aim is to make extraordinary ideas and projects a reality – whether an art installation, the construction of a branded venue, a live event or something which combines film with other innovation – Will O’Rourke has been specifically established to make it happen.
Will O’Rourke’s rostered talent includes some of Australia’s highest profile creative people from the worlds of broadcast writing, television, film, architecture and art:
Shaun Gladwell – Art
Chris Bosse – Architectural Design
Julian Morrow, Craig Reucassel and Dominic Knight from The Chaser – Writing and Broadcast Entertainment
Sascha Ettinger Epstein – Documentary Making
Steve Rogers – Direction
Revolver Roster – Direction
The Glue Society – Art, Brand Content, Direction
The roster will expand with the addition of more creative talent as the company grows.
Will O’Rourke, a sister company to film production company Revolver, will apply the same rigorous and world- class approach Revolver is renowned for in the film production space, to all new areas into which advertising agencies and brands are venturing.
Says Michael Ritchie – pictured above left with Josh Mullens, head of projects – executive producer of both Revolver and the new company: “I believe Will O’Rourke brings together unique creative talent across an extremely wide range of disciplines. And marrying that with strong production support, we really should make extraordinary things happen – things that live both in front of and beyond the camera lens.”
Adds architect Chris Bosse of LAVA: “Cross-disciplinary collaboration is the answer to an interconnected world with increasing complexities. It is like alchemy, mixing known ingredients to create a novel and unexpected outcome. I am very excited about the potential that Will O’Rourke can unleash.”
Says Jonathan Kneebone of creative collective The Glue Society: “For many years, film production companies have serviced the advertising industry. And now that there is a need to creatively deliver more complex projects, it feels totally appropriate to also be on the roster of a company that has been specially set up to do just that. We relish the opportunity to be involved in the creation of what hasn’t been done before.”
Adds Julian Morrow: “I’m looking forward to being a part of the creative collaborations that Will O’Rourke makes possible, and to taking the piss out of them at The Chaser.”
Will O’Rourke has already begun work on a large project event for Publicis Mojo for an international client, an architectural project with Droga5, a documentary project with Host, and an entertainment project called “Watch With Mother” – a sketch horror show launching online in mid 2011.
Will O’Rourke’s website features more information about the talent roster and production resource. For more details, call Michael Ritchie, executive producer or Josh Mullens, head of projects at Will O’Rourke on 02 9319 7904 or via hello@willorourke.com
25 Comments
next gen? seems like a copy of Blink’s production house expansion model which has been in action for yonks… Blink, Blinkink, Blinkart and Colonal Blink http://www.blinkart.co.uk/
Bla Bla Bla. We’ve heard it all before.
Blink? Bullshit.
Come on…. Credit should go where credit is due:
*Kapitii in 2007: John Reynolds and Robert McLeod
*Team Dry in 2008: Tim & Eric, Mr. Show & SNL writer Bob Odenkirk
*Vote Earth in 2009: Shepard Fairey and Syd Garon
*Orcon in 2010: Iggy Pop
Then Smarties and now Winter’s Bone…
http://www.curiousfilm.com/press/award
Sounds like a great idea. Good luck to all involved.
so….it’s an ad agency with a couple of film directors?… Are they going direct to clients?…seems a complex business model.
the new One Centre!
It’s an agency SUPA CENTA
Yes, looks awfully like a finger at the Ad Agencies and your dealing direct with clients now.
Doesn’t matter how many ways you say your not, that’s what your doing.
I’m just worried that the MD is going to tell us all not to use the new ad agency called Will O’Rourke, aka REVOLVER because they are now competitors.
Actually, the amount of work Steve Rodgers does in Aus is small compared to his OS work. So I suppose he can go direct without to much retribution, kneebone has been doing this for years under the radar.
Now I can use the term, “Biting that hand that feeds you”.
with all that talent,can they start off by sorting out sydney’s public transport system.
Really 3:45? How often do ad agencies use their marketing skills to service clients with architectural design, or installations, or events (more often a PR role), or documentaries, or tv episodics, comedy or drama, or documentaries?
You really think that your agency will be competing with WO on any of these levels, more or less with the additional talent they’ve lined up to add to Revolver’s already superlative roster, not even counting their association with Bisquit?
As far as the Glues, they’ve been doing agency creative as well as direction for a number of years now, so nothing new there, and certainly no competition for full service agencies, because the Glues don’t do client service by and large, or planning, just the creative, and then the production. Unlike most agency creative departments, they can actually execute what they conceptualize and design.
Retribution for biting the hand that feeds? As if top agency creatives would even allow their MDs to boycott Revolver with Steve and the Glues and Bruce comprising the top group of directors in the country, as well as the access to Noam and gang.
Just call Will O’Rourke Revolver ++ if you like. The top company in Oz just got better, and broader, and smarter, and the notion that Revolver and Will O’Rourke are following some kind of model that Curious put into play here in ANZ insults Blink, and Anonymous Content, and @radicalmedia, and R/GA and any number of integrated production companies, all of whose work is on a completely different playing field than the likes of Team Dry or Orcon. Rest assured that this new wrinkle at Revolver will only serve to cement their status as the creative benchmark in this region.
