My Day Of Play Crazy Unedited Talks With Alison Weissbrot And Astronaut Leland Melvin

Welcome back to the studio.  This is My Day of Play, where you’re taken into the real events and actions of how it happens long before the process of editing or cleaning up.  This episode takes us to February 10, 2025.  The top subject was the newly unveiled Superbowl commercials. We begin things with Adweeks chief content officer Alison Weissbrot. Then we’ll wrap things up with not just another brilliant storyteller but and astronaut and researcher…the legendary Leland Melvin This is My Day of Play.  Monday February 10, 2025 completely unedited in the way of meeting the wizard behind the curtain.  

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Speaker 1: How many times have you wandered into Barnes and Noble

or even onto Amazon dot com and you see this

incredible book right there in front of you. In fact,

Audible is guilty of this as well. You have this

incredible book, but you know nothing about the author. Oh

it might be their voice on Audible, but is it them?

That's why we created view from the Writing Instrument on

ero dot net A R r oe dot net. Don't

just read the words from the author, get to know

them are dot net Enjoy your exploration. Yeah, what's going on?

Welcome back to the studio. This is my day of Play,

where you're taking into the really vincent actions of how

it goes down before the process of editing or cleaning up.

This episode takes us back to February tenth, twenty twenty five.

The subject was the newly unveiled Super Bowl commercials. So

we begin things with Adweek's chief content officer, Allison wei Sprat.

Then we're gonna wrap things up with not just another

brilliant storyteller, but an as not and a researcher, the

legendary Leland Melvin. This is My Day of Play. Monday,

February tenth, twenty twenty five, completely unedited in the way

of meeting the wizard behind the curtain. Good morning, Good morning, everybody,

Happy Monday.

Speaker 2: Hey, what's up Barrow? Hey? What's up with you two?

Speaker 3: Hey?

Speaker 2: Well, we're just talking commercials.

Speaker 4: One of my favorite things to talk about a broken record.

Speaker 2: I gotta be honest with you. I'm with you on

that because because I write, produce and direct commercials. I mean,

it really is. I mean, there was a game yesterday. No,

I went to a commercial party, is what I went to.

Speaker 4: Yeah, that's what I did.

Speaker 5: I barely watched one second of the game, but it

was a bad game anyway.

Speaker 2: So I got to start things off Allison with one question.

Do the commercials set the tone of the nation or

is it a reflection of our nation?

Speaker 5: I think that's a really interesting question. I think it's both.

I think we're of a reflection though this year. And

I think we say that a lot this year because

you have, yeah, just a lot of bland sort of

ads that, you know, a lot of slaps to humor,

a lot of tropes like babies, baby animals, kids that

aren't going to rock the boat.

Speaker 4: And you know, we live in a pretty divided in time.

Speaker 5: So if you're trying to reach one hundred million viewers

at the same time, you really have to be careful

with what message you're putting out, and you really you

can't say much at all.

Speaker 2: Well, the one that I can't digest yet is the

Disney one where it says when when every second didn't count?

And it really it stopped my heart and because it's

like that is the one statement we have never been told,

because it's always been every second counts, and they said

didn't count.

Speaker 4: Yeah, I really liked that ad.

Speaker 5: I thought they did a great job of sort of

showing how much Disney's ip has just shaped our culture

and like what would life be like without you know,

Elsa singing Frozen or Star Wars.

Speaker 4: Like I really I thought they did a good job

with it.

Speaker 2: One of the things that I've been reading about lately

are what these actors go through knowing that the world

is watching and all of these armchair chair quarterbacks and

critics are sitting here going I'm going to judge you

in this commercial, this thirty second ad, and I'll never

forget what you did to it. For instance, like Channing

Tatum in the Cold Brew.

Speaker 5: M Yeah, I mean, I get that, But on the

other hand, I'm like these celebrities, like, when you become

such a public facing person, you're sort of putting your

life out there and your work out there to be judged.

Speaker 4: So I think they'll survive.

Speaker 5: I think Channing Tatum's got, you know, some some things

going for him.

Speaker 4: He'll get over it.

Speaker 2: Do you remember the days when Roku was that thing

that weird people watched. Most people didn't even know what

it was.

Speaker 4: Yes, I sure do.

