The LEGO Group released its new Play Is Your Superpower campaign, which features the brand’s first film that celebrates how heroes can emerge in a world that has forgotten how to play.
The campaign has been created to encourage adults to make play a priority for the children in their lives. It will run for four months with three key moments: the fall launch; World Play Day on Oct. 12; and during the brand’s peak holiday season.
The five-minute film includes Easter eggs that allow viewers to play along with visual assets on lego.com.
The film is directed by Ellen Kuras and stars Hollywood actor Jane Lynch (played by Sun Li in the China adaptation) as the work-obsessed CEO who becomes enlightened to the merits of play by seeing its impact through the eyes of six adventurous children who go to their parents’ workplace for “Bring Your Kid to Work Day.”
Each child brings a different skill to a mission to spread play in the workplace, which is a bland space focused on all work and no play.
The director of photography for the film is Rachel Morrison, who was one of the first female directors of photography for a big-budget superhero movie with Black Panther.
Female-led production company The Corner Shop, along with Kuras, worked with set designer and art director David Lee, whose credits include Star Wars and Batman Begins. Kuras also partnered with new Irish post-production and VFX company GABHA studio to complete the superpower element of the film that takes viewers on the journey that emphasizes the power of play.
The campaign draws from insights from a recent global study that found children are spending just 2% of their week — which is equivalent to seven hours — on average playing, with one in three spending less than three hours of their week playing, according to The LEGO Group.
The study also found that adults spend 26 hours a week scrolling on a smartphone, which is more than three and a half hours per day. These statistics are causing concern for experts since play remains a crucial factor in shaping a child’s cognitive abilities and overall well-being.
“If we don’t recognize that factoring in time for a child to play each day is imperative to their well-being and future success, we’re going to have a generation of young adults missing vital skills,” says Alero Akuya, Vice President of Brand Development at The LEGO Group. “With this campaign we aim to re-frame the way adults see play and its many benefits, and encourage them to reprioritize it in their family lives. It should be seen as just as important as reading children a bedtime story or helping them eat well to boost their health.”
The LEGO Group has enlisted the help of leading cultural figures who agree that the skills they developed through childhood play helped make their dreams come true. This group, known as The Play Squad, includes fashion designer and entrepreneur Tan France, comedian and actress Naomi Watanabe, conservationist Bindi Irwin, and actress Stephanie Beatriz.
“As a young boy growing up in Doncaster, UK, the idea of being where I am today felt far removed,” France says. “Little did I know that the skills I was learning through play in my bedroom would directly impact my future life. Play helped me imagine infinite possibilities, allowing me to see things differently and discover my place in the world. A huge part of my career focuses on instilling that sense of endless imagination in adults; sometimes I wish I could rewind the clock and encourage people to step into their own adventures through play.”
The LEGO Group, as well as various digital creators known for being playful, will also be bringing play to unexpected places around the world and sharing how to inject moments of playfulness into busy schedules ahead of and on World Play Day.
“We knew we wanted to make a big statement around the power of play this year, so we designed a campaign that celebrates just this,” says Nic Taylor, the Senior Vice President and Head of Our LEGO Agency. “The film showcases the endless possibilities for play that children see, in even the dullest of situations, and shows the difference play can make to the world as the children rebuild it for the better. Jane Lynch and Sun Li add to the playfulness of the film by revealing themselves as forward-thinkers who want to overthrow the norm and inject more play into their workplace.”
