DDB Mudra Group’s Rahul Mathew: You don’t win silver. You lose the chance to feel like a million bucks. And be the envy of an entire industry.

DDB Mudra Group’s Chief Creative Officer, Rahul Mathew, served on the Audio and Radio jury in Cannes this year. Here he shares some of his thoughts on the experience.

For as long as I remember, once the awards are announced, the non-awarding juries come into play. Discussing the winners over coffee, lunch, dinner, drinks; at the palais, out of it and definitely at the gutter bar. The awarding juries are judged more than the work at this point in time. And never does a jury come out of it unscathed. Nor is there a year where some pieces that made it to that hallowed stage aren’t chastised.

But on the night, the team that’s on the stage cannot help but gasp with joy. (Those who aren’t aware – Only Golds and Grand Prixs make it to the stage). You feel like the rockstars who have just finished an incredible concert where your peers are suddenly your fans as they fill the auditorium with applause and whistles. And at that moment you know you want this moment again and again. Even the ones who have been on that stage on numerous occasions, have the same glint in their eyes and the same face-stretching smiles as the first-timers.

And the ones who may later dissect the wins and scoff at the winners; at that point in time would trade anything in the world to be there. Because it looks just as incredible from where they’re sitting.

Bernbach had said that we’re so obsessed with the changing man, but we need to be more concerned with the unchanging man and his unchanging emotions and feelings (this is genderised only to stay true to the quote).

And no one understands it better than Cannes. While categories have been added and their definitions have been changed, Cannes still talks to what’s unchanging in all of us. And that stage is where it all comes together.