Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly - S10E20 - Bookmarks 2021

Episode Date: May 20, 2021

This week, it’s our annual Bookmarks episode - where we tell you the fascinating stories that didn’t fit into our regular episodes. Including a little-known backstory on the 1972 Canada/Russia hockey series and a moving story about a hockey game that was cut short by tragedy. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly. As you may know, we've been producing a lot of bonus episodes while under the influences on hiatus. They're called the Beatleology Interviews, where I talk to people who knew the Beatles, work with them, love them, and the authors who write about them. Well, the Beatleology Interviews have become a hit, so we are spinning it out to be a standalone podcast series. You've already heard conversations with people like actors Mark Hamill, Malcolm McDowell, and Beatles confidant Astrid Kershaw. But coming up, I talk to May Pang, who dated John Lennon in the mid-70s. I talk to double fantasy guitarist Earl Slick, Apple Records creative director John Kosh. I'll be talking to Jan Hayworth,

who designed the Sgt. Pepper album cover. Very cool. And I'll talk to singer Dion, who is one of only five people still alive who were on the Sgt. Pepper cover. And two of those people were Beatles. The stories they tell are amazing. So thank you for making this series such a success. And please, do me a favor, follow the Beatleology interviews on your podcast app. You don't even have to be a huge Beatles fan, you just have to love storytelling. Subscribe now and don't miss a single beat. We'll see you next time. new locations. What matters is that you have something there to adapt with you, whether you need a challenge or rest. And Peloton has everything you need, whenever you need it. Find your push. Find your power. Peloton. Visit Peloton at onepeloton.ca. This is an apostrophe podcast production. You're not you when you're hungry.

You're a good hand with all things. You're under the influence with Terry O'Reilly. When it comes to marketing a book, there are a couple of things that are critical. First, the cover. A good cover can attract a roving eye in a bookstore. A great cover can attract a reader who has never heard of the author, or the book, or even the subject. The second item on my list is one that is often overlooked. I feel the book's spine is a critical piece of marketing real estate. As someone who has written two books and is about to publish book number three,

I have noticed that after the short launch period where it gets the most attention, your book is then relegated to a bookshelf in a bookstore, spine out. In other words, the only part of your book that most buyers see is the spine on the shelf. So, a lot more creative design attention should be given to a book spine. Lastly, maybe the most important element of book marketing is the title. As an author, I find that you either have a great book title early in the process, or it's a painful process trying to come up with one after you've written it. That said, there have been some very funny book titles. One of the books that makes me laugh is called

I Can Make You Hot! The Supermodel Diet by Kelly Killoran Ben Simon. I don't think this title was meant to be funny, but the exclamation mark just makes me laugh. Chelsea Handler is a master of book titles. I love, Are you there, vodka? It's me, Chelsea.

Judge Judy is a no-nonsense lady who rules television court. She wrote a book titled, Don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining. America's toughest family court judge speaks out. Old Judge Judy had a follow-up book titled Beauty Fades, Dumb is Forever. Perhaps knitting is your jam. Here's a title that's hard to ignore.

Knitting with dog hair. Better a sweater from a dog you know and love than from a sheep you'll never meet. The blurb on the front says, For those who dread being in fashion's doghouse. Relationships are a big book category. Men don't understand women and women wish they didn't understand men. And maybe this book might help.

Love, Sex, and Tractors by Roger Welsh. His follow-up book is Everything I Know About Women I Learned From My Tractor. Instead of Dear John, it's a John Deere theme there. Cookbooks are perennial sellers, so may I suggest this one? Cooking with Poo. An alarming title, until you realize that's Winnie the Pooh. Subtitle, Yummy Tommy Cookie Cutter Treats.

Beginner's guides are always helpful, especially if you're feeling unsure about tackling something new. So may we recommend The Beginner's Guide to Sex in the Afterlife by David Strum. Well, it's something to look forward to. Then there's a little something to relieve the boredom of lockdown.

Make your own sex toys. 50 quick and easy do-it-yourself projects. Which brings a whole new meaning to the phrase do do it yourself. Welcome to our annual bookmarks episode. We read a lot of books while doing research for this show, and occasionally, some of the great material we gather just doesn't fit into our regular episodes. So, we saved the best bits for this show.

From a music biography to a book about one of my favorite movies to a book about hockey, they all contain memorable stories. And remember, reading can make you hot. You're under the influence. One of the most memorable and historic sporting events in Canada's history was the legendary Canada-Russia Summit Series in 1972.