Speaker 2: I mean just for them to be on the Super Bowl,

I sat there going, oh my god. You know, it

was like, I'm part of that generation that was here

before it was here, I know.

Speaker 5: And that's sort of you know, We've been talking about

this on a few other stations this morning, but that's

sort of why you see a lot of the ads

now released before the game, because it really is hard

to capture everyone in a TV broadcast these days, and

if you're trying to reach younger audiences, you have to

be doing things across platform. So it's not just that

thirty or sixty seconds that the brand is trying to maximize.

It's what are you doing on social media? How are you,

you know, reaching a cohort. That's not necessarily actually watching

the broadcast.

Speaker 2: Only because I have sat down with many business owners

when it comes to writing and producing commercials. I really

felt heavy in the heart after quarter number two because

all of those millions of dollars that people tuned out

of after that second quarter.

Speaker 5: Yeah, it's really interesting. And this is actually a discussion

we were having our in our war room last night

when we were covering all the ads together at the office,

is if the game is a blowout like it was

last night, then does that impact your ROI I think

a lot of people were probably like leaving Super Bowl

parties at halftime last night, and only really, if you

aired your ad in Philadelphia, you're probably good to go.

But yeah, it does sort of diminish the impact when

the game isn't as interesting.

Speaker 2: I think the best joke I heard last night was

that the reason why people didn't understand the lyrics from

Kendrick Lamar is because he was mumbling them. He was

trying to get through them quickly so that they didn't

lose any advertising viewers.

Speaker 4: I hadn't heard that one, but yeah, that could be

the case. They were told him, you know, hurry up.

Speaker 2: And What is it about Eugene Levy that we always

find funny? I mean, seriously, I remember when he was

just a young dude.

Speaker 5: I mean, he's just iconic, right, and he's kind of

one of these actors that's really like blossomed in his

in his older age. I think ever since Shit's Creek,

he's just been like really top of mind. And you know,

an interest trend that we noticed last night was there.

We sort of dubbed it the Silver Bowl. There were

a lot of older celebrities featured throughout the ads, whereas

in previous years you get a lot of gen Z,

you get a lot of TikTok.

Speaker 4: Creators and stuff like that. So I thought that was

interesting too.

Speaker 2: Does Matthew McConaughey fall into that silver zone? Has he?

Has he reached that area yet?

Speaker 4: You know, he's probably close.

Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean he's been around, so he's not quite

Harrison Ford age, but I think he's getting there.

Speaker 2: But you know what, though, when it comes to branding, though,

he would be that guy I would always go to

because I swear to God, he's making more money through

advertising than he is in movies.

Speaker 5: Yeah, well that's the thing I think, you know, you

see so many celebrities in these ads, and I think,

on the one hand, for them, it's kind of like

easy money, right, Like you don't have to like film

a whole movie or you know, uproot yourself like a

lot of these, A lot of these are shot in LA.

It's probably just like a couple of days of their time,

and they make a lot of money off of it.

Speaker 2: My wife and I both agree that our favorite commercial

angel Soft.

Speaker 5: Yeah, I thought that was really clever. The only thing

that they kind of got wrong with the execution.

Speaker 4: Though, is thirty seconds is not long enough for a.

Speaker 2: Bathroom, right, Yeah? Yeah, And that's you know, the average

listener does not understand thirty seconds is thirty seconds. I

remember being in that studio many, many, many times with

advertisers as well as my sales department, and it's going

thirty one and thirty two seconds and you're trying to

shave off that time. My god, how do you guys

do it for the Super Bowl commercials?

Speaker 4: Yeah?

Speaker 5: I mean I don't make the Super Bowl commercials, I

just write about them. But I would imagine that those

decisions of what millisecond to cut are very hotly debated

in many a you know, post production conference room or

wherever those things happen.

Speaker 2: I think a real commercial that I saw yesterday that

I really I want to go back and study because

I and you can take it out into the community.

Nerd wallet is in touch. There was a total connection

with me with this commercial. Yeah.

Speaker 4: I think they actually they did a really good job.

Speaker 5: I mean they had a talking animal, which is one

of the tropes that we see a lot in Super

Bowl ads, which is actually was voiced by Kuran Culkin,

which is also kind of the moment. And yeah, I

thought that the their blend of sort of like awkward humor,

it landed.

