Matt Swanson: A Few Of My Favourite Things

One glance at the list of Epoch Films director Matt Swanson's list of 'Favourite Things' makes something very clear: his curiosity for curios runs deep.

Since being fired from an amateur production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, leading to his pivot to directing, Swanson’s bold commercial work has been recognised by the Cannes Lions, the One Show, the British Arrows, Ciclope Berlin, D&AD, and the shots Awards... with the production team of his ill-fated Shakespeare performance presumably recognising him, as well.

Here he talks kitsch, calendars, and crack-smoking councillors - and why a little absurdity is essential to staying inspired.

The Pulp Reading Material

None of us can read anymore, but even the most battered frontal lobe can handle pulp. 

If I need a break from work and don’t want to look at a screen, reading pulp gives me a nice reset. 

I’m into classic pulp, but maybe nothing beats Heat 2, which is basically a novelisation of a movie that doesn’t exist. 

I love Michael Mann, and this book is extremely cinematic but also kind of terrible. 

I accidentally ordered the 'Large Print Edition', which means all the text is twice as big as it should be. 

It’s great, because it feels like Michael Mann is yelling at you the whole time.

The Friend's Art

I am a serial surreptitious photo-taker, which I’m good at, though one day my luck will probably run out and I’ll have the shit kicked out of me by an unhappy subject. 

Anyway, I was at the duty-free shop at the Buffalo border crossing and took a sneaky photo of a man contemplating what liquor he’d like to buy. 

My friend Miranda Elliott, who is a fantastic painter, saw the photo, asked if she could paint it, and then gave me the painting. 

Having things around my workspace made by people I actually know is the best.

The Rob Ford Bobblehead Shrine

If you don’t remember Rob Ford, he was the former mayor of Toronto who was caught on video smoking crack cocaine. 

I lived in Toronto during that time, and even though he was sort of an arsehole who wanted to do insane things like close all the libraries and make cycling illegal, he was also one of the funniest people to ever come out of the city. 

It’s hard to pick just one highlight from his tenure, but I enjoy this moment, as recounted by Jon Stewart. 

He was like a human geyser of unintentional comedy with a seemingly endless supply. 

To tap into some of that comedic abundance, I made a little shrine to him next to my desk and surrounded him with crystal rocks that vibrate on a slightly higher frequency than the rocks he preferred as mayor.

The EKCO AD-65 radio

If you’re about a hundred years old and live in the UK, you almost definitely had one of these in your house growing up. 

It was designed by my cousin, Wells Coates, who was an early modernist architect in London. 

He designed a building in Hampstead called Isokon Flats, which was home to Agatha Christie, half the Bauhaus when they fled Germany, and basically every Russian spy in London. 

If you live in London, go check it out. 

It’s weird and enormous and sort of looks like a huge ocean liner fell from the sky into the middle of a residential block. 

These radios are hard to come by these days, and even though mine doesn’t work, I love it so much. 

It’s like a family heirloom hiding in the background of my Zoom calls. 

I even snuck it into a Wealthsimple spot - a detail that a sum total of zero people noticed.

The Oblique Strategies Cards

These cards were gifted to me, and, even if I don’t use them much, who doesn’t want a smart black box with “BRIAN ENO” in gold lettering sitting on the shelf? 

They were put out decades ago by Eno and his pal Peter, and are basically a fancy version of a Magic 8 Ball. 

When you’re creatively stumped, you go to the deck with a question, and the card you flip over is meant to help. 

Sometimes they’re fun to use, but mostly I find I’ll ask a question like “How do I do all of this in camera?” and the deck gives me answers like “Water” or “Do we need holes?”