How a Global Team Embraced the Superpower of Play for LEGO

There’s nothing frivolous about play. The LEGO Group’s latest campaign, ‘Play Is Your Superpower’ makes that very clear. The brand’s first ever fully playable brand film celebrates the heroes that can emerge in a world that has forgotten how to play.

It began with an aim from LEGO to challenge people to think differently about play. Too often it’s just seen as “something to fill in the time between homework and dinner time, or to keep kids quiet while parents are trying to focus,” says Nic Taylor, VP and head of Our LEGO Agency. But, LEGO’s belief is that play is fundamental to a child’s wellbeing and development, helping kids develop skills like creativity, confidence and resilience that will help them thrive now and in the future.  

Once LEGO has helped people understand the importance of play, its next mission was to encourage people to reprioritise play in their day. The company’s research found that children only spend an average of 2% of their week playing. “So, we wanted to reframe how families see play, and help them incorporate more playful moments into their day-to-day life,” says Nic.

The resulting work is, as Jen Speirs puts it, “ridiculously playful”. But there’s some gravity to its purpose, says the chief creative officer of Droga5 Dublin, part of Accenture Song, who collaborated with LEGO’s in-house agency to create the campaign. “We need our kids to play more. We wanted every adult who saw this to want to play more with their kids – and every kid who saw it to want to play more. To really, really get the message that play is a superpower – and to also get a kick of how we landed that message.”

To do that, they knew they’d need to make something special. “We spent hours as a team discussing the epic impact that play had had on each of our lives, and how it had helped us become the people we are today. I found the stories to be incredibly personal and moving,” says Nic. 

Once they’d got the idea of showcasing play’s superpower status, the creative teams knew they’d have to do some storytelling worthy of that. “In an epic, adventure-packed, cinematic story – with superheroes, villains, twists, suspense, surprises,” says Jen. “And we also wanted to show that beyond just fun, play has the power to genuinely transform people and places. So, every new scene that the kids found them in was basically a mission to make it better with play. And of course, we wanted to do all of this with a healthy splash of humour.”

Humour was crucial, because reaching both adults and children was a key aim. “You’ll spot some quirky moments in the short film that make everyone – no matter your age – have a little giggle,” says Nic. 

To get that tone right, the team chose Ellen Kuras, director at The Corner Shop. “It just seemed fun,” she says of the first time she saw the script. “And more importantly, the bigger picture message that LEGO puts forth is a positive one for the world. Something so simple, yet so important.”

The resulting five-minute film is fully playable and packed with Easter eggs, allowing viewers to interact on LEGO.com and the LEGO Life app, where prompts on the site will encourage participation. Families will also be encouraged to transform themselves into minifigures like the characters in the film and join a global squad of passionate play advocates on LEGO.com.

Along with the six superkids – LEGO play is another hero in this story. It called for heaps of character development, storytelling and also, bringing together different generations to play together. “One of the most exciting decisions we made was to make this film playable – to hide easter eggs in the film and encourage kids to uncover clues, and literally play with the film,” says Jen. “We weren’t just going to be saying that play is important and just give kids something to watch - we wanted to genuinely demonstrate it by giving kids something to play with. Lots of firsts for The LEGO Group, so lots of things for us to be excited to get stuck into.”

Everyone involved on the project appreciated the ambition. “It was a lot of fun to help bring the LEGO ‘Play Is your Superpower’ world to life along with Marvel and Disney characters. Working closely with The Corner Shop and Droga5 Dublin to create this over an 11-day shoot was a fun challenge that shows in the end result,” says GABHA creative director and shoot supervisor Daniel Morris.

“It is special to be able to tell a story so generously in such an extraordinary length,” says Jan Hübel, shoot supervisor. “Plus, it’s a dream for someone in VFX to bring the magic of LEGO to life, using visual effects to merge the real world with the fantasy world and thus help to tell the story.”

Supervising sound editor and mixer, Will Cohen from String and Tins, appreciated having his own space to play in the project too: “A lot of the material we work on in short form only has time for one hit or trick.  So it was great to work on essentially a short film, with all the storytelling and filmmaking that comes with working with such an experienced director.”

Dafydd Upsdell, executive producer at GABHA has been lucky enough to work on LEGO campaigns before, he says, “but none quite to the scale of power of play, the creative detail that went into all aspects of the campaign was amazing.  Working on a big brand such as LEGO always comes with the pressure of knowing your client isn't actually sitting in an office somewhere but is actually everyone that has ever owned, loved and played with LEGO at any point in their life.”