Speaker 2: So now I would love to know what you guys

do with with your research, because the people that paid

all of the money to be on the Super Bowl,

what about the ROI the return of investment they've get.

There's got to be something they get out of this

knowing that that the networks got some money. Yeah.

Speaker 5: I mean it is the biggest stage as a brand

you're going to get all year, and there are diminishing

places to get mass awareness. Right in front of a big,

tuned in audience that's all watching the same thing at

the same time. Those big water cooler moments are just

becoming more fewer and further between, and this fragmented media

ecosystem and landscape that we live in, So I actually

think moments like this Super Bowl become even more valuable

and it's not really something you can measure the next day,

right Like, I mean, you can see how many people

talked about the ad and did we get any new

website visitors and things like that, But it's really the

halo effect, right of Like millions of people have heard

of Nerve wallet, for instance, now, and that has value

and there's not as many places to do that anymore.

Speaker 2: I would like to be in a meeting today with

Go Daddy because you know, first of all, if I

was anybody in Hollywood, I would get my hands on

Walter Goggins and I would try to figure out how

to make a show out of this, because you know,

extend the Go Daddy presence in a sitcom or something.

Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean people love him. It's also a

really big departure for Go Daddy. I don't know if

you remember their past Super Bowl ads were pretty raunchy. Yeah,

so this was a different a different approach for them,

and I'm curious to see if it worked.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and I would like to see what's going to

happen with Mountain Dew with the Seal serenade, because I

mean to physically have Seal in it. It took me

a second to realize, Holy crap, that's Seal. That's who's

in this commercial.

Speaker 4: That was Seal as a singing Seal.

Speaker 5: That was probably one of the most memorable images of

the night. I wouldn't be surprised if I open up

Instagram and I'm flooded with memes of Seal as a Seal.

Speaker 4: But yeah, I think in.

Speaker 5: Terms of like the shock value and the humor, I

think they was it was odd, but they landed it.

Speaker 2: I know that we talked about Eugene Levy being part

of the Silver Generation, but somebody who is probably looked

upon as being it. But I will never look at

her as being part of the Silver Generation. Martha Stewart

with Uber Eats. I love Martha Stewart so badly.

Speaker 4: I know.

Speaker 5: I mean, she's fantastic, and so even to just have

her show up in and ad for three seconds, like

I feel like you won.

Speaker 2: You know, do you like the way that David Beckham

kind of made fun of himself because I mean, well,

here's another guy that you know, he was so serious

when we were first introduced to him, but now he's

that guy that is kind of like Michael Bolton. They

just kind of laugh at themselves.

Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I think also another one who laughed at

himself is the duncan Ad with then applet. Yeah, Jeremy, So,

I think it's kind of fun to see these like

really intense actors and athletes and they're sort of in

this new era of fame and they just play ridiculous

versions of themselves and kind of poke fun at themselves,

and I think that's fun for people to see.

Speaker 2: Would you say that the best thing and the best

way to digest these commercials is hold on wait for

about two or three weeks because these commercials are going

to play over and over again. Make your judgment three

weeks from now. Don't make it now because there was

other things going on in your life last night that

interfered with your love for commercials.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Speaker 5: I think there's something about the first time seeing something

that's really valuable. But I also think like it's going

to depend on how heavily they run these ads in

the next few weeks and months, right, because there's nothing

more annoying than when you get the same ad like

every single ad break, so that could wear people down.

Speaker 2: Yeah, you got to come back to this show because

I love talking commercials and man, you know your game.

Speaker 4: Girl, Well, you can have me back anytime.

Speaker 2: Will you be brilliant today? Okay, thank you.

Speaker 1: Please do not move. There's more on the way with

astronaut and researcher Leland Melvin. Thank you so much for

coming back to my day of play. Let's get into

that talk with an authortic astronaut. It's Leland Melvin. Hello

and happy Monday, everybody.

Speaker 3: Happy Monday.

Speaker 2: Arrow.

Speaker 5: I'm here with Leland Melvin for Space Chasers. Let me

put you through.

Speaker 2: Okay, thank you so much, thank you. Hello, How doing fantastic?

How are you doing, Leland?

Speaker 3: I'm great. Too much screaming last night from the super Bowl.

