Bryan Buckley's first Super Bowl commercial aired more than two decades ago. It was a 30-second spot for Monster.com, shot in black and white, with children speaking directly into the camera about their comically bleak career goals.

"I want to claw my way up to middle management," one says in the 1999 ad.

"I want to be forced into early retirement!" says another.

Buckley thought it would be a hit. And eventually, it came to be considered one. But the initial reactions — including in USA TODAY's Ad Meter, a ranking of Super Bowl ads by consumer rating — were tepid, Buckley recalled. And his client "was freaking out."

"Because it's the Super Bowl," Buckley said, "the stakes are so, so high."

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Few directors understand those stakes like Buckley, a 56-year-old Massachusetts native who has directed more than 50 Super Bowl commercials over the past two decades. He's directed multiple Super Bowl ads in 16 of the past 20 years. And he's been behind the scenes of several memorable Super Bowl commercials, from E-Trade's brilliant waste of $2 million to an inspiring Microsoft commercial last year.

"I just feel very fortunate to be in this position, to do work that’s going to be exposed at such a large level," Buckley said in a telephone interview. "You realize that we’re creating pieces of pop culture here, that go out there and can influence things in many different ways. I’m very conscious of that."

Buckley is directing two Super Bowl ads this year: A Boston-themed Hyundai commercial featuring Rachel Dratch, Chris Evans, John Krasinski and David Ortiz, and a 30-second spot for SodaStream.

But he's also evolved beyond commercials. His short film "Saria," which tells the stories of two young female orphans in Guatemala, was recently nominated for an Academy Award. His 2012 short film "Asad," in which the entire cast consisted of Somali refugees with no prior acting experience, also received an Oscar nomination.

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Buckley believes all of his work "ties together," whether it's a comedic 30-second spot for CareerBuilder or an emotional 23-minute opus. It's all storytelling. So he's not one to get caught up in labels.

"If you want to call me a commercial guy, it’s OK. At some point, maybe they’ll call me a feature director," Buckley said. "At one point, they called me an ad guy."

That was "ancient history," he notes — in the late 1980s.

Buckley, who never went to film school, graduated from Syracuse with a degree in advertising design and opened up his own ad agency with fellow 20-something Tom DeCerchio shortly thereafter. They went against the grain but had immediate success, earning accolades from industry magazines and feature stories in The New York Times. But they hated it. So both Buckley and DeCerchio moved to Los Angeles to become screenwriters.

Director Bryan Buckley, a two-time Academy Award nominee who has directed more than 50 Super Bowl commercials. (Photo: Courtesy of Hungry Man Productions)

"We sold a screenplay to Columbia Pictures and we thought, 'Oh, this is easy! Hollywood!'" Buckley said.

That thinking proved to be naive. Instead, Buckley ultimately found steady work co-directing some commercials for a then-burgeoning sports channel called ESPN. He co-directed an estimated 30 to 40 editions of the now-famous "This Is SportsCenter" campaign and about 180 hockey-related spots. He called it "film school on ice, basically."

"I didn’t call myself a director for the first year, year and half, because I was embarrassed," Buckley said. "I didn’t really believe it. A guy shows up on set and tells hockey players what to do? (That) didn’t seem like a director to me."

Buckley eventually warmed to the title, though, and after the Monster.com ad in 1999, his Super Bowl seasons grew increasingly busy. He directed three commercials apiece in 2002 and 2003, and four in 2005 and 2006. In 2011, he directed six ads for six different companies.

Buckley said the beginnings of each commercial, and his influence within it, can vary. Some companies or ad agencies give the director an airtight script and little room for change, he said. Others have a general idea and trust the director to make it work. Decisions on casting, location, script and final edits can all fall within Buckley's purview — in addition to, of course, the actual filming and framing of the ad.

With 30-second advertising slots during the Super Bowl broadcast now selling for between $5 million and $5.6 million, the pressure to get it right is immense. And Buckley said it's becoming increasingly difficult for an ad to resonate. 

"If you’re not top-five, then you’re not talked about. That’s it. It’s over, in my mind," he said. "And how do you get to top five? How do you get there? It’s not easy. And really, there’s no set formula."

Though 30-second Super Bowl commercials might not carry the same prestige as Academy Award nominations, Buckley takes them just as seriously — and has found them to be just as meaningful. He mentioned last year's Microsoft commercial, which finished third in USA TODAY's Ad Meter rankings, as one example. The ad shows a 9-year-old boy named Owen, who has a rare physical condition called Escobar syndrome, playing video games.

It's an ad for the Xbox adaptive controller, but almost a mini-documentary, too. And Buckley said it was one of the most satisfying projects of his career.

"A great kid who has a difficult physical disability suddenly launched onto a national (platform) — it was beautiful," he said. "You can’t make up that moment."

Contact Tom Schad at [email protected] or on Twitter @Tom_Schad.

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