Experiential Marketing Case Study: Amazon Studios Installations

The Challenge: To Raise Awareness with Emmy Award Voters

The Emmys For Your Consideration (FYC) events are an opportunity for video content developers to showcase their programs to members of awards voting groups.

Amazon Studios worked with Culture Cube to build immersive installations for their Prime Experience FYC space.

In 20 events at the historic Hollywood Athletic Club, where the first-ever Emmys took place, we offered several “experiences” to entertain, educate, and influence TV Academy Members.

These included Q&A panels with show creators and talent, and immersive spaces featuring Amazon shows:

• Jack Ryan
• Good Omens
• A Very English Scandal
• Hanna

Amazon challenged Culture Cube to create strong visuals and narratives to bring the shows to life.

We designed several experiences exposing guests to select show content as seen through the eyes of a character.

Objectives: What the Project Hoped to Achieve

• Emmy nominations
• To capture voter information: names, email addresses, etc.
• The successful launch of new integrated technology
• Extended event reach via social media
• To stand out in a crowded awards season

Culture Cube’s Experiential Displays

Jack Ryan

This installation took guests on the analyst-to-agent journey of John Krasinki in season one of Jack Ryan — albeit with less bloodshed. It focused on the award categories of Special Effects, Sounds Design/Mixing, and Stunts.

The experience began in the virtual lobby of the CIA, where guests received their credentials and an alert that Jack Ryan needed help.

Actors ushered guests to a conference room, where, as a group, they scanned a large touch screen map of the world to find the terrorist cell.

The payoff for identifying the cell’s location was a trailer highlighting the show’s realistic special effects and high-fidelity sound design.

Now, as experienced analysts, guests moved to the training area, where they assisted Jack Ryan in the field.

Actors behind a two-way mirror trained guests to escape from a chokehold, block a karate chop, and throw a punch. A stunt coordinator oversaw this portion of the experience.

Finally, guests had their pictures taken as they hung out of a staged helicopter.

The Jack Ryan experience was a fan favorite. Guests waited in long lines to enter, with average visit times exceeding 10 minutes. 30 to 45 guests participated in the experience at any point.

Good Omens

This installation encouraged guests to interact with the thematic elements of the unreleased show.

Culture Cube built a book of awards prophecies, suggesting to voters that Amazon should figure prominently in the awards.

Teaser clips played on an 85″ TV when guests pressed electronic buttons built into pages of the book.

Guests enjoyed several photo ops. They yelled at a wall of virtual plants, mimicking David Tennant’s character and making the plants tremble in fear.

The show premiered at Prime Experience during the Good Omens FYC night. David Tennant, the show creators, and a choir of nuns attended the event. Separate from the event, the nuns toured Los Angeles on a double-decker bus. Their tour was in black and white.

Hanna

We recreated the most stunning visual aspect of the show: a glistening snowy forest.

Northern lights shone from the ceiling, and the beat of a pursuing helicopter played over a surround sound system.

More than any other installation, this experience lent itself to photo ops, with guests caught in the “spotlight” of the chase helicopter.

A Very English Scandal

This immersive space transported guests to 1960s/70s England and the famous court proceedings that inspired the show.

Guests typed out love letters, the key incriminating evidence of the scandal, and sent the letters to loved ones or themselves.

When they did, the letters appeared on a ticker display encircling the room.

With half the room wrapped in the Union Jack and the other half recreating a courtroom, guests posed for photo ops, incriminating themselves for posterity.

The Results

All experiences were a hit. Amazon captured voter data at their FYC events for the first time while guests engaged with the spaces and took and shared photos.

Each show received Emmy nominations in its categories.

Mozart in the Jungle

A show about a symphony orchestra and the relationships between the conductor, musicians, donors, and the orchestra’s management.

• Culture Cube filmed a real orchestra with three cameras. The orchestra played an original piece of music commissioned for the filming.
• We recreated orchestra members digitally, using gaming technology.
• The orchestra was projected life-size on a custom screen.
• We invited voting members to conduct the orchestra, heightening their involvement.
• The “conductor” could instruct musicians to play or stop at the individual level.

After the performance, the conductor invited the orchestra to stand and bow any number of times. All movements were directed by the conductor’s baton and hand gestures.

Finally, conductors posed next to the orchestra for snapshots or were given a video file of their experience to post on social media and send to friends.

The Results

Two Emmy nominations; Emmy Winner for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (Half-Hour) and Animation.