Danny Ducovny of Los Angeles-based Cucoloris Films is the director behind the latest spots for Internet search engine Lycos. Ducovny shot "Scottish Bagpipes" and "Soccer" through Bozell, New York.

Both spots feature the trademark Lycos dog, a Black Labrador named "Beau." While the commercials were scheduled to be shot in England, the country's strict quarantine rules forced the production to shoot in France instead. The outskirts of Paris passed for a London setting while Normandy was used as a substitute for Scotland.

Bernard Wesson, an executive producer at Cucoloris, says that the quarantine issues were unusual.

"Very few campaigns are based on a specific dog that are international in scope. I've never heard of this issue before, and we've done a lot of different types of production," comments Wesson. "Never before did we have to literally ship a dog and a trainer to some part of the world where there would be an issue about how you can bring the dog in."

According to Cucoloris head of production Jeanne Stawiarski, shooting in England would have required that the dog be quarantined for six months.

"What they will do for you in the case of shooting," explains Stawiarski, "is that you can pay to have a quarantine site set up on set, but you have to pay huge amounts of money because it has to be supervised by an official."

The Lycos dog featured in the spots is meant to symbolize the ability of the search engine to fetch anything on behalf of the user. The tagline is: "Go get it."

"Scottish Bagpipes" shows a bagpipe player outside of a castle on an extremely windy day. He struggles to keep his kilt from blowing up, while at the same time playing the pipes. All of a sudden, the viewer sees Lycos running towards the castle with something in his mouth. The Black Lab sits in front of the bagpipe player, revealing a pair of tartan plaid boxer shorts. Saved by Lycos, the piper can continue to make music amid the windy conditions.

Stawiarski describes "Soccer", the second of two spots, that is set in an unidentified town in England.

"We see this hapless guy walking down the street wearing a yellow football jersey. Then we see this crowd of football hooligans all in red jerseys, and they're all screaming and excited. Lycos is running towards the hapless guy and he's got a red jersey in his mouth. He encourages the guy to put it on. The guy puts on the jersey just as the crowd comes around the corner. They see him and they hoist him up and carry him along with the crowd. He's saved by Lycos."

The Lycos commercials broke yesterday during Monday Night Football.

Creatives behind the campaign were senior partner and creative director Rich Levy and associate creative director Tom Millar. Mark Allen served as art director and Rick Lieberman, copywriter.

Special effects were by New York's Charlex.

Among Ducovny's credits are: "Search" and "Stock-holder" for Sprint, "Stunt Men" for Degree deodorant, and a number of spots for Lycos, including "Quick and Easy," "Dinosaur," and "Varoom."

Contacts:

http://www.bozell.com

http://www.charlex.com