Chapter 4

Production Design

Back when most productions were shot on film, we knew that a camera recorded what was transpiring in front of it at a rate of 24 frames per second. And we could imagine that each of those frames was a literal picture: a moment in time that was frozen in a little box. And everything in that box—except the actors—was an element of the production design. Although now most “films” are shot digitally (and are thus are sadly lacking in frames), the concept remains the same. Everything within the “frame” that is not human is part of the production design.

The production design helps tell the story. The color of the walls, the style of the furniture, the specificity of the props, the cut of the costumes—each choice helps the director clearly communicate the story that she is trying to tell. Although there are many, many people to assist the director in making those choices, ultimately it is the director’s responsibility alone. Just as President Harry Truman said, “The buck stops here,” so it does with the director, who is the president of the production. Therefore, in order to be best prepared to make such major (and minor) decisions, it is helpful to have some gained some background in art history, to have traveled and navigated different cultures, and to have read widely. Having done so gives the director a platform of learning that inspires self-confidence and perspective. It’s simplistic but true: if you’ve walked the streets of Barcelona (or Beijing, or Boston, or wherever your story takes place), you’ll have a different point of view than someone who has merely read about it. The job of the director is to have a point of view—a creative vision that pulls every department together to create a cohesive story. So the director ideally comes to the project with both a varied personal background and specific research regarding the script.

 

 

COLLABORATING CREATIVELY WITH DEPARTMENT HEADS

If the project is an episode of a television show, all the department heads (leaders of each division) will have already been hired and will remain consistent through the season of production. However, if you are making a movie (feature or TV) or pilot, it is the job of the director (with the producer) to interview and hire the department heads, who will supervise their particular area of expertise and help the director bring a script to life. The critical factors in hiring people are finding someone who:

Shares the director’s sensibilities

Brings inspiration and enthusiasm, contributing new and original ideas

Can communicate those new ideas clearly

Knows they are part of a team, not an independent voice

Can work within the budget allowed

 

 

 

Making a film is a very creative and therefore emotional experience. People give: they give their ideas, their loyalty, their time, and their effort. They do so in the interest of making the best project. And there will be differences of opinion that may lead to interpersonal disasters. It is crucial for the director and producer to find department heads who “fit”: who can work together with this staff and crew for an extended period of time in an environment, which—due to budget and deadline pressures—can be stressful.

The production designer is a particularly eminent hire because that person supervises several departments and is a pivotal link between the ideas in the director’s head and their realization on film, tape, or digital recording.

COMMUNICATING WELL IN CONCEPT MEETING

Once everyone has been hired, there is a concept meeting. All of the department heads—along with the producer, the writer, and the director—gather to discuss the script and receive preliminary information from the director about the approach that will be taken. Let’s say that you are directing a family drama that takes place in London during the Blitz in 1940. At that first concept meeting, your staff and crew will want answers—direction—from you. What does the set look like? How much money and status does the family have? Is the environment one of positive energy or negative? What kind of transportation do they use? How do they dress? What set pieces or props are needed to help tell the story? How do you want the actors to look in costume, makeup, and hair? What is the overall color palette? In order to provide some answers, the director will have done some research.

As we all know, people in Paris live differently from people in Pittsburgh. And people in 1940 (or 1440, or 2140) live in a different environment than we do today. So you will have investigated by looking at source material from the time and place. Thank goodness for the Internet! But don’t forget, in addition to those resources, to take advantage of what exists not only in virtual reality but in reality itself. Visit relevant places. Go to museums. Interview experts. Start to forge pictures in your head of what your film or TV show will look like. Accumulate visual aids so that you can illustrate your points. This activity is necessary because it’s all subjective. One person’s idea of “red” is different than another’s. The director’s vision of “poor” might be very different than the prop master’s. So the director will show pictures and say, “This is the kind of [chair, sheep, car, house] that I am thinking about.” And keep in mind that your department heads will have done their research, too. They will come with files, with pictures, with layout boards covered in fabric swatches and drawings. Everyone wants to contribute creatively by providing the most specific and wonderful fulfillment of the director’s requests. So it’s incumbent upon the director to have put some thought and work into the script before bringing the department heads on board.

On day one of your prep of this hypothetical WWII film, you’ll be asked: red lipstick or coral? Car, bicycle, subway, or walking? Homemade pine furniture or antique Chippendale? Chicken on the dinner table or beef stew? Down and dirