In 2013, I got a brief to make a television commercial to promote AFL Indigenous Round whilst working at GPY&R Melbourne. I decided to write a script based around the 20th anniversary of the iconic moment Nicky Winmar stood up to racist abuse at Victoria Park.
The idea was to get current AFL Indigenous players to re-enact Winmar’s iconic stance, on the very spot Nicky himself had stood up, strong and proud at Victoria Park in 1993.
To their credit, the AFL immediately approved the idea.
Along the way, a range of Indigenous AFL stars donated their time to appear in the commercial. Patrick Ryder from Essendon, Andrew Walker from Carlton, Lindsay Thomas from North Melbourne, and Shaun Burgoyne from Hawthorn stepped up and delivered strong performances for something that they all, to a man, believed in.
Adam Goodes also was scheduled to appear in the ad, but because his training was in Sydney, he couldn’t fly down for the shoot day.
But a compromise was reached, and he read the voiceover to the commercial.
His delivery was powerful in its simplicity, and talking to him he had so much admiration for what Nicky did that day.
Later in the week posed for The Daily Telegraph re-enacting Winmar’s pose as well.
It’s one of the ads I’m most proud to have been involved in.