Note: This set of concepts were for the promotion and packaging of Bonnie and Clyde on the History Channel and Lifetime, for Loyalkaspar, and NYC-based entertainment marketing agency.
Bonnie and Clyde- 2 Part Miniseries
Lifetime and History
Having read your brief and the scripts for the mini-series we are excited to submit ideas for its promotion and packaging. There are many formal and emotional “hooks” in this mini series that can be leveraged in its promotion. They include:
- The main characters (Bonnie and Clyde) are folk heroes known to us all. Next to Romeo and Juliet they are the most famous “star-crossed lovers.” Unlike the Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway portrayal, there is no sexual dysfunction between the couple. The sparks fly from the moment they meet and their passion for each other is visible to everyone that sees them together.
- The couple’s depression era bank robbing spree was a strike against hard times an often unfair and cruel banking system. Their Robin Hood-like myth is especially relevant today as people feel powerless against the cavalier banking system that brought down our economy.
- The telling of Bonnie and Clyde’s story gives us a unique glimpse into the lives of these legends. It goes all the way back to their respective childhoods, surrounding the characters with rich family and community characters and reveals the hard times that shapes the adults into the legend.
- Destiny, the fates, and premonitory sight. Clyde has visions. They are angelic visitations of beauty and love (Bonnie) and gruesome foreshadowing of their fate. This gives the whole story a multi-layered feeling that the Fates are driving the characters to their legendary Destiny.
- This is a period gangster story at its core, set in depression era Texas. It is a simpler time. Romantic. The whiskey is strong, and illegal. The cars are old but beautiful. Security is decidedly low tech. Tommy guns and shotguns are the ultimate weapons and they are blazing. Despite the period setting, the script calls out a decidedly modern approach to filming the action sequences that involves extreme slow motion, and dynamic visual effects and camera moves.
TEASE PROMO
State Line.
In Bonnie and Clyde’s day states were more independent. You could rob a bank in one state and flee across the border to another to escape the law. This tease uses this fact to root the story in a simpler time.
Open on a low angle view of a winding, dusty dirt road. The camera slowly sinks towards the ground as a vintage truck lumbers up the hill. The truck, now seen to hold the entire possessions of a Depression Era family heading to California, edges out of the frame just as…
A Model A Ford goes flying right over the camera to land in the road ahead of us. Banjo-infused blue grass music blasts. The car swerves on landing kicking up a hell of a lot of dust. Someone is hanging on its running boards firing a spray of bullets from a Tommy Gun as they disappear into the distance.
The camera cranes up to eye height as several cop cars giving chase roar past in hot pursuit. The camera has now craned up and widened to reveal, at the edge of the road a sign, “KANSAS STATE LINE.” A cop car skids to a stop in the street. The deputy jumps out and stomps furiously, whipping his hat against the car.
The cop cars in the distance break off their pursuit. The Model A Ford cuts across the screen trailing a cloud of dust. Home free.
Cut to inside the Model A. Clyde turns and smiles at Bonnie. She slides across the bench seat to give him a kiss.
Cut to logo/End Tag.
“Bonnie and Clyde- a Two Part Mini Series”
TUNE IN PROMOS
Premonition
A young boy, in depression era short pants and braces, a cap and drooping socks walks down a dirt road through a twilight country landscape. The amber sky silhoettes trees and buildings on the horizon. The boy approaches a 1930s Model suspended in a luminous pool of light.
Though we never see his full face, his eyes, the curl of his mouth, the careful way he approaches the car speaks of his awe and wonder. He circles the car timidly. Awkwardly reaching out to touch its round sensuous fender. A flash of light- a beautiful blonde, the curve of her inner thigh.
The boy pulls his hand away quickly, startled. He doesn’t run though. He continues around to the front of the car. It’s gleaming grill. He reaches out and touches the teardrop headlight. Another flash. A smile, the nape of the blonde woman’s neck cranes to meet his embrace. Flash back to the boy- but he’s no longer a boy. It is a young, virile man in fine clothes. He caresses the car. A grinding moan jazz saxophone builds. The blonde woman swoons. His hand glides along the fender, the woman writhes. The young man slides over the wheels towards the passenger compartment.
