The campaign aimed to blitz national media with positive and creative “stand out” news page coverage of Dame Helen Mirren in her first ever “Ship’s Godmother” role at the live bottle-smashing naming ceremony of the largest cruise liner built for the British market - the 116,000 tonnes P&O Cruises “Ventura”.

With Dame Helen not expected to actually break the bottle herself, the challenge was to also come up with a creative way of breaking the bottle on the ship’s bows… that would be guaranteed to work. We solved this by approaching the Royal Marine Commandos, asking if they would be willing to abseil down the side of the ship to break the bottle, on Dame Helen’s command.

Our methodology was to remorselessly line up Dame Helen for live interviews and picture opportunities in advance of the 8.30pm Naming Event- effectively creating a continuous live event. After a red-carpet noon ‘arrival’ photocall, Dame Helen visited an ISDN equipped shoreside radio studio, for 45 mins of down-the-line live interviews on BBC Radio Five Live & Radio 2. By 1pm we staged the ‘core’ photocall…of Dame Helen beneath Ventura’s bow accepting a kiss from two hunky Royal Marine Commandos, showing them how to swing the champagne bottle against the hull.

While many of the 32 attending photographers from regional and national press wired back these early pictures, Dame Helen was prepared for a live ITN Lunchtime News interview by Ventura’s swimming and jacuzzi pools, before attending a final ‘live preview’ photocall on Ventura’s bridge.Changed into a dramatic evening gown Dame Helen then ceremoniously pressed an electronic device, triggering two Marines to simultaneously abseil down the floodlit bow of the ship to smash the bottle successfully. Dame Helen declared she was delighted to “Name this ship Ventura!” followed by a fitting finale of live fireworks.

The Mail On Sunday ran the announcement of Dame Helen and the Marines exclusively in advance, and this set off a raft of other coverage, including the Sunday Telegraph, Metro, with regional ITV and BBC covering both the story from P&O Cruises and the Marines viewpoint, plus Sky News Radio and IRN bulletins.On the Naming Day itself, IRN news ran it live in both lunchtime and early evening bulletins, Sky News’s Kaplinsky went in live with Dame Helen, as did the BBC One Show. CNBC also covered from the business angle, and BBC South and ITV Meridian followed the whole onboard day’s events. Live radio with Dame Helen included BBC Radio 2, BBC Five Live and IRN Showbiz bulletins nationally.The following day, no fewer than eight UK national press covered the story - Telegraph, Times, Sun, Express, FT, Star, Mirror and Metro, followed by the Sunday Times.Highlights included Dame Helen in Ventura captain’s hat on the Express front page; a full picture sequence of the ship’s features, plus Dame Helen with Marines in the Telegraph; a Sun picture of Dame Helen kissing Noddy; and an immortal Mirror headline beneath Dame Helen saying “I Dame This Ship”.