I had already been in Chile for several years and I came for two years as creative director of Walter Thompson. I did another two years at Walter Thompson, and then I opened my own agency called SoCat Morrison Walker. And there I continued as a creative. In other words, the agency has grown. Walter Thompson at that time was number one, then it went down a lot. And we had a very successful Chilean agency and then all the creative work was known and well, what happens is that all my friends that I was making between creatives and those who made movies and those who took photos like Pedro or those who made music like Jaime de Aguirre, who everyone is today, they are big names, but they did their first jobs with me because there was no work. So I was giving him work from Walter Thompson of the Emergency Agency, many people who later became known in advertising. And so those were my friends. And there they invited me as a creative to work on the No campaign. My partners worked in the Yes campaign, which was like everything else; it was known, the executives and men from companies and all of them were 100 percent with Pinochet. I had to say no, because I had signed that paper that said in Pinochet’s time, foreigners who settled here had to specifically sign a paper that said they were not going to participate in politics and that helped me say no to the Yes campaign and say yes to the No campaign, but clandestinely, without it being known.
So many of us worked without anyone knowing, because you could lose your job, I would lose all my clients, my partners, everything and they would have fired me. And I remember the first meetings. They were made in a place that some priests lent, also on the coast, near Santo Domingo. And what happens is that when we went there, on the weekend, it was possible. I would stay at night and all this could be done and we worked there. And then market studies and different things were commissioned and we met when we could until the idea came out, which is the spirit of the campaign. That I, despite all that is attributed to them, I give more credit to two people who are brilliant, which is Jaime de Aguirre and Eugenio García. And I would tell you that the first line and the first note that came out was from them. Here there is a group work and everything, but the first things that took shape were from there, which is basically the music, the “let’s say No”, and all things to calm down, that spirit of reassurance that went very well collected, which came from the surveys, but the creatives who gave it the most input were the two of them. Well, I also worked with them, but I admit that they had much more experiential knowledge, of life, than I did, and that was good. Now after they began to make different pieces, practically all the film people worked. I remember because I heard the comments that the yes campaign had a hard time bringing together creatives from those who paid a fortune who were more like mercenaries.
There was another Argentine working there who earned money from him. I think he didn’t need to work anymore after that, because they did have to be paid. I remember because they, they worked with a helicopter to film, they filled the National Stadium and turned around with a helicopter and said this is pure money. But the ideas were not good and they were a threat. It was, it was that strong hand that Pinochet had and that really terrified people. Because, just as our thing is to say that it was no longer joy, joy is coming. And it was like soft, light, a little more like the Coca Cola campaign than anything else. The other was a threat that if it comes, they were, let’s see; there was the time of blacks and whites and it was either communism or the company, or to be well and development and all well-being. And those, those dichotomies never work well, because people who are not well feel that they would be much better off from the other side. Do you get me? They naturally lead you to it. And reassuring the fact of
putting the line in it was not reassuring and it came with a rainbow and joy is coming, something that later they pointed out that it was not a big deal. But the other one was threatening, he really was bad. And thus they showed the opposition as bad, bad, bad people.
And well, then we worked on various things, because we worked in a house, on the street, in golf, we stayed up late because I could only go after work. Six thirty, seven, seven thirty. And there again the credit for two commissioners who represented the parties, a little more from the left and a little more from the center. That one was Juan Gabriel Valdés, current ambassador to the United States and another Patricio Silva, he remembered a loving person and was a Christian Democrat and after, after the first government of Aylwin, he was also ambassador to the United States. They were measured, it was them, it was a little bit the ones who had to take our work and carry it, they were like the mediator with the political parties who didn’t understand much about communication either. You have to understand that before the country was looking at it, customers do not understand today and they will never understand, a creative person, someone who wants to. Sometimes they don’t understand the spirit until it’s done. And then there was a person who put together all the material and who would stay until any time putting together all the films that Ignacio Agüero did, another person who is not mentioned today either, a great documentarian, but really, really great. And he put together all, all the pieces of the campaign. For this reason, the movie movie is a kind of fantasy that makes me nervous. Nobody was like that character that the Mexican did. Nobody was like that, we were well down to earth, well down to earth, well, anyway, we were grown up, we weren’t so little, we didn’t play around.
Good. And well, a lot of discussion, each piece that was made afterwards, one that yes, there were always people who tried to put up one more thing for discussion, a fight and everything, and there were others who tried to manage and negotiate that this be nice. for there could be no stone to be laid. It had already been too bad to be able to. We had to speak well of ourselves and not bad of them. Only evil reads itself. So, of course, in some things there were discussions, there were always people who filmed on their own and brought and they had to say no, that things had to be fixed. But I would tell you that it was a great, great, great experience, that I was not able to enjoy on the 5th or at night or anything, because, well, I already have a background in Argentina, having had a very bad time and my son asked me for Please don’t go out because it was risky until then. Imagine that they were in the counting and Pinochet refused to receive the thing that he was losing and. And there were hours of waiting to see if it was accepted or not, because we had indicators that they were leaving, that it was going well. Or the celebration, they went to my house with great joy and the next day it was wonderful. Look, I remember such a fun thing in the Alameda, people would go and bring flowers to the cops because the cops were dressed the same as always, with their skunks, with their big guanacos that were throwing water and all that. But some of the rioters with Ahumada threw water and then they remained calm and the people walked towards them with their hands up and gave them flowers. And that was wonderful.