Speaker 2: That's what it's all about, though, That's what it's all about.

We got to start things off by by speaking directly

to young adults and in the way of saying, if

you if your imagination is creating it, be like Leland

and follow it, build upon it, you know, exp because

that's the one thing that I love about studying you

is the fact that you just don't say no.

Speaker 3: You know, that's funny erro. I mean, my parents were

middle school teachers, but they gave us everything, panel lessons,

clarinet lessons. My mom gave me a camera when I

was a kid, and I made her laundry room into

a development area that's made all the clothes smell like fixer.

So they feel that curiosity to me at a very

early age, and I think more kids need to have that.

But if they don't have that at home, maybe they

can get through the Space Chasers. Maybe they can see

themselves on the cover and say, maybe I can do

this too.

Speaker 2: Even as an adult, I can relate with this book

Space Chasers, because it reminds me so much of my

own childhood. And to me, this book right here is

going to open up imaginations in the way of saying,

I want to go to space, and these people are

just real, down to earth, everyday people and they're going

to go exactly.

Speaker 3: And I think having the dog element in there too,

kids love dogs and cats and animals, so having them

go up to the International Space Station and pick up

my dogs and help bring them back home it's pretty

cool too.

Speaker 2: So now one of the things that instantly I think

of when I was reading the book is I go,

this would make a great series on Netflix, Hulu or

even Nickelodeon. Are you in the toxic for something like that.

Speaker 3: I haven't got to that point yet, but I'm ready, ero,

if you want to sign me up, All ready to go.

Speaker 2: Did it feel like that you were stepping back into

space by sharing this story?

Speaker 3: I really did, because you know, Joe my co co writer,

and Alison Acton, who's the illustrator, you know, when we

have these conversations, these email threads, it really did take

me back. And one of the pictures in the book

is of a sunrise and the kids are out doing

a space walk looking at the sunrise, and you know,

you see a sunrise in the sunset every forty five minutes,

and it just really blows your mind when you think

about how fast you're moving in our planet below us,

and how we're all connected.

Speaker 2: See, and it's so fascinating because I was that kid,

and I would love to find out what you were

like as a kid in the way I would tip

the doghouse over step inside was headed to the moon

dude stoopy style, right, that's exactly it. Man, How did

you move through the desire to be up in space?

Speaker 3: My mom gave me an agent appropriate non OSHA certifying

chemistry set, and I blew up her living room. So

they got me into chemistry. And then my dad drove

her a bread truck into our driveway and he said,

this is our camper. And it was just a hollow

bread truck. And that summer we turned it into a

recreational vehicle. So building bunk bed to flip down mechanical engineering,

Coleman Stove's chemical engineering. I was learning all this stuff

as a kid, and you know this got me on

a path to thinking about science and engineering. I played

some NFL time, pulled a hamstring, so I didn't follow

that journey. But the whole teamwork thing, working with other

people in NASS led me to applying to become an

astronaut and I got in.

Speaker 2: Speaking of that teamwork, that is very evident in this

book right here, in this age where we want to

do things all by ourselves around some sort of gaming

thing where we just speak to each other, this book

is about working together as a team.

Speaker 3: Yeah, a lot of the kids in this book, they

know believe in themselves at times, and you know that

imposter syndrome, especially Tia, who doesn't really go to school

much because her parents aren't in her life and she

works as a mechanic in her brother's auto mechanic shop.

But you know, with the other kids and me trying

to tell her that you do have the right stuff,

she ends up saving the day on the International Space Station.

So enough of that, you know, grit and resilience that

you can drive into kids now is shown through this book.

Speaker 2: There's so much simplicity in it, and yet I honor it.

One of the scenes that really kind of opened up

my heart was the fact that the girl who doesn't

have a pencil and a friend lends her the pencil.

That to me warmed my heart because I don't see

a lot of that anymore.

Speaker 3: It's so much competition to be the best and we

we and you know, as astronauts you have to share,

you have to work together or it's perilous in space

and so you don't maybe make it home if you

don't share. And I think that's something that I want

kids to see in this book, that they become close

knit friends, team members, and they look out for each other.