Suddenly. The sultry jazz is overtaken by an explosive drum solo. The boy now, stands by the passenger door- it is riddled with bullets. His hand reaches out to touch one of the deep holes. Flash cuts of bloody bodies writhing in a firestorm. The boy recoils. Blood seeps from the holes of the Model A.
The boy runs off into the night. Terrified. The light on the Model A goes out.
Cut to logo/End Tag.
“Bonnie and Clyde- a Two Part Mini Series”
The Interview
A woman’s hands (PJ- though we never see her) sets out a period radio microphone onto a table in the foreground of a small town barbershop, circa 1933. She is there to conduct some interviews with normal people on the growing legends of Bonnie and Clyde. She identifies the date, report, location, etc. as the first subject sits down.
One seasoned farmer, a grisled but now clean shaven visage- worn hard by years of work in the sun speaks first. He recounts how he witnessed a bank robbery by the Barrow Gang. He says he knows that “what they’s doing isn’t right” but he lost his farm to foreclosure and is barely scraping by working on his cousin’s spread. He’s no friend to the bank.
As the first subject is finishing, an uptight church going woman just getting her son out of the chair, can contain herself no longer. She says something snied about Bonnie Parker being a Jezebel straight from the gates of Hell, and that the sooner the law sends her back there the better. The reporter invites her to sit down and tell her more. She modestly obliges. She goes on about the adulterous relationship, the stealing, the murder, and the ten commandments. PJ quizzes her on whether she is at all intrigued by a woman following her heart, without a care for what society thinks. The woman says, “decidedly not. She is a God fearing woman.”
Suddenly a roar of a bank siren, squealing tires followed by machinegun fire and cop cars giving chase erupts outside. All the barbers and their clients rush to the window. The Church going woman pauses a moment, but then is overcome by the thrill and rushes to the window too.
PJ’s POV. She follows the crowd to the window just in time to get a glimpse of a Packard squealing past with two squads in hot pursuit. PJ looks at the Church going woman, who is flush with excitement.
PJ, “No interest whatsoever maam?”
The woman struggles to gain her composure, and pushes the microphone away from her face.
Her son speaks, “Wait I till Poppa that we saw the real Bonnie and Clyde.”
His uptight mom grabs him by the ear and twists, pulling him out the door. “You will do no such thing young man.”
Close up on PJ. A wry smile.
Cut to logo/End Tag.
“Bonnie and Clyde- a Two Part Mini Series”
Foreclosure
A family of Oakies and their neighbors are being evicted by a stern, heartless bank manager. He reads a formal declaration and posts a sign on the door saying that he is seizing the farm for non-payment of mortgage.
A weather-beaten farmer, looking 60 but likely in his early 40s huddles with his wife, taking a small dirty child from her arms. “But where we gonna go? This farm been in my family for nearly 100 years.”
The bank manager, having done this scores of times now, and enjoyed it a bit too much, smiles coldly. “Well I don’t rightly know where you gonna go. But you got 15 minutes to get off this property or everything in your possession, including that there jalopy will become bank property.”
Suddenly a teenage boy steps out of the barn holding a double-barrel shotgun. “Step aside Daddy. I’ll show him.”
The banker begins to sweat. Looks to the police escort. The policeman reaches for his pistol. The Farmer speaks, “Now Son, that won’t do no good.”
The boy raises the shotgun anyway. “They ain’t getting our farm today Daddy.”
Suddenly, the tense scene is disrupted by a Packard thundering down the dirt road in front of the farm, followed shortly by three police cars in hot pursuit.
Everyone gawks. An onlooker speaks. “I declare, I believe that there is Bonnie and Clyde.” Everyone rushes to the fence to look. Only the Farmers family, the banker, and the teen with the gun remain on the porch.
The policeman runs off to his car to join the chase. The Banker yells after him, “Get back here you fool. We ain’t done.”
The Policeman, as he jumps into his car and peels away, “The farm will be here tomorrow. I’m gonna catch me a Bonnie and Clyde.”
