Pharrell Williams 'Happy' case study and task.

1. Happy? Case Study
AIM: Understand the impact of a well known music video and
plan a thirty second re-creation
You may be sick
of it…if not you
will be!
TASK: Watch the
video and make
notes about how
many different
locations and
characters are
used.

2. Happy facts
• Cross media convergence: the website
‘24 Hours of Happy’ was launched at the
same time.
• Billed as the world’s first 24hr music
video – users logged on to a different clip
worldwide related to the time they
visited. They could then share that clip on
social media. Exchange was actively
encouraged. (11.5m views)
• It featured various people dancing
around LA including some celebrity
cameos
• The 24 hour version was aired at Buenos
Aires Film Festival. Good example of a
mass product appealing to a niche
market.
• The music video edit of the 24 hours of
footage was released on YouTube a few
weeks later (668m views)

3. Even happier facts
• Was a song from the soundtrack for Despicable Me 2 – characters from
which appeared in the video but otherwise unconnected.
• Directed by French production team ‘We are from LA’, shot using a
steadicam
• Won many awards at the Grammys
• Active embrace of digital technology, exchange and changes in copyright.
Massive global impact. Thousands of cities and countries did their own
version under the tagline of ‘We are Happy from…’ A lot of them were
extremely professional and got over 3m views in themselves
• Parodies, tributes, versions…all using copyrighted material (the titling, the
song) were all actively encouraged and not contested by the record label.
Why?

4. https://youtu.be/uSeaC6IDDtw
Not so happy…
• Iranian laws forbids women being
unveiled in public and dancing with
members of the opposite sex.
• 35 years of conflict with the USA means
their government do not take kindly to
Western cultural influence in Iranian
society. The video had 1.5million views
– mainly in Iran which worried the
Iranian government
• Iran has a very young population who
are very liberal – it was seen as a clash
of values and generations.

5. How could we link ‘Happy’ to David
Gauntlett’s Media 2.0 theory?

6. How could we link ‘Happy’ to Stuart Hall’s
Reception Theory?
DOMINANT
NEGOTIATED
OPPOSITIONAL
Producer of
media text
encodes meaning
Hall argued that audiences decode the producer’s meaning depending on their cultural
viewpoints and experiences. What can we read into the reaction to ‘Happy’?
Why do you think this might be?

7. TASK: Recreate 30 seconds of the Happy
video.
Deadline_______________
You can create a parody, a different version or whatever BUT you must
use a similar format, shots and editing techniques.