60 Stories About 30 Seconds, Bruce Van Dusen
60 Stories About 30 Seconds, Bruce Van Dusen
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60 Stories About 30 Seconds
How I Got Away With Becoming a Pretty Big Commercial Director Without Losing My Soul (Or Maybe Just Part of It)

Author: Bruce Van Dusen

Narrator: Daniel Henning

Unabridged: 9 hr 17 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/15/2020


Synopsis

1977. New York City. Cool and crime-ridden, cheap and wild. Bruce Van Dusen shows up in town with a film degree and $150 to his name. He wants to make movies. So he does. The only ones anyone will pay him to make? Little ones. Thirty seconds long. Commercials. He has no idea what he's doing and the money sucks. But he's a director.

He quickly learns he has the two things he needs to succeed in the fickle world of commercial-making: a talent for telling short, emotional stories, and the hustle to fight for every job no matter how small. He still has no idea what he's doing—not that anyone needs to know that. He just keeps making it up as he goes along.

He gets hired by a client on life support in the most depressing hospital in New York. Gets peed on by a lion. Abused by Charles Bronson. Explains peristalsis to a Tony winner. Makes a movie and goes to Sundance. Goes back to little movies when it bombs. Keeps hustling, shooting anything. Gets married, has kids. Pushes, shoves, survives. Gets divorced. Survives some more. Is an asshole, pays the price, finally learns when and how to be an asshole and becomes one of the industry's stars.

About Bruce Van Dusen

Bruce Van Dusen directed his first commercial when he was twenty-three. He's gone on to direct a thousand more. He also directed three movies and a feature documentary. Being a director is a weird gig. When you work, you give orders, and people and objects do what you tell them. When you're not working, you still give orders, but nobody listens. Born in Detroit, Van Dusen lives in New York City.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Becki on November 08, 2020

What goes on behind the scenes in television commercials isn’t something most people think much about. These essays build a memoir about a man who may have directed more commercials than any other individual. While the title sounds like the book would be a lot more about the commercial jobs, the stor......more

Goodreads review by Garrett on November 30, 2020

I'll give this one five stars because it, first of all, introduced me to a world I've been curious about for a time. I've written a story about a man who works in advertising (not yet published) but I basically made up the few sketchy work references. This year I got on a Covid-inspired, video-store......more