Bob Giraldi may be the busiest film maker in America. He's considered the Cecil B. De Mille of music videos, the Steven Spielberg of television commercials. Having worked with Michael Jackson on the now-classic, award-winning Beat It video, he is credited with setting the standard for that medium. Consequently, such heavyweights as Paul McCartney, Lionel Richie, Diana Ross, Kenny Rogers and Pat Benatar have sought him out for their own videos. As for TV commercials, Giraldi could easily be the highest-paid director in the business, if not the most visible. In addition to making the infamous Pepsi spot in which Jackson's hair caught fire, he has directed the majority of the hilarious Lite Beer All-Star ads for Miller, a campaign that has been recognized as the most successful in history. Bill Zehme caught up with Giraldi in New York. He reports: "I asked Giraldi if he'd like to take the Pepsi Challenge. He said he'd rather not, though he swears he'd pass--he just hates that ad campaign. During our conversations, he drank ice water, took a call from Olivia Newton-John, looked at rushes of a Jermaine Jackson video and made fun of dancing lesbians."

Q 1

PLAYBOY: Do real men watch rock videos?

Bob Giraldi: Interesting. The other night, I was sitting in my apartment in Los Angeles with three friends, all guys, all real men. We were each on our tenth glass of wine, watching MTV. We were heckling the screen, saying, "What the hell is this shit?' But we found ourselves waiting for the next one, glued with a sort of excited expectation. One guy had an appointment, but it took him an hour and a half to drag himself away from the television set. Another guy was like a kid who memorizes batting averages; he knew the names of every one of those fucking groups: Crush, Fear, Up Your Nose, The Talking Glasses, The Ashtrays. The whole thing was like watching sports. I had never found myself doing that before, but I was with guys. Now, maybe truck drivers and macho muscle men get uptight seeing sissies dancing and prancing around in videos. But my feeling is that 90 percent of that population are flaming faggots, anyway.

Q 2

PLAYBOY: Settle a raging debate for us. Are videos advertising or art?

Bob Giraldi: I say art. Cynical businessmen and record executives call me naïve. But I know advertising and have been in that business all my life. Videos are, perhaps, a promotional tool to bring the music industry back to life. But are they ads? They may help sell records, but so does the weather. Videos don't sell songs the way Bubba Smith sells Lite Beer for Miller. There's no pitch involved. When you see a great video, you're more interested in watching, hearing and feeling it than you are in running out to buy the record. Videos are created through inspiration, much like paintings or movies. That goes for the very best videos, anyway. The majority of them are just boring and repetitive. Those are the ones that are most like advertising, simply because they all look the same. I've had enough of selling. When I feel the urge to sell, I make a Pepsi-Cola commercial.

Q 3

PLAYBOY: What is MTV's most unforgivable sin?

Bob Giraldi: Saturation. Nobody could have predicted this video craze, but we owe it to ourselves to be careful. Videos may wear out their welcome. I like MTV and believe it's the single most responsible entity behind the boom in the music industry. But even my 17-year-old daughter, Maria, tells me she can't watch a steady diet of MTV anymore, whereas she enjoys shows like NBC's Friday Night Videos and New York Hot Tracks. For me, it's like football, in the sense that at the end of every single winter season, there's been too much.

Q 4

PLAYBOY: Where would you rather watch MTV?

Bob Giraldi: Thirty-five thousand feet above the ground, in an airplane. That would be a smart place to pipe in a channel. You're a captive audience up there. When you're bored on one of those six- or eight-hour flights to Europe or California, you might like some jive to break things up. You know, the plane would rock a little bit in the sky. The worst place to watch it is in bed, making love. The beat is so varied, you might lose your place.

Q 5

PLAYBOY: A number of big-name acts--Joe Jackson, for one--have denounced videos for robbing people of their right to visualize music for themselves. How valid is that argument?

Bob Giraldi: Not valid at all. Joe Jackson thinks videos suck for several reasons. However, he has also said that if he could dance like Michael Jackson, he might not mind doing videos. What he's saying, in his heart, is he feels he may not be a consummate performer. I disagree. I'd love to make a video with Joe Jackson, because I'd make him as hot as a firecracker onscreen. Moreover, he underestimates the power of music.

Example: Lionel Richie's classic love song Hello. We made a video in which Lionel is a teacher to a blind girl who's in love with him. She sculpts an identical likeness of his face in clay. Admittedly, the video is somewhat contrived--purposefully, in fact--but it's a nice visual love experience. It's my personal concept of the song. When I told Lionel about it at dinner one night, he damn near cried. He said it had nothing to do with the song, but he loved it. When you hear that song on your car radio, I guarantee that you will not think about the video. If we're as romantic a people as I think we are, songs will never leave our imaginations. Music is stronger than that.