New Archive:

November 2001 Issue

Music Video Director Marc Klasfeld: Helmer of the Hip Clip
A Profile By Michael Aushenker

Without explanation, the video begins with the fresh-faced kids of Sum 41 rapping acappella for two flummoxed Asian men behind a liquor store counter. Cut to the Canadian pop-punk quartet performing outdoors in some suburban wasteland before a hyperactive, multi-ethnic teen crowd. A pre-adolescent white boy busts hip hop moves to the fast and furious staccato rap/punk ditty. A bookish middle-aged East Indian gent gets down. Ramp-jumping skate rats suit up like robots and tote Roman candles. Teens chase geese. A redneck taunts police like a scene out of Cops. A band member shaves a girl's hair down to a defiant, razor-stubbled baldness. Suddenly, the music morphs into a thrashy guitar anthem, and Sum 41 reappears in Iron Maiden drag, unleashing heavy metal thunder.

Irreverent humor, existential spontaneity, total teen chaos--are all hallmarks of "Fat Lip/Pain for Pleasure" and other videos by director Marc Klasfeld.

Klasfeld may just be the bane of Carson Daly's existence these days. "Fat Lip" and Klasfeld's like-minded clip for Alien Ant Farm's cover of Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal," like broken records, were stuck in rotation on Total Request Live's countdown this past summer. The Fat Lip clip propelled Sum 41 into Billboard's Top 20 and snagged them the opening slot on MTV's 20th anniversary concert.

"Smooth Criminal" unleashes twisted homage to the number one Jackson with its can-you-name-them-all allusions: "Billie Jean"-inspired cheeseball freeze frame graphics and illuminating sidewalks; crotch-grabs and moonwalks; even an ersatz Bubbles the chimp.

Two of Klasfeld's other recently released videos make creative references to pop culture as well: a second video for Sum 41, "In Too Deep," which apes, shot for shot, the championship diving contest climax of Rodney Dangerfield's classic 80's Comedy "Back to School;" and the video for "Girls, Girls, Girls" by A list rap star Jay-Z (who's new album was number 1 for most of September). Klasfeld even has a cameo in the "Girls, Girls, Girls" video as himself (a video director) when Jay-Z walks off the set of the video within the video.

Energetic pieces of eye-candy, Klasfeld's videos make mucho mileage of suburbanarchy--break dancing white boys, barnyard animals, kids running amok in monster masks.

"My mom always says people love animals and kids," said Klasfeld, 30, "which is funny, because I don't have kids and I don't have pets."

Klasfeld, a Fort Lee, New Jersey native, In 1994, started his production company, Rock Hard, after graduating from NYU Film School. Klasfeld's video verite style has its roots from scores of rap clips he shot, which took him to the ghettos of New Orleans and Memphis. Klasfeld's 1998 video "Ha" put both the young director and rapper Juvenile on the map.

"I saw people with jaundiced eyes from crack, mothers with 15 children, rats running through apartments," Klasfeld said. "No pretty people at all. There was no fantasy. People in N.Y. or L.A. don't realize that this kind of reality still exists in this country. A third world reality."

What caught the eye of Sum 41 was Klasfeld's "Country Grammar" video for rapper Nelly.

"They liked the homegrown kind of look," Klasfeld said.

The "Fat Lip" aesthetic was inspired by time spent shooting videos in Orange County, and from the random naturalism of skateboard videos like "CMY2K." As for the illusion that the group is playing to a diehard fanbase in some nowhere Canadian burg, let's not forget that this is Hollywood. Klasfeld hand-picked the "fans." And the town?

"Pomona," said Klasfeld.

Visually, Klasfeld has long admired the work of video/film auteurs such as David Fincher and Spike Jonze. His dream assignments: shooting videos for Bon Jovi and Van Halen (pioneers of humorous videos with clips such as "Hot for Teacher").

The sought-after director has helmed 15 videos in the last year, not including commercials he did for ESPN, Motorola, etc. Just recently, two more of his videos came out: One for the song "Ugly" by Bubba Sparxxx, from the album that debuted Halloween week on the charts at number three; and another for the rock band Saliva.

And, as if all that weren't enough, Klasfeld is also working on "Yenta," a documentary about his girlfriend's colorful Jewish mother.

Michael Aushenker is a staff writer at the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles. He is also a professional cartoonist. For more information on his comic books, visit www.elgatocomics.com.

---

lifestyles | fiction | politics | daily buzz | relationships | culture | social action | spirituality | chatroom | J-TV giude | win stuff | e-postcard | about us | archive | disclaimer