#somereallygoodones, #howardzieff, #dailynews, #mammamiathat’saspicymeatball
Every so often I will come across a photographer or body of work that seems unknown to me. This is the case with Howard Zieff (1927–2009) whom I first encountered when he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Lucie Foundation more than a decade ago.
This is from their press release: “Howard Zieff is an advertising legend: the Fellini of television commercials, the pioneer of funny cigarette advertising, the man who put Benson & Hedges on the map, the father of the Alka-Seltzer stomach close-ups. In the ad world he is regarded as a flawless craftsman, the ‘King of the Hill,’ a one-man show, a tough customer”.*1
At the height of his powers he was the quintessential non-WASP “Mad Man” of the era. His agency, Doyle Dane Bernbach, drew “creative types” (known to the trade as ‘Jews and Italians’), who not only brought reality and humor to advertising but proved that reality and humor could also sell the product. Of this latter group Zieff was a star exponent. His ability to put across real people was amply expressed in the “You Don’t Have To Be Jewish” series, which he and DDB produced for Levy’s bread, as well as the classic “Mamma Mia, that's a spicy meatball” for Alka-Seltzer, and the like for Polaroid, SONY TV and Volkswagen.
“He also has an outstanding eye for detail. If an art director could conjure up a layout, for example, of a couple eating potato chips on a living room couch, Zieff could see the picture on the wall behind them, the cigarette burns on their coffee table, their overloaded electrical socket. As a still photographer he became known as the darling of the art directors, a non-Wasp Norman Rockwell.”*2
I sat in awe as a video of his career was played to the audience. His photographic accomplishments may pale in comparison to his eventual success as a director/producer of legendary Hollywood comedies of the 1970s (“Private Benjamin”). Prior to his advertising and film work, he was a New York Daily News advertising photographer who anticipated and captured the seismic change in our increasing appreication of and sentitivity to the ethnic range American culture and society, he literally showed us what we look like. You can anticipate the whole arc of his career in those black and white images of men reading tthe News, funny little New York dramas.
Howard Zieff, “Untitled (Daily News)”, 1950s
The influence of Norman Rockwell is evident in his composition and staging, but it is his casting that is genius, his ability to find “real” characters”. He could create unexpected family and neighborhood gatherings, colorful groups or tribes that were specific, even exotic, and full of empathy.
He was a humanist and a classicist. The early stuff is great. His widow, Ronda Gomez-Quinones, is also a class act trying to keep the flame alive.
*1 https://www.lucies.org/honorees/howard-zieff/
*2 Op cit
©2021
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