Dive Brief:

• During the Oscars broadcast Sunday, five advertisers united to pay tribute to Hollywood stunt performers, the largest multibrand effort in the film award show’s nearly century-long history, per a press release.
• Carnival Cruise Line, Kiehl’s, L’Oréal Paris, Mntn and Samsung ran a combined six spots over the course of the show, showcasing over 75 professional stunt people as they barged through glass, dove out of helicopters and staged elaborate fights. Stunt veteran and director Chris Denison helped orchestrate the campaign.
• The Oscars ad blitz, created in partnership with Disney Advertising and a raft of agencies, recognizes growing calls for stunt work to be recognized as an awards category and comes as Hollywood bounces back from ravaging wildfires earlier this year. All of the commercials were shot in Los Angeles after the fires.

Dive Insight:

The 97th Academy Awards last weekend celebrated some of the year’s biggest movie releases while also delivering a blockbuster multibrand campaign. The effort centered on stunt work speaks to the growing role high-concept advertising plays around live events that serve as some of the last bastions of appointment TV viewing. Host network ABC is owned by Disney, whose advertising division helped develop the campaign. The collaboration also carried a purpose-driven bent, championing often undersung professionals and a city that has recently been battered by wildfire devastation.  

Carnival Cruise Line, Kiehl’s, L’Oréal Paris and ad-tech firm Mntn each ran a spot depicting an elaborate stunt while Samsung ran two to promote its new Galaxy smartphone. The commercials were made with over 150 crew members from two LA-based production companies, with stunt performers serving in roles both behind and in front of the camera. Mr. Bronx Audio Post assisted with the sound design.

The occasion marked the first time L’Oréal Paris has been at the Oscars since 2018 while 173-year-old Kiehl’s, which L’Oréal owns, had never run a national TV ad before. The timing also landed around Mntn filing for an initial public offering. 

Though the ads don’t have direct movie tie-ins, some of the reference points feel obvious. Samsung’s spot shows a besuited hero in the vein of John Wick as he battles goons while checking his phone notifications. Carnival’s depicts a “Mission Impossible”-like bit of derring-do as a stunt person dives from a helicopter and lands in a pool on the deck of a Carnival cruise ship with pinpoint accuracy. Steve Brown, Samantha Win, Hannah Betts and Gary Hymes make up some of the on-screen talent.   

Disney Advertising has shaken up its Oscars ad strategy over the years, including through a bigger focus on in-show integrations. ABC‘s Oscars telecast, which had a sold-out ad slate, saw viewership slide 7% from the year prior to 18.1 million, according to Nielsen. The streaming broadcast on Hulu was also plagued by technical problems.