Story Board

I didn't like their choice of the little boy for the ad, and I said so in the first meeting. There was something about his eyes that seemed more sly than happy. He looked like a teamster winking at a mayor who'd just paid him off to keep trucks rolling through Scranton.

“The head's too big,” I told McCavity, head of Creative.  “He looks like a baby George Meany.”

“Whoozat?” asked Redondo, our summer intern.

“Jezzus, have you even started shaving yet?” McCavity barked. He didn't like interns butting into conversations. Slowed things down, always having to explain cultural references.

“I agree,” he said. “Head's too… something. Square maybe?”

Schvartz from Art coughed politely. Heads turned.

“That's actually from a photograph of the Bossman's nephew,” Schvartz  rasped. He had a smoker's cough with a smoker's throat to match.

“Aww, shit,” McCavity said, slapping a meaty hand on a half-eaten Danish, by mistake. Then, “Aww, shit,” when he couldn't find his napkin. Redondo rushed to give him one.

Everyone turned to study the storyboard.

Ethel the Account Manager suggested that we lighten the kid's hair and add more orange to the spaghetti sauce to deflect attention away from the  oversized noggin. A few people mumbled, said they'd run it up the flagpole.  McCavity, wiping cream cheese and cherries from his shirt cuff, added, “And while you're at it, add meatballs to the plate, or the family dog begging under the table.  Or a pretty mother with tits.”