Krystexxa

The film is unlike most things you see produced in the pharma world. It’s dark and ominous. But it’s also educational and effectual. Created alongside the good people at Area 23—an agency that has always pushed the boundaries of what healthcare creative can be—the film has a serious, even somewhat provocative tone, and a deeply resonant message. Through the longer-form storytelling and the expert character design, Dan & Jason deliver something that leaves a long-lasting and informative impression.

LOOK AND FEEL

The key to capturing something as challenging as chronic kidney disease was to create a visual tone comparably unsettling. To achieve this, Dan and Jason made the background environments stormy and gritty. The characters were given complementarily dark designs. Uric acid became a jagged, spiky monster who'd be every balloon's (not to mention kidney's) worst nightmare. And the afflicted organs and appendages—kidney, heart, bone, foot, and hand—were each given anthropomorphized faces and limbs that brought their deteriorating downfalls into stark, painful reality.

IN DAN & JASON'S WORDS

"Our whole thing as directors has always been 'story and heart.' Whether that's having a fun, silly-goose time or taking on a story with a real moral, we always want our audiences to feel something. In approaching this project, both the agency and client came to the table thinking outside traditional norms. They told us to go all the way, and as a result, we really got to dig deep into this world and into these characters. By having an anthropomorphized kidney as our protagonist, there’s already some baked in humor. So we decided to approach everything else seriously. Kidney health isn’t a joke; it can be a really serious problem. We wanted to treat the event of this story with the gravity it deserved."

"We love these characters. We love this world. We’re really proud of this piece."

-Dan & Jason

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