The Banker, now feeling very insecure, eyes the teen with the gun. “This doesn’t change anything.”
“It does for today. This farm is still ours and I advise you to get off it while you can still walk.” The Banker considers challenging him, but sees the neighbors closing in and bolts. He is halfway down the drive when the teen shoots off one, then the other barrel, into the air. The Banker ducks, falls, and scrambles back to his feet running down the road.
Cut to logo/End Tag.
“Bonnie and Clyde- Dead and Alive”
LAUNCH SPOTS
Bank Robbery
A young boy, holding onto his mom’s hand, and flanked by his older brother, make their way across a street in a small town depression era. They are heading to a bank on the corner. The young boy notices a car parked near the entrance, its motor running. He squints, but he can’t see the driver. His mom enters the bank. The boy resists. Something makes him not want to enter.
Inside the bank, full of atmosphere and quiet. The family makes their way to the teller, as the camera swings around to a dolly pull move in front of the boy. The camera pushes into the boys eyes, and they widen, the camera pulls back to reveal.
Ultra slow motion a bank robbery by the Barrow gang. The boys eyes roll back into his head as shotguns and tommy guns blaze, Windows shatter, cash flies, patrons cower. The boy turns to see, instead of his older brother at 12, his brother in his late twenties brandishing a Tommy Gun.
He looks up, instead of his mother, Bonnie, in full gangster mode smiles back at him. She pulls his hand, bringing the adult Clyde up onto the tellers barrier. He hops the partition and grabs the satchel of money. They turn, flee, and are followed shortly by the bank guard. The door slams shut- returning the boy to the present.
Mom, “Well, what do you mean that’s all there is. There must be a bit more.”
Teller, “I’m sorry Maam. Would you like to speak to the bank manager?” “No. No. Let’s go Clyde.”
Cut to:
Bonnie and Clyde – Dead and Alive.
MAINTITLE
The script calls for a black screen, with the sound of two hearts beating, as the opening minutes of the film. This is the moment that Bonnie and Clyde realize that the game is up and they are about to be ambushed. Another way to express and extend these poetic final moments in the lives of these legendary figures is through a dramatic, and ultra-slow-motion tableaux.
Two heartbeat in time. Inside the Model A there is darkness. A searching light illuminates small details in crisp detail, very shallow focus before they slip into darkness. Titles slip in and out of the light.
- The dust rising from the mohair upholstery.
- The hard surface of the enameled steering wheel clenched by Clydes hand.
- The second hand on the car’s clock clicks forward.
- Bonnie’s chest heaves with her last breaths.
- Clyde turns to gaze into her eyes.
- Clyde’s hand brushes across his revolver
- Rain drips slowly down the windshield.
- Bonnie slides up next to Clyde. Her skirt hiking up.
Cut to:
“Bonnie,” “Clyde.”
KEY ART
Bleeding Ink
This one sheet plays off the lust for fame and glory that possessed Bonnie and the tragic foresight possessed by Clyde. In a recreation of the famous pose against their stole Packard, the couple brandishes their weapons and hug each other. The photo graces the front page of a small town newspaper, under the headline Bonnie and Clyde strike again.
The newspaper, however, featuring the couples picture and details of their latest exploit is on the ground, half in a pothole near the tire of a vintage car. It has begun to soak through and the ink halftone image of the couple smears in a foreboding way.
Lenticular Posters
Using the Lenticular technology we create 3D wanted posters and ones that feature multiple images.
- Clyde – a wanted poster using a police line up image- which reveals an image of Clyde as a kid, staring forward as if he sees the future described in the other image.
- Bonnie- A wanted poster using a police line image- which is doubled up with her fantasy image of her career on the stage, and, if possible, her pose with a pistol on the front of the Packard.
- Buck- All bravado with his sawed off shotguns, and bandoliers. Combined with Buck as a kid- so innocent.
- Emma- With her young daughter, so full of hope and promise. Combined with an image of her reading the latest account of her daughter’s exploits in the newspaper, surrounded by the “clucking hens.”