There’s a special joy of playing with a brand that’s almost universally loved, along with IP from the likes of Marvel and Disney; everyone on the job was indulging in things they love. “I have a fascination for LEGO, it drove my youth and personal development so it was a big responsibility to make justice to the brand and the world they have created that inspires millions and millions of children every single day,” says Jordi Bares, executive creative director and founder of the creative studio Rohtau.

“We all knew we were going to have a lot of fun on this project,” says Josh King, Rohtau executive producer, head of production and sustainability. “This was one of those projects where work doesn't feel like work, but more like the power of play.”

Inclusion was baked into this idea. As Jen from Droga5 notes, “Whoever you are, you have the superpower of play inside.” Making sure that they stayed true to that inclusivity was important – especially when it came to casting. “We needed lots of different kids and adults alike to see themselves in the story – and I’m so proud of making that happen,” she says. 

For the director, Ellen, that was the biggest challenge. The minifigures they transform into had already been designed, so they needed actors that not only could act and had the right energy, but also had the exact physical attributes that the designed characters had. “Inclusivity was key for all of us, so when it came to casting ROXIE, we made the decision to cast a child who had a prosthetic leg as the character has,” she says. “This wasn’t something we felt we should cheat. It took weeks and weeks of searching, but I’m glad we went the extra mile because when we found her, we knew we had made the right decision to take the more difficult route in the name of representation.”

Then there’s the little matter of Jane Lynch’s part. “We knew we needed the right talent for the ‘BIG BOSS’ role – someone who had the gravitas to pull off the person worthy of the big shiny corner office,” says Jen. “But also someone who had a bit of a twinkle in her eye, to quickly flip into praising the superkids for bringing play to the office, transforming it into a better place – and landing the message to all of us, that play is a superpower.”

The shoot took place in Prague with service production from unit+sofa.

However, with so much complexity, it required early collaboration. Union editor Marco Perez travelled to be on set to work with Ellen closely. “Being involved early on was great, because on this one we were doing all the ‘no-no’s’ of working with kids and dogs,” he says. “Moreover, Ellen is one of the directors for whom I most love to edit. We have a relationship where one of us throws the ball as far as we can and the other catches it, throwing it back even further.” 

Marco edited the project in London, working out of Union partner house Marshall Street Editors, where Joshua Sampson served as social media editor, cutting the various social and playable assets associated with the film.  

The star talent was helpful. “Jane made my life as an editor very easy,” says Marco. “And Ellen cast the children so well and has such a sure instinct for building a story, visually and narratively, that their performances really shone, as an ensemble and individually.” 

From an audio perspective, Will says the biggest challenge was taking the temp score and ideas from Marco and translating them into something original. “We talked about the key idea being to create a theme – something simple that could be re-worked and re-imagined across different sections of the film, from a major iteration for moments of success, to more sinister workings for signposting the baddies! Beyond the traditional classical arrangement, we wanted to make sure there was plenty of fun production to get kids into it - so we combined the musical superpowers of Joseph Alexander and Jim Stewart for what I think is an awesome mix of style and vibe.”

A highlight for Will was getting the edit the first time. “Seeing in the flesh what I'd hoped would materialise and knowing that we were in for a fun ride. There's something really nuanced about a great edit that leaves a lot of cues for us as sound designers, and Marco really landed that.” 

There are fascinating examples of new collaborations leading to magic all over this project. Our LEGO Agency hadn’t worked with Droga5 Dublin before. “It naturally came with a lot of excitement and possibility from the start,” says Nic. “We all truly believed in the campaign as we all had a unique connection to the mission; it was something we all understood to be true and could see from our own experiences.  

Once we had the clear ‘Play is Your Superpower’ concept, the team united (you could say almost like a group of superheroes…) across LEGO Brand, Our LEGO Agency and Droga5.”

That level of simpatico was crucial, in fact. “The scale of this global project was a little daunting at the start - an undertaking for us all,” says Jen. “And, the only way through it was true collaboration. Yes, between us, the LEGO Group and OLA – but also, everyone else who came on board signed up to do whatever was needed to stay true to the idea, and get it out into the world in a superpowered, epic way. We were all in the gang together – we trusted each other and we never, ever settled.”

Geography was important to this global job. “From the very first conversation we had with Droga5 Dublin we felt very strongly we had to run the job out of our Dublin office,” says Dafydd, “So that when it came to crunch time we were able to give the team at Droga full access to our studio at all times. We still had the responsibility of bringing on board exactly the right team and everything fell into place very quickly when we asked our good friends Rohtau to come on board as partners.”

“The quality of the team was truly spectacular,” agrees Dragos Stefan, VFX creative director. “Interacting with the amazing people at GABHA and Rohtau, having awesome producers taking care of the job, and talented artists from all over the world pouring their creativity in, it was one of these rare encounters where you can concentrate mostly on the creative aspects and not waste energy dealing with issues of various kinds. This will stay with me for a long time.”

Deadlines were tight for such an ambitious feat. Dafydd admits that having to deliver what were in essence three pretty significant VFX-heavy campaigns all at once was a big undertaking. “But everyone knew their role and responsibility and we did so much up front pipeline testing and character development we knew at an early stage we were in for a lot of fun.” 

Jordi reveals that the main challenge was to make sure the communication with clients and partners was as clear and regular as possible. Working on the cloud was key. “Given our distributed model, we have put in place these practices to make sure all stakeholders are kept in the loop and feel part of the team, making sure we avoid wastes of time and resources,” he says. “Working on the cloud for VFX requires a true commitment - you can't be halfway there, you have to be all in or it just does not make sense. Also, some bold decisions have to be taken, but once they are accepted, it is insanely empowering – like the ability to scale up to render without having to buy new computers, network etc.... you just press a button and boom, you have another 200 machines working.”

With VFX artists working from Brazil, New Zealand and Alaska to the UK, Ireland, Romania, Belgium, Malta, Germany and Lithuania, post producer Julie Nixon was “slightly nervous” to produce such a big campaign with a tight deadline. “But I believe I speak for the whole team when I say working on the cloud was seamless, and we loved the fact we weren’t limited by location - ensuring participation from  the very best artists.”

Dublin based animation director Conor Ryan took on the task of Marvel’s Groot and Disney’s Olaf. “It was great to slip on the suits of Olaf and Baby Groot,” he says. “Two global stars who had a trove of great reference material to draw from and two very different personalities/styles of movement. I had a lot of fun bringing them to life”. 

Animation director Tomas Juchnevic will always remember the sight of a cheerful smile during daily video calls from Inaki, their team member from Brazil. “Faced the challenge of waking up early, at 6am Brazil time to join the video meetings with an enthusiastic grin on his face was truly inspiring,” he says.

For an animation obsessive like Tomas, working on a brand that’s so deeply ingrained in the world of animation and creativity, in general, was a joy. “What excited me about the LEGO project was the fusion of two of my greatest interests: animation and LEGO. It was a perfect blend of creativity, technical challenge and collaborative spirit.” 

Specifically, he embraced the challenge of working with the unique movement of the characters. “LEGO characters and minifigures come with limitations in their range of motion – they can't bend their elbows or knees, for instance. Achieving the desired movements often calls for creative and humorous solutions. Paradoxically, these limitations are helping to create unique LEGO world animations.”

For Jordi, the proof that the team was up to this task was proven when they saw the client’s reaction to their first internal tests with minifigures dancing. “They felt comfortable with both our setup and the team producing the material,” he says. “The fact that getting Marvel and Disney approval was so easy highlighted we had the very best artists in the project and fully reinforced our model as the future of VFX.”

As shoot supervisors, Daniel and Jan’s most exciting part of the project was the gravity-defying scene: “We filmed as much as possible with the camera. Using a Phantom we flipped the camera to shoot falling objects, water and ketchup at 2,000 frames per second. This gave the illusion of objects floating in zero-g. 

The coincidences that happen on a real shoot are the inspiration for the 3D artists. All locations were scanned with a laser (LIDAR) scanner to help place the computer-generated elements in the right place. This is where reality converges with the imagination of the 3D artists.”

And, all of this enthusiasm is easy to explain. “We all fundamentally believed in it,” says Nic. “There was an incredible energy even on set, from Ellen and Rachel to the amazing production team at The Corner Shop, to our inspiring Play Squad. It was definitely one for the memory box! It’ll also stick with me knowing that this ‘superpower’ is inside all of us, and that even as an adult, we need to exercise play to be better at our work and relationships. It’s relevant at all times and stages.”

“This is a career high for me,” says Jen. “We set out from the beginning to do a big, storytelling piece – and create space for different individual characters to play their own way, and bring their own magic to the story.”