Just had a look at the the site – a great tutorial taking an uber pretentious picture of yourself. http://www.willorourke.com/roster_julian_craig_dom.html
what’s in a name?
An agency by any other name will smell….
Actually Blink was a much stronger production company before it splintered into so many parts, and Anonymous will struggle to pay its massive overhead in the face of America’s fragmenting, and consequently, vibrant commercial production landscape.
Splintering brands was so five years ago….
What a bunch of haters… looking forward to seeing what these guys make.
I think you will find that most of the better prod co’s offer this service and then some.
To be honest most agencies can source for themselves the great range of freelance talent that is widely available.
I am sure that none of these people are being paid a salary to sit in an office all day waiting for a brief….they will come together when a project comes in the door….no different from an agency doing the same thing……
What it really boils down to is that most agencies have dumbed down the tv dept…it is now a glorified email service between the outside production companies and the creative dept…this isn’t helped by the fact that most tv producers in agencies spend very little of their time doing any constructive research into new areas of production….
so Will O’Rourke is born… and will probably go gangbusters….but every agency could have the same model and could do exactly the same thing…they just can’t be bothered.
My apologies. I was responding to the first comment on this story. I certainly didn’t mean to insult Blink or Anonymous, much less, Will.
I was actually both Blink & Anonymous’ Asia-Padific representative while raising my kids in Japan. Thus, I have heaps of respect for James, Bart, Dave, and all that fantastic work that they have done over the years..
I’m also a great fan of integration, as we’ve had a similar Curious ++ model incorporating studios (Studio One and SuperStudio), writers (Stephen Davis & Bob O), musicians (NASA & Squeaky), photographers (Derek Henderson), fine artists, feature filmmakers and creatives from around the world for some time, albeit without a separate company moniker.
Congratulations and I wish you & your crew the very best for your new endeavour. Working with a variety of people across many disciplines is always a rewarding creative experience!
Verbal integrator’s pretty flash with the rhetoric.
Well done Mullens, sounds like the perfect gig. Good luck and see ya in Oz next year hopefully.
The respect that agencies had for production companies was completely DESTROYED when STW/WPP opened Plush Films to service its agencies. This division has sort to destroy production companies income. hey 3:45 “Biting the hand that feeds you” is just not valid anymore. Rather it’s biting the hand that destroyed your business.
Goodluck Revolver, I am sure they will do really well, with their clients best interests at heart, rather than making money to send back to the sinking mother ship of WPP.
12:09 – Ooooo, look out for that flash rhetoric. Scary.
Looks like they are working with some good agencies. Hope all goes well for them.
looks like an extension of HOST
Vertical Integrator said: Blah blah…
I think 3:45 certainly hit a nerve there, not that I agree 100%, but none the less he does have a point. Becoming an ad agency and not saying you are, certainly will make people think twice when calling up Revolver thinking there side company maybe pitching on the same bit of TV, outdoor, etc.
I’m a big fan of Steve Rodgers and Hunt, but I don’t go to Revolver for Revolver, I go there for them, Same reason I don’t call Exit for Garth, Zoom for Toia, Filmgraphics for Deneen, film Construction for Nyquist or Sweetshop for Mel etc. I call them only to get the directors.
They are the brains behind the ideas or execution and that’s all we want from them. You middle men are just that… Middle men. Same as the ad agency model. The same dog in a different dress.
Regardless of all that, I hope it goes well. You have great directors on hand so you can’t really fail 🙂
9:32 – You show your complete ignorance of the production process when you refer to the companies that support directors as middlemen and nothing more. In the case of Rogers, Deneen, and Toia, at a minimum, they are the owners of the production companies, in consort with their producers, so they are the ‘dog in the dress’ as you so cleverly put it. If you’d ever really worked with any of these directors, instead of telling us all why you ‘call them’, then you’d know that the support systems they’ve built with their production companies, who not only represent them but help them bring their vision, and presumably yours to life are an essential part of why their names and their work are what they are.
The broader tool set that Will O’Rourke and others are bringing to the process shouldn’t intimidate agencies, and most likely will not with those who actually do the better creative work, simply because it just means that one organization can bring together skills under one roof where an agency producer may have had to go to several in the past, and this just allows for a greater range of creative ideas capable of being serviced for an agency, collaboratively.
It’s not competition, but collaboration, and if the agency is the conduit to the client for the brief from their creative teams then that’s how it will continue to work. If, on the other hand, ideas generated by Will O’Rourke and other new production/creative models are those being pitched directly to clients then the agencies will be left out of the process, but only because they didn’t have the vision in their position as the client’s chief marketer to generate a broader range of creative ideas themselves.
In the end, as evidenced by a few of the comments here on the blog, it’s interesting to see how agitated agencies become, and how encroached upon they feel when production companies begin building organizations that can become more a part of the creative process from it’s inception, as well as providing a wider range of capabilities than the traditional broadcast only models of production, but they curiously have no problem with the creation of their own in-house production units to compete with the production companies in order to beat down the costs to their lowest levels, and as a result maximize their own profits.
this is all so far up its own arse, its not funny