With an award-winning background in creative development and film production, partner at Citizen, Steve Fong is a quintessential jack-of-all-trades. He’s also a strong advocate of merging traditional media with new media to form additional avenues of creative content to reach audiences in original and unexpected ways.
At Citizen, and its predecessor agency Collaborate, Steve has created breakthrough work for Amnesty International, NRDC, Pabst Brewing Company, Logitech, Seagate, and University of California. Many of these projects, Steve has also directed; his film and TV projects have been represented by Copper Media in Hollywood and Washington Square Films in New York. His early career included stints at BBDO New York, Chiat\Day, New York and FCB, San Francisco. Along the way he has won international awards for his creative work for clients as diverse as General Electric, Levi's, Pepsi, Sega, Reebok, Fox S
12.22.09
Inexplicably in Turlock with No Gas
If you have a degree in what field is it? Sacramento Community College for five years until they told me I had to leave. Then Art Center—but community college was much harder and more fulfilling.
If you could choose one person to work with (outside your own agency), who would it be? Brian Bacino at Swirl; he always picks up the bar tab.
Who was the client for your first advertising project? Sizzler Restaurants. I was living the high life: a tiny office, a Mac Classic and no debt. Nice.
If you were to change professions, what would you choose to do? Architect. Or stealth crime fighter. Toss up.
From where do your best ideas originate? Actually, when I’m driving long distances. Nothing smoothes out the creative process like a long, winding drive to nowhere. At the end of the journey you find yourself with several good ideas, concepts and, inexplicably, in Turlock with no gas.
How do you overcome a creative block? Call my friends, ply them with alcohol and blatantly steal their ideas—then credit them to long drives.
If you could choose any product to create an ad for, what would it be? Sizzler Restaurants. I could nail that assignment now. For one I know that cheesy cheese toast has two “e”s.
Do you have creative outlets other than advertising? Yes, I like to write novels, screenplays and stage plays that never get out of the top drawer of my Ikea Johan desk. It’s a performance art piece in procrastination and futility.
What’s your approach to balancing work and life? Spend at least four hours a day on a daily commute into the city. Nothing straightens out your role in life better than public transportation.
What product/gadget can you not live without? My eight-year-old Mac because it has all the software I’ve accumulated from various stops.
What’s your favorite quote? From the movie Barton Fink, “It’s Hollywood Fink, you can’t throw a rock without hitting a writer. And Fink, throw it hard.”
Do you have any advice for people just entering the profession? Think carefully before you leap. The water is deep and very cold. Also be able to do a lot of things—you’ll be much harder to fire if you’re doing the work of seven.
What’s one thing you wish you knew when you started your career? That there are always options. Also, the world is a glorious, fun, exciting, scary place; don’t be afraid to take chances because at the end of the day you have that four-hour commute to look forward to.