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Storyboard display created by advertising agency Chiat/Day and given to Apple's Marketing Communications (Marcom) department before the launch of Apple Computer’s iconic ‘1984’ television commercial, which famously introduced the Macintosh computer to a national audience during Super Bowl XVIII on January 22, 1984. Presented on a black 22 x 36 posterboard, the display consists of eight color photostat images from the original hand-drawn ‘1984’ storyboard, with seven measuring 4 x 3 and the largest, which depicts a line of people marching through a long tunnel, measuring 16.75 x 13.75. The lower portion bears an affixed label with the Apple rainbow logo and printed text: “On January 19th, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like ‘1984.’” In fine condition, with peeling to the photostat images, one of which is missing, and some bumping to posterboard edges.
This very display can be seen in an excerpt from an Apple promotional video that features an interview with the commercial’s famed director, Ridley Scott, who offered his thoughts upon first viewing of the storyboard: ‘The board, I thought, was one of two things. I thought, my god, they’re mad because this is terrific from a filmic point of view, and I know exactly how to do a kind of pastiche on what 1984 may be in dramatic terms rather than factual terms, right? And I thought it was such a dramatic idea that it would be either totally successful or we’d all get put in state pen.’
As quoted from Rebecca Keegan’s 2022 interview with Scott in The Hollywood Reporter: ‘When the agency, Chiat/Day, pitched Ridley on directing a spot for Apple, he thought they were talking about The Beatles. ‘They said, ‘No, no, no. Apple is this guy called Steve Jobs.’ I went, ‘Who the fuck is Steve Jobs?’ They said, ‘It’s probably going to be something.'’ Scott read the script and thought, ‘My God. They’re not saying what it is, they’re not showing what it is. They’re not even saying what it does. It was advertising as an art form. It was devastatingly effective.’’
From the Clement Mok Collection.