Speaker 2: I recently did an interview with a woman who wrote

a books talking about how how important it is to

just be weird, and one of the things that really

caught me off guard was the fact that she said

astronauts are weird people and happy about that because they're

weird about space. They're weird about science, they're weird about

being up in space, because why do you go to

the bathroom up there? I mean, it's just do you

feel weird?

Speaker 3: I started out being weird when I blew my mother's

living room up because I was a scientist. And nerds

back in the day, you know that we get they

would get. You know, I don't know if you know

what a melvin is, but when someone grabs your underwear

pulls because you're a nerd and they mess with you

and do things with you. But nerds through the world,

and so being a nerd back then with a blurred

a black nerd. But being a nerd is cool these days.

And I think kids realize that you know, knowing how

to solve problems, do tech things, play video games. All

this stuff has a tech edge to it, and that's

what we use to go to space and go to

the millon of Mars. So that's the future being a

weird nerd.

Speaker 2: The book we're talking about is Space Chasers. I know

that Jeff Bezos of those guys are trying to put

real people up thereto into space. But the thing is, though,

is that your book allows kids to believe in themselves.

Because I'm not seeing too many young adults coming off

from jeffsa and little jets. So I mean, you at

least give us belief and hope to be up there.

Speaker 3: Well, that's what we all need, right that belief and

hope and a more positive and enlightened future for everyone.

Speaker 2: What about AI technology, because I've heard that rumor that

they're going to put robots on Mars before, man, I

would rather see a man or a woman up there first.

Speaker 3: Well, we've had robots up there for a very long time, curiosity,

the sojourner, and you know, they're the emissaries for getting

us to see where the places are that we want

to live. And so that's fine to send them out first.

I mean, that's great, but we need the heart and

the mind and the soul of people to make decisions

real time without you know, without a machine doing it,

and there's no whether the machine can give us what

it feels like, what it tastes like, what it's like,

a human.

Speaker 2: Being can even with my it makes it makes you

I get it, but I don't when I listened to

it though, I just feel like this sounds windy all

the time, and to me it just falsifies the situation.

Speaker 3: And you can't get the Martian dust and you have

to clean yourself off with the vr gog.

Speaker 2: So true, but you do believe that that young adults

are interested in space, right, because I mean so many

times people say, ah, no, people don't need believe in

space anymore, and it's like, are you kidding me?

Speaker 3: Well, all the flat earthers that come up to me

and not to tell them, you know, we did a

distance facees a distance face. But I think kids are,

you know, innately curious, especially at these middle grade ages,

and you don't want them to get turned off to

the tech and science and things. But have them see

what it's possible for even kids to go to space

one day with dogs.

Speaker 2: Yes, yes, especially you know because I was a child

when those dogs went up all by themselves, and I

realized the full story of that. But the fact of

the matter is it told me as a kid that

we can all go up into space exactly.

Speaker 3: And that's the message from space chasers. We're all possible

and capable of doing these incredible things if we work

together as a team.

Speaker 2: Did you feel like a kid when that when that

drone was flying around up there on Mars?

Speaker 3: I've always thought a kid. Yes, we have to, because

if a kid sees an adult acting like a kid

and doing stupid things, fun things, it will bring them

along and let them know that it's okay to be

weird and to be a nerd and all of that,

and that you can do these great things if you

have that same type of mindset.

Speaker 2: So they always say that we have our normal calendar age,

and then we have the age that our mind, body,

and soul believe that we are. I always tell people

I'm still seventeen years old. What is your inner inner

core age?

Speaker 3: Probably thirteen?

Speaker 2: Yes, And that's why this book is here, isn't it,

Because that's thirteen year old? Put this book together exactly.

You did this in math class man.

Speaker 3: Oh it's too funny, right, you got me?

Speaker 2: Where can people go to find out more about you? Leland,

because you really do have an authentic story here.

Speaker 3: I'm a website lelandlova dot com. I have activities for

kids to do in a section called stemography, and you know,

you can google and see some things I've done online.

But I think the main thing is to let them

know that anything is possible. Believe in yourself, and if

I can go to space, you can go to space.

Speaker 2: I love it. Please come back to the show anytime

in the future. The door is always going to be

open for you.

Speaker 3: Thank you, Eric. Look forward to it.

Speaker 2: Will you be brilliant today? Okay, sir?

Speaker 3: Yes, sir thirteen years old, Yes, yes, my guy.