Lovett or Leave It

Statue of Liberty 3D Art and Rendering by Paul Spella | Senior Art Direction by Jesse McLean

In 2022, Crooked Media and host Jon Lovett decided it was time to refresh the “Lovett or Leave It” brand. Launched in 2017, “Lovett or Leave It” is a weekly podcast and live show featuring a panel of comedians, actors, politicians, activists, and more riffing on that week’s news. After a long pre-production and exploratory phase, I took over the design of the show’s official key art and live show branding. The team had commissioned 3D artist Paul Spella to create an image of Statue of Liberty being caught doomscrolling on the toilet to use as the central key art figure, but they could not decide on how to use the Lady Liberty.

I played around with dozens of iterations of Lady Liberty — on stage, in a pop-art void, in the bathroom stall — but, ultimately, the team requested I bring in a 4th of July fireworks scene to barrage the sky behind her. For the logotype, I leaned into the New York setting and took inspiration from intersecting street signs. I selected a bold color palette that matched Lovett’s personality and love of 1980s brights.

Next, it was time for the live show materials. The “Lovett or Leave It” team named their 2023 tour “The Errors Tour,” a reference of the epic Taylor Swift world tour that was happening simultaneously. At first, we shied away from a direct visual parody of the Taylor Swift 9-square Eras Tour poster. I toyed with a number of ways to represent “errors,” from pop-up windows to broken stage lights. However, we decided on a clearer homage to the Eras Tour imagery, as it helped land the joke better.