Art Director Behind Joe Camel Is Subject of Short Documentary

David Bartels gets his 15 minutes of fame

David Bartels spent 50 years as an art director. He worked on iconic campaigns for Wendy’s and StarKist and dreamed up Joe Camel, the smooth but controversial character at the core of the Camel cigarettes campaign. All the while, he schmoozed and collaborated with the likes of Joe Sedelmaier, John Hughes and Andy Warhol.

But Bartels is not well known, which is why directors Noah Readhead and Matt Richmond give him his due in the documentary David Bartels’ Fifteen Minutes of Fame.

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The film, which screened at the Oscar-qualifying American Documentary and Animation Film Festival, is now available on Vimeo.

Here, Readhead talks about getting to know Bartels and explains how he employed animation to bring his subject’s colorful career to life.

MUSE: How did you learn about David Bartels, and why did you want to make a movie about him?

Noah Readhead: I met David in 2017 when I was working with him on a series of videos for a natural dye company. One afternoon, I was at his house, and David casually mentioned that he had a hand in the creation of Joe Camel. I was pretty unconvinced, until his wife, Ceci, brought down two original art-boards of Joe—one with sunglasses and one without.

I pressed him on the details, and he told me the whole story—a sales-promotion tactic that somehow made its way to the brand level. My gears were turning as I thought of the possibilities and what other contributions to advertising he had made. He definitely saw my interest, and over the next few months he told me more incredible stories from his early days of advertising.

I started my career in advertising and still continue to work with agencies—first internally, and now as a production partner. But I still consider myself a student of the craft. I definitely have a love for the art and strategy of the industry. Plus, Joe Camel is so iconic—for good or bad. And I knew I had to tell David’s story.

Did David reveal anything that surprised you?

I probably had two or three conversations with him prior to the formal sit-down interview. Those conversations helped shape our questions, which, ultimately, helped shape the film. I don’t think there were any bombshell findings. But it was surprising to find out that multi-million dollar campaigns were sold with verbal ideas and sketches on bar napkins. Today’s world of RFPs and brand strategies would never allow that.

Your film is just under 11 minutes. What made you decide that was the perfect amount of time?

This was easily the longest interview I’ve ever filmed. There were countless stories that we cut for time in favor of not bogging the viewer down with dates and events. It was Matt’s idea to name the film David Bartels’ Fifteen Minutes, an homage to Warhol.

For that reason, we only wanted to focus on the stories that would make someone “world-famous.” Matt and I workshopped this storyline for a year between other projects. We boiled it down to the stories that held the greatest weight and had the biggest impact on culture. I jokingly refer to Bartels as the “Forest Gump of Advertising,” because he has had so much impact, but he’s so unassuming and unknown.

Who did the animation for the film, and can you talk about your approach?

I spent hours researching different styles on Vimeo, Dribbble and Behance. Because of David’s role as an art director from the late-’60s through the ’00s, he definitely went through an evolution of styles. Originally, we had planned to hire several animators to bring his stories to life in a variety of styles. This would create a bit of a mish-mash of techniques to illustrate his work. Ultimately, we decided to animate it in one style for the simplicity of working with a single animator and ensuring that the visuals all held the same high-production value.

I came across animator Lucas Schwantes online and fell in love with his style. His work is reminiscent of Saul Bass mixed with Terry Gilliam. It felt in line with the work of an art director who came up in the Mad Men era.

Working with Lucas was 100 percent remote. I would clip assets and lay them out in Photoshop, then send them to Lucas to animate. I would put these elaborate and prescriptive Word documents together to explain what I wanted in each scene.

How did you fund this project?

This project was done under the umbrella of Retriever, my production company. We utilized cameras and lenses that had just been used on a client production and weren’t due back to the rental house yet. We also asked for favors from the crew that we work with often. I spent hundreds of hours searching for images, cutting them out, writing up directives and on phone calls. So, lots of sweat equity and a little bit of cash outlay over the period of a few years made it a palatable expense.

Any words of encouragement to offer to aspiring short filmmakers?

Just get out there and make it! This documentary was made as a passion project. We begged, borrowed and stole—figuratively—to make it happen. From the beginning of principal photography to the final cut, it took a little over three years. This was because we were calling in favors and working on the project in our down time.

My advice: Who cares how long it takes? Write that screenplay, film that idea, dream up, invent, create! The sky’s the limit.