It's approaching 10 pm in London and John Spary is at the office, sitting at his desk, burning the midnight oil. For many production companies and agencies, he's a go-to person for directors; his company, John Spary Associates, reps more than 50 throughout Europe and the rest of the world. At this particular moment there are 80 boards piled on his desk, 30 of which originated in Eastern Europe.

In particular, Russia's growing economy is keeping European and North American directors busy as the amount of work that agencies in Moscow are churning out far exceeds the number of Russian directors working the local market. "One day I had seven boards in from Russia, though it's usually more like a board or two per day," says Spary. "A lot of board flow is coming from the eastern bloc right now." He estimates his directors have completed 80 shoot days in Russia since the beginning of the year, accounting for 30% of JSA's business. Meanwhile, the country's top production house - Park Productions - shoots upwards of 100 spots per year and new prodcos are regularly opening in Moscow.

"It's a place where a director can build a showreel surprisingly well and surprisingly quickly," says Spary. Still, young directors aren't the only ones boarding flights to Moscow. In November, Wim Wenders of Saville Productions helmed an American Express spot for Russian TV through Propaganda Ogilvy, and last year Jim Sheridan of Moxie Pictures directed an ad for Cheerios for Saatchi & Saatchi, New York.

But unlike many regions that court foreign talent to shoot on their shores, Russia isn't a magnet for production services. That's because its locations are, well, very Russian. Instead, local advertisers generate enough work to keep prodcos and agencies on their toes, and as a result, create a production boon for foreign directors.

CASTING CALL FOR DIRECTORS
At the forefront of this boom is BBDO in Moscow. As one of the country's biggest agencies, it produces roughly 250 TV spots a year for its Russian clients alone.

"Clients here are getting bigger and spending more and more money on advertising," says Elena Gazhevskaya, head of TV production at BBDO Moscow. Such additional resources mean agencies can afford to look beyond the country's borders for directing talent. BBDO is also increasingly shooting abroad, most recently in Toronto, Germany and Budapest to complete a series of jobs for one of Russia's most prolific advertisers (and spenders), Mars.

Increased money is not the only reason foreign talent has become so appealing to Russian agencies. Gazhevskaya cites a lack of local directors as a prime culprit, a problem exacerbated by a renaissance in the Russian film industry, which lures potential directors to the film world. "I could [only] name 10 local Russian directors I would work with. There are new, young directors, but talent takes some time to develop and the industry is young."

Producers, on the other hand, are a different story. Much like the rest of the production universe, many in Russia's production industry started out as PAs in the 1990s and worked their way up, albeit rapidly. Ilya Medovy, a 26-year-old producer with Just Productions, has lived in the United States and worked all over the world but is perfectly happy in Moscow where he says anyone with talent and drive can succeed quickly.

"A lot of people are interested, outgoing, expressive and young. The industry is growing very fast," says Medovy, who just completed post-production on the Amex job with Wenders. "I don't think it would be realistic for someone my age to be a producer in the US or the UK but I can in Russia."

The director shortage is good news for non-Russian directors like American tabletop specialist Ben Dolphin. A former dance choreographer, New York-based Dolphin has shot 15 spots for the Russian market in the past two years as a freelancer, and is considering renting an apartment in Moscow. "It's terrific. There's a professional attitude among the production companies and the work ethic is do or die," he says.

Dolphin has watched the demand for advertising drive up the level of professionalism among crews. When he lands a job in Moscow, he orders lights and camera equipment early to ensure availability in a busy market, though prodcos are increasingly buying the specialty cameras that tabletop shoots require. Shortages of seasoned specialists are common, so Dolphin routinely brings in food stylists and other key crew members if the most experienced people are booked.

When asked about location shooting in Moscow, Dolphin laughs knowingly. Traffic is a nightmare and there's no film infrastructure outside Moscow or St. Petersburg. Bureaucracy is also an issue. "We were shooting this commercial where I was preparing to shoot a complex shot from a crane over a car and all of a sudden the police came and said you have to be out in 20 minutes," he says. "We had a permit for two hours but that didn't matter, there's no conversation. Your homework prepares you for those situations."

AD CULTURE EVOLUTION
Dolphin works regularly with Brian Dapp, another ex-pat and former commercial DP who moved from Los Angeles to Moscow, where he set up Red Square Films in 2003. Dapp agrees the explosion of work has forced the industry to mature, noting that when he arrived, producers regarded pre-lights as costly and unnecessary. "I'd explain the pre-light and people looked at me like I was from Mars," he says. Now, the pre-light is commonly budgeted.

Dapp says his company, which at 12 employees is small compared to other Moscow production houses, completes an average of two sizeable jobs per month. By contrast, big Russian prodcos typically top 50 to 60 staffers, including in-house casting, post-production and audio departments, which Dapp says has to do with a legacy of scarcity. "In the beginning there was a lack of qualified people here. Where do you turn if they're not on staff?"

Gradually, that model is changing. Young producers who've worked abroad are hungry for a true freelance market that fosters an exchange of ideas. Young people are also increasingly intolerant of the industry's top-down culture of entitlement. Many people interviewed for this piece - on and off the record - expressed annoyance with company heads that must have final say over everything.

For example, Red Square did a series of spots for a sporting goods chain without going through an agency. Once the job was finished, Dapp had to present the work for approval to the president of the company who had not been involved in the process at all. Even though the cuts had been approved by everyone at the lower levels, the president ordered a different a series of cuts, seemingly on a whim. In another instance, a client ordered his marketing manager to renegotiate a lower director's fee after the job was done.

"These situations can happen anywhere but it's so typical here. It's a lackey culture. People are intimidated by their bosses and won't stick up for their ideas - not just creative ideas but also logistical planning ideas. Most agency producers in this market could not work as a PA in London or New York," says Dapp. "I quickly learned fairness and honesty are interpreted as weaknesses and now I'm a hard-ass."

THE CORRUPTION QUESTION
Dapp is also put off by "creative commissions" or kickbacks agency producers receive for rigged bids. Even though there are 10 to 15 highly capable prodcos in Moscow, Dapp says some agency producers will only bid with two or three. The price is typically around 3% to 5% of the budget and on rare occasions 10% if an intrepid producer, knowing how much a client has in his pocket, manipulates the bidding process to ensure he or she gets a bigger chunk of change, says Dapp.

"It is the policy of my company not to participate in that," he says. "However, in order to survive here, we have to. If we didn't, we'd be missing out. You can't work here without greasing somebody's palm."

Russia is considered to be among the world's most corrupt countries. The Economist calls corruption the country's "biggest problem" and Berlin's Transparency International places Russia between The Philippines and Rwanda on its Corruption Perception Index, which ranks the degree to which corruption is perceived to be a problem among public officials and police.

But while Dapp considers corruption a fact of life, other production heads say they don't participate in back-room dealing. "It doesn't influence us at all," says Oxana Mishina, managing director at DTV-MA, a nine-year-old company that shoots 50 to 60 spots per year, 80% of those with foreign directors. "We do a very good job and we are proud of the quality of our work. Ideally, of course, it would be great to have business without creative commissions."

She says corruption is endemic among government officials. And although the Kremlin is spending money to revive feature filmmaking, the producers Boards spoke to said the government largely ignores the ad business.

For Mishina, the level of Russian creativity is of greater concern than the issue of corruption. She contends that an old-school mentality pervades thinking among Russian clients, which can adversely affect the quality of the creative. She also sees a lot of copycat ideas on TV - especially when a rare gem hits the airwaves.

Mishina, who worked for 10 years as an agency group accounts director, divides Russian clients into two categories: Local offices of big international corporations and local clients. She contends that the former are usually afraid of taking risks, saying no to their bosses or straying from the in-house brand guide. The latter generally has less money and is too inexperienced to see the advantages of a good idea.

"Though sometimes the ideas are really strong," she says. "I always hear (creatives) talking about 'festival ideas' and 'non-festival ideas', but I don't know what that means. If an ad is meant to sell, why can't a 'festival idea' sell the product?"

BBDO's Elena Gazhevskaya disagrees, arguing that what attracts foreign directing talent is the quality of her agency's creative ideas. "It's very rare nowadays for local clients to run something by headquarters for approval," she says. "That was more the case six to seven years ago. A lot of clients are enjoying their independence and are a bit more adventurous."

Although foreign productions are not clamoring to shoot in Russia, Russia is coming to them. Instead of sitting around worrying about Moscow's notorious gridlock, icy temperatures or corrupt bureaucracy, good agencies are sounding the call around the globe for directing talent and prodcos' ears are perking up in Britain, South Africa, Romania, Ukraine, Germany and Canada.

Thanks to John Spary, Toronto-based director David Popescu recently traveled to Russia for the first time to shoot two Ikea spots. When he arrived, a production guy picked him up and drove him to an Ikea store. The sameness of it all was almost depressing, but strangely comforting.

"It looked exactly the same. It's the same kind of players - agency guys are the same, they're funny, they'd love to do this shot or that ending. Clients have the same concerns. You can spot the wardrobe girl because she's got groovy pants on," he says. "It's funny, you travel halfway around the world and everyone is exactly the same."

BBDO Moscow> www.bbdo.ru
DTV-MA www.dtvma.ru
John Spary Associates www.jspary.com
Just Production www.justproduction.ru
Park Productions www.parkcinema.ru
Red Square Films www.redsquarefilm.ru