Blood, sex and Shakespeare will loom large in a keynote presentation that Dublin agency Rothco will deliver at the forthcoming Cannes Lions Festival later this month.
Rothco’s top brass, including CEO Patrick Hickey, managing director Richard Carr and chief strategy officer Emer Howard will take to the stage to talk about “Blood, Sex, Storytelling: Turning Crowds into Audiences” in what is set to be a lively, interesting and funny presentation.
Drawing on Shakespeare as well as the techniques stand-up comedians use to interact with the crowd, the trio will explore what is required to turn the crowd into an audience while at the same time remaining in control.
According to a note on the presentation, which will take place in Cannes on Wednesday June 24th, Shakespeare wrote many of his plays in the knowledge that he had to get the attention of a distracted, noisy and often disruptive crowd. Shakespearean actors were also trained to interact with this often unruly crowd and they worked hard to turn them into an audience. Now, having had a lengthy period where audiences were captive and had less distractions; marketers are telling stories in a live environment using multiple, always-on platforms, to a group of people who do not behave like an audience- similar to the live audiences Shakespeare wrote for.
Rothco is the only Irish agency to present at Cannes this year although the number of Irish agencies that will be in attendance has increased significantly following moves by IAPI to encourage adland to be more involved in Cannes.
