Willem Dafoe’s narration gets more and more kinetic as he asks over and over in the above Nike spot, “am I a bad person?” Meanwhile, faces of famous and not-so-famous athletes flash before us.
“I’m single minded. I’m deceptive. I’m obsessive. I’m selfish,” Dafoe says, getting increasingly manic. “Am I a bad person?”
Dafoe is describing personality traits of the ultra-competitive, athletes who are heralded by society for their winning ways. The spot features such personalities – Olympics-bound or otherwise – as Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kylian Mbappé, Serena Williams, Sha’Carri Richardson, Sophia Smith, Bebe Vio, Qinwen Zheng, Jakob Ingebrigtsen, Cristiano Ronaldo, A’ja Wilson, Ixhelt Gonzales, Victor Wembanyama, Vinicius Junior, Sabrina Ionescu, Eliud Kipchoge and Alexia Putellas.
“This is about celebrating the voice of the athlete,” Nicole Graham, chief marketing officer at Nike, Inc., told Campaign US. “It’s a story about what it takes to be the best. It reminds the world that there's nothing wrong with wanting to win.”
Nike dropped the campaign, created in collaboration with creative partner Wieden+Kennedy Portland, days before the start of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
Besides the short film, Nike is mounting an out-of-home campaign in the U.S. cities of Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Chicago, Atlanta, Phoenix and Portland. Globally, it will pop up in Peru, Argentina, Mexico, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, India, Australia, Japan, Korea, Netherlands, France, UK, Italy, Spain, Germany, Turkey and South Africa.
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