Will Wightman: Gen Z Genius

An auteur in the fully pretentious sense of the word, Will Wightman writes his own scripts, directs them and composes the addictively pulsating music that scores them. 

His work is an often dizzying coming together of the heartfelt and horrific, set in a hypnotic world of bleak flats, dating apps and people seemingly on the edge of psychosis. “Often when I get personal projects,” Wightman says, “there’s a kind of a feeling that I want to push stuff out into that darker space. If you make something that is excessively preened and overly optimistic, it can feel a bit disingenuous. So, what I try to do is try to create worlds that at some level have a kind of gritty honesty.” 

"If you make something that is excessively preened and overly optimistic, it can feel a bit disingenuous."

This has been evident from his very first short, Heart Failure, which shows the aftermath of the breakdown of a relationship. Wightman made it partly because he’d become, “slightly frustrated by content about young people because it’s usually made by 45-year-olds, just because of the nature of our industry.” 

Above: Wightman's first short film, Heart Failure.

What makes Heart Failure, and the rest of his work, all the more accomplished is that his films are as funny as they are unsettling. Another brilliant example is This Place is a Sh*thole, which features the aforementioned Mr. Sticky and sees two flatmates battle a creature that their own slovenliness and poor hygiene has created. It plays out like Shaun of the Dead for Generation Rent, an apt comparison it transpires, given one of Wightman’s directorial influences. 

“Edgar Wright was huge for me,” he says. “He does that stylised world of camera, music and editing but there’s a real grounded Britishness as well, which I think is something that is big for me. I like stuff that has a stylised quality at some level, but I think you have to anchor it in something real. Otherwise an audience has nothing to hold on to.” 

"[Edgar Wright] does that stylised world of camera, music and editing but there’s a real grounded Britishness."

This Place is a Sh*thole also highlights the eye that Wightman has for comedy talent. The flatmates who are terrorised by Mr. Sticky are played by Paddy Young and Jack Shep, who since then have gone on to become two of the standouts on SNL UK. Working with actors who can experiment is something that Wightman relishes. “The very best experience you can have on set with actors, particularly comedy actors, is when you’re no longer trying to just make the scene work. You’re just getting to think ‘what, tonally, do we fancy?’. Let’s try one where you guys hate each other. Let’s try one where there’s a bit of a sexual undertone. You just have a play.” 

Above: Wightman's film, This Place is a Shithole, is "like Shaun of the Dead for Generation Rent".

Wightman’s comedy frequently comes with a satirical edge. His Shop To Save Lives film for PETA starts off like an old school kids TV show and quickly turns into something much more troubling. The chirpy host is played by Jessie Cave, another example of his peerless comedy casting and someone who Wightman describes as “an incredibly experienced, precise performer.” She tries to keep a brave face as the animal puppets surrounding her start showing off the horrific injuries they’ve suffered as a result of their fur, wool or skin being used to make clothes.  

Shop To Save Lives won silver at the 2023 Cannes Lions. Other awards have followed, and in 2024 Wightman scooped Best Commercial at the Young Directors Award for Deliciously Predictable, his ad for Ore-Ida fries. In an industry where there is increasingly less appetite for visionary work, here is a piece which is big, bright and bizarre. Taking its lead from the Golden Age of MGM, it utilises numerous creative techniques. This approach of blending different styles is something that Wightman credits to his current production company.  

“I love Jurassic Park and Jaws and Alien. Even 50s black-and-white sci-fi movies, like The Creature from the Black Lagoon.” 

“Before I was at BlinkInk, I was purely live-action and wouldn’t write anything that I couldn’t shoot myself, with no visual effects tools. Going to BlinkInk, I’ve learned so much. I’ve done puppets, I’ve done prosthetics, 2D animation, CG, stop-motion.” 

Even with Deliciously Predictable, a jaunty musical that doesn’t end in heartbreak or dismemberment, it feels like there is something deliciously off key: as if at any moment the whole thing could descend into madness. This is perhaps unsurprising when you consider that Wightman’s filmic touchstones all have an air of menace and strangeness, “I love Jurassic Park and Jaws and Alien,” he says. “Even 50s black-and-white sci-fi movies, like The Creature from the Black Lagoon.” 

Above: Wightman's film Deliciously Predictable won him two Gold Screen awards at the 2024 Young Director Award. 

Wightman is without a doubt a singular talent, but all talent needs advocates. In his case the advocate happens to be an icon in her own right, Saatchi & Saatchi CCO Franki Goodwin. For ten years Goodwin developed award-winning, integrated movie campaigns through her own design and digital agency. She joined Saatchi in 2013, was promoted to Chief Creative Officer in 2021 and won Campaign’s Creative Leader of the Year in 2024. 

“Franki was actually one of the very first people to back me,” says Wightman. “She saw the grad film that I made when I was at Falmouth University (the aforementioned Heart Failure), when she was in charge of the selection process for the Cannes Lions New Directors showcase. At every stage, when she gets a chance to talk about people she’s excited about, she always seems to mention me, which is so lovely.” 

“When you first get started in the industry, the people who back you like that, it makes all the difference.” 

Goodwin is, Wightman adds, “an avid supporter” and he’s fully aware of the impact that support has had, saying, “when you first get started in the industry, the people who back you like that, it makes all the difference.” 

The ad world has always needed creators who are bold in their thinking and brave in their choices. That is truer now than ever, and thankfully directors like Wightman are showing us that the canvas on which we can paint is all the more enticing when we don’t subcontract our dreams to robots, but rather let our imaginations run glorious riot.  

Will was chosen as an Innovator by our Icon, Franki Goodwin, and you can read her interview here.