Why conflict can inspire creativity

We’ve all heard stories about diva directors throwing tantrums, rinsing budgets on ill-fated ideas or sending producers into a tailspin. Euphemistically it might be stated that they can be very… creative... to cover up behaviour worthy of the naughty step. 

I’d very much like to think that’s not me. But I did recently discover that a healthy sprinkling of conflict and disagreement can spawn great ideas and catalyse creativity. 

A healthy sprinkling of conflict and disagreement can spawn great ideas and catalyse creativity.

I’ve spent the last two years working on a short film that was borne out of an argument I had with my partner. Cry Like a Guy is a spoken word lecture exploring why we - that's us guys - cry, and why we shouldn’t be ashamed of it, delivered by a tough guy from HBO’s House of the Dragon, Kieran Bew. 

Turns out that, for our own good, we should probably all do more crying. 

Above: Rubinstein's recent short was borne from an argument with his partner. 

I’ll confess, I never used to see the value in tears. But, thanks to the healthy debate my partner and I had (and the incredibly well-researched essay Catherine wrote to prove me wrong), I am a truly changed man. I bloody love crying now. 

[Projects can become] a piñata of pragmatism that everyone has had a swipe at, knocking out the good stuff with each blow.

I appreciate this is quite an eccentric response to a domestic spat, and it isn’t every day that a disagreement uncovers a ✨shots Best-of-the-Month worthy✨ insight but, on an everyday level, the production process is riddled with tension points and differences in opinion. It’s natural that all the different stakeholders want to shift the project in different directions based on their own objectives, like a multi-axis tug-of-war;

• The producer wants to save money.
• The director wants to waste it on a five minute director's cut extravaganza.
• The agency wants to win awards.
• The client wants to keep their job. 

This can often land us in ‘the middle ground of mediocrity’, where stakeholders compromise in an uninspiring stalemate. No one really gets their way and the project is whittled down into something that doesn’t fully tick any box. A piñata of pragmatism that everyone has had a swipe at, knocking out the good stuff with each blow. You might be left with the deformed husk of a pony at the end, if you’re lucky, but it's certainly not fulfilling creative potential. 

Above: Ed Catmull's book talks about Pixar's culture of ‘radical candour’.

Ed Catmull, the founder of Pixar, discusses this in his book Creativity Inc. (an essential read for anyone in this industry): as Pixar grew and succeeded, it became more beholden to its various stakeholders and backers, all pulling in different directions. To address this, Catmull and his team fostered a culture of what he calls ‘radical candour’. People at Pixar weren’t afraid to speak candidly, to argue with one another and tear things apart, all to make their films better. It’s fair to say, after 30 years of Pixar, it worked. 

A creative I worked with said he specifically looks for a director who pushes back, isn’t knocked over easily, and is always fighting to put creativity first.

Of course, this should be taken with a giant scoop of salt; it’s much harder to disagree with a paying client whose word is final (no matter what the director thinks), but sometimes, to make the best work, perhaps backing down isn’t the best option.

A creative I worked with on a Sky spot said he specifically looks for a director who pushes back, isn’t knocked over easily, and is always fighting to put creativity first. After all, there are more than enough people on any job to say what isn’t possible, that it doesn’t need to be the director’s job, right? On the shoot, I tried my best to heed this advice and squeezed our fleeting timeslot with David Beckham to the very limit, eeking out as many different takes and angles as we could get, right up until he was physically yanked off the shoot by his publicist.

Above: Rubinstein pushed as hard as he could for as much time as he could get with David Beckham for his spot for Sky. 

Sometimes, when there are competing factions pulling in different directions, the compromise doesn’t have to be the middle ground of mediocrity, it could be a solution that’s way outside of the original tug-of-war altogether. It might be the tension and disagreement that causes you to go looking somewhere totally new. 

While shooting Camilla Cabello’s Champions League final opening ceremony announcement, we couldn’t decide which of her tracks to use for it. Should it be the iconic and well-loved Havana (client preference) or the newly released Bam Bam for the currency and novelty (my preferred choice)? 

Pick your battles and fight them hard (just not so hard that no one ever wants to work with you again). 

The team was split. It was only a 30-second promo, so we didn’t think a mash-up would work. But, when we choreographed a dramatic outfit change to embrace the obvious discontinuity between the tempos and key change, we ended up with a moment in the film that I think is truly kickass and wouldn’t have happened without that disagreement.