In ad man Terry O'Malley's book titled Integrity and All That S***, Stories and Stuff from Nearly 40 Years in Advertising, he tells a little-known backstory. Terry was the creative director of advertising agency Vickers & Benson, one of the predominant ad agencies of its day, and Terry's agency was chosen to help get the hockey series off the ground. But they were told they would have to move fast. The first task was to name the team. Someone associated with the league suggested the NHL All-Stars,

but Terry reminded them that the players weren't playing to represent the NHL, they were playing to represent Canada. So a Vickerson Benson writer by the name of Terry Hill suggested Team Canada. That was an odd name for a team. It seems familiar now, but it was highly unusual back in 1972. But the name was approved. Next, the ad agency was told

there was going to be a big press conference the next day announcing the series, and they needed a jersey design. Again, everything was moving so fast, as it always is in advertising. O'Malley assigned a very talented art director named John Lloyd to the task. Overnight, amazingly, John Lloyd created the iconic Team Canada jersey. He bought long-sleeve red and white t-shirts, then cut out two

giant stylized maple leaves. Lloyd's wife, Michelle, a seamstress, stitched a white maple leaf on a red home jersey and a red maple leaf on a white away jersey. It was a completely fresh design. It had no

central crest on the chest area like every other hockey sweater did. It had no central crest on the chest area, like every other hockey sweater did. It had no numbers on the sleeves, and each jersey had the word Canada in big letters over the number on the back. Another innovation, as names on jerseys didn't become mandatory until 1976. Again, John Lloyd did it all overnight. And there it was. The team name and the iconic Team Canada jerseys all developed in just over 24 hours at an advertising agency. And here's the ironic part. Terry Hill, who coined the name, was American,

and John Lloyd, who created the jersey, was British. In another related hockey story, Hall of Famer Ken Dryden tells an interesting one in his book titled Scotty. In that book, Dryden asks Hall of Fame coach Scotty Bowman to compare teams from all eras to arrive at the best NHL team of all time. It's a fascinating read. Dryden tells the story of when the Soviet national team

was going to play the Montreal Junior Canadians. Jacques Plante asked Scotty if he could play in goal. Plante had never played against the Soviets and he wanted the chance.

He had actually retired the previous year but wanted to come back for this game. Scottie said okay. Here's the interesting part. Jacques Plante had a strategy for winning. He got his defensemen together and drew on a chalkboard to show them how he wanted them to play. He told them the Soviets were great passers, but poor shooters. So when the Soviets approached the net on a two-on-one rush, Plant wanted the defenseman to protect against any potential pass.

Plant would go head-to-head with the shooter. Everyone was in awe of the Soviet team's ability to pass on the ice, but that incredible finesse masked a weakness that Plante detected. It was a radical strategy, because Plante was essentially telling his defensemen to force the Soviets to shoot on goal. He was confident he could stop them at the net. He was right. The Canadians would win that game 2-1.

Jacques Plante was the first star. He was 37 years old at the time. That same thinking holds true in marketing strategy. The solution is always found inside the obstacle. When Audi couldn't build a faster engine than their competitors in order to win the 24-hour Le Mans race, they won by building an engine that needed fewer pit stops. The obstacle was engine speed.

The answer was fewer stops. The solution was inside the obstacle. Just as Plante observed, the Soviets' passing was dominant, but their shooting was weak. Choke the passing, force the shooting. In the book titled Sound Pictures, The Life of Beatles Producer George Martin, written by Kenneth Womack, the author reveals a strategy behind Beatles records.

Martin and the band decided to have Ringo sing one song on every Beatles album. And it wasn't just to be nice to Ringo. In the first wave of Beatlemania, Ringo was the most popular Beatle. I once worked with comedian Mitzi McCall. Years ago, she and her husband Charlie Brill were a comedy team called McCall and Brill. They were a nightclub act that finally got a big break to be on the Ed Sullivan show. But that big break happened on February 9th, 1964, the historic night the Beatles also appeared. The comedy team came on right before the Fab Four's second set that night,

but they couldn't hear each other while performing their sketch because the 14-year-old fans were screaming for the Beatles. 73 million people watched that night. It was their big opportunity, and no one remembered McCall and Brill. were screaming for the Beatles. 73 million people watched that night. It was their big opportunity and no one remembered McCall and Brill. They bombed. Their agent didn't call them again for six months after that. They say they never watched the video of that night.

When I spoke to Mitzi about it, she told me about one funny moment. She was standing with John Lennon before the show, looking out the window at the screaming crowd outside the theater. She turned to Lennon and said, Can you believe this is all for you? Lennon shrugged, saying, It's not for me. It's for Ringo, actually.

And that's why the Beatles always put a Ringo vocal on every album. As George Martin said, it was just good marketing. In the book, Why to Kill a Mockingbird Matters, by Tom Santopietro, he tells a story about the classic film score.

Elmer Bernstein was hired by director Robert Mulligan to compose the score for the movie. Bernstein was one of the greatest film composers in Hollywood history. The Oscar winner scored movies as diverse as The Magnificent Seven and The Ten Commandments to Ghostbusters and Animal House. But when he was working on To Kill a Mockingbird in 1962, he struggled. He wrote and discarded many different attempts. His usual process was to watch the film over and over again for a few days, then the inspiration would come to him. Except this time, it wasn't working.

To Kill a Mockingbird had a momentous integrity, and that theme was proving difficult to grasp musically. He kept his eye on the riveting performance of Gregory Peck, but trying to capture his courage and his decency and his nobility was overwhelming. Then, in a flash, Bernstein suddenly understood the problem. He was focusing on the wrong thing. In that moment, he decided to change direction and score the quiet magic of the children's world instead. He sat at his piano and picked out the notes with one finger,

the way a child would play them. He called up Mulligan and said, I want you to listen to something. Then he played the simple theme over the phone. Mulligan said he never forgot that amazing moment. Bernstein had found the core of the film. It truly was a story told from the children's perspective. It was a movie about shattered innocence.

The main theme of To Kill a Mockingbird became one of the most classic film scores of all time. That insightful thinking is the foundation of good marketing, too. Effective advertising sells the very core of a product. It sells the benefit. As I said in my last book,

This I Know, an advertiser has to ask themselves what business they are really in. Molson isn't in the beer business. It's in the party business. Michelin Tson isn't in the beer business. It's in the party business. Michelin Tires isn't in the tire business. It's in the safety business.

And whitewater rafting companies aren't selling transportation. They're selling transformation. Just as Elmer Bernstein realized in To Kill a Mockingbird, you have to dig to find the essence of the story. Likewise, advertisers have to dig to find the essence of their products, or else they kill

their marketing. And we'll be right back. You're listening to Season 10 of Under the Influence. If you're enjoying this episode, you might also like the bookmarked show from Season 5, Episode 22. You'll find it in our archives wherever you download your pods. Mary Wells Lawrence was one of the most successful women in the history of advertising, and we featured her in an episode recently. She also wrote a terrific book on her career,

which I highly recommend, called A Big Life in Advertising. Several times in that book, she talks about working with celebrities and how difficult that can be. When her advertising agency was filming the great I Love New York campaign, Mary convinced Frank Sinatra to be in one commercial. The night of the shoot, the film's setup took much longer than expected. Sinatra had one line, I love New York because it's open all night. But by the time the director was ready,

Sinatra had been cooling his heels for more than two hours just to film a single line, and he wasn't happy. When he was finally called to the set, the director told Sinatra there would be dancers moving around him, so be careful not to bump into them when he said his line. Sinatra snapped, One take, that's all you're gonna get.

The director yelled, Action! Sinatra said his line, then bumped into one of the dancers. When the director yelled, Cut! Sinatra said, That's it, goodbye.

The director said, Whoa! He needed one more take because Sinatra had bumped into one of the dancers. Sinatra said, no more. Then one of the dancers said, oh, Mr. Sinatra, my mother will be watching. I told her I would be in the scene with you and she's so thrilled. Sinatra paused and said, okay, I'll do it for you.

You and your mother. I love New York. You know why? Because it's open all night. I love New York. You know why? Because it's open all night. I love New York. All night. It went off perfectly. Then Frank marched directly back to his limo in a huff. It was a great commercial moment, but it wasn't an easy moment.

Mary Wells Lawrence tells another celebrity story in her book about working with the great Peter Sellers. Mary's agency had just landed the giant TWA Airlines account. For the launch commercial, her agency wanted Peter Sellers to star as a spokesman. But Sellers did not do commercials and he turned them down. Later that night, Sellers had a dream about his dead mother.

In that dream, she told Sellers to do the commercial. So the next day, Sellers changed his mind and said he would do it. Mary was thrilled. Then Sellers added,

Oh, by the way, Mother said that if anybody wore the color purple on the set, I must leave immediately and never return. So, on the shoot day, the director had to position someone at the studio

door ready to tackle anybody who was wearing purple, even if they were wearing purple socks. Welcome to the crazy world of celebrities. Adman Dave Trott wrote a terrific book titled Predatory Thinking, a masterclass in outthinking the competition. In his book, he reminded me of an amazing story.

Back in 1999, a fierce high school hockey rivalry was taking place in Michigan. It was the Trenton Trojans versus the Detroit Catholic Central Shamrocks. They were the two best teams in the state.

Catholic Central had won 13 championships since 1959 and the Trojans had won 12 championships since 1975. Both teams were powerhouses. With the exception of one single loss to the Trenton Trojans that year, Catholic Central was undefeated, going 25-1. Catholic Central wanted to avenge that loss. So this highly anticipated matchup was to determine, once and for all, who was the better team.

On the night of the game, February 10, 1999, the arena was packed to the rafters. Catholic Central dominated the game, going up 4-1 heading into the third period.

Then just when fans thought there was no hope, the Trojans mounted a remarkable comeback, scoring three goals. Now it was a nail-biter. With just a few minutes to go in the third period,

the score was tied 4-4. It was coming right down to the wire. Then, tragedy struck. At the Catholic Central blue line, a Trenton player was hip-checked. He went head over heels, and his skate slit the throat of Catholic Central defenseman Kurt LaTarte, cutting his jugular vein. When fans saw the amount of blood, it became chaos. People were screaming for help.

A doctor jumped out of the stands to try and stop the hemorrhaging. Letart's parents watched in horror. There was so much blood on the bench, the referees blew the whistle and stopped the game. The crowd went deadly silent. Letart was rushed to the hospital. The coaches were told there was no guarantee he was going to live. In that moment, and you can see this on YouTube,

both teams knelt on the ice and prayed for Letart. There was 4 minutes and 53 seconds left on the clock. The coaches agreed to end the game. It would be forever frozen in a 4-4 tie. In 2009, Gatorade created a TV

series called Replay, where classic games between big high school rivalries were restaged years later. Kurt LaTarte had miraculously survived his near-death experience back in 1999, and there wasn't a day since then that he didn't think about it. He needed some closure, so he sent in an application to Gatorade to restage that infamous game.

So, in Season 2 of Replay, Gatorade reunited the Trenton Trojans and the Catholic Central players to finish their classic game once and for all. The players were pumped to get a chance to play that unfinished game.

Except, they were all 11 years older now. They were married with kids and jobs and mortgages. They were heavier. They were all out of shape.

They had eight weeks to prepare for the game. That's where Gatorade stepped in to help. Gatorade is reuniting the original players from those two 1999 teams to come back 11 years later

and replay that game to finish what they started and settle the score for good. The company provided both teams with full access to the Gatorade Sports Science Institute and its professional trainers. There were high-level strength programs, advanced

stretching techniques, and a nutrition program was put into place. For the first few weeks, some of the players just collapsed on the ice. They cramped up, threw up, but they didn't give up. But even though it was incredibly difficult, it was also

special for the teams. They were playing for Kurt. On game day, 4,000 fans packed into the CompuWare Arena. The teams were ready to finish their game. The winningest coach in NHL history, Scotty Bowman, was the honorary coach of Catholic Central. Detroit Red Wings star Brendan Shanahan was at the bench for Trenton. Red Wings legend Gordie Howe dropped the ceremonial puck. It was a fantastic, exciting, hard-fought game.

And when the buzzer went at the end of the third period, the Trenton Trojans beat Catholic Central 4-2. After all these years, the score had been finally settled. As Dave Trott says in his book, products are always searching for a perfect fit. And this story was perfect for Gatorade, a sport drink that helps replace the energy you've lost, and a game played by 30-year-old guys

who had lost a lot of the energy they once had when they were 18. It wasn't just the fun of watching guys get back into shape or watching the towns get so invested in the game. It was also the pull of that eternal human question that tugs at us all. What if? Books are full of buried treasures. I worked with the late John Lloyd and never knew he designed the iconic Team Canada jerseys.

He never mentioned it. I wish I had known. And isn't it interesting that ensuring Ringo had one lead vocal on every album was not just an act of throwing Ringo a bone, it was smart marketing. When you're in a creative business,

it's so incredibly difficult to solve vexing problems. But Tom Santopietro's book makes it reassuring to know that even giants like Elmer Bernstein struggled too. And it's inspiring to be reminded that once he found

the essence of the film, he found the essence of the solution. As Mary Wells Lawrence tells us in her wonderful book, the world loves celebrities, but celebrities don't always love you.

They can be temperamental and even terrified of the color purple. And as Dave Trott points out in his story about Gatorade, every once in a while, wonderful things can emerge out of tragedy. That's the great thing about books.

You never know what you'll find between the covers when you're under the influence. I'm Terry O'Reilly. This episode was recorded in the Terrastream Mobile Recording Studio. Producer, Debbie O'Reilly. Sound Engineer, Keith Oman. Theme music by Ari Posner and Ian Lefevre. You can find all the books

we talked about today in our show notes at cbc.ca slash undertheinfluence. Happy reading. Caution. Books cause unlimited epiphanies. Contents in your overhead bin may have shifted during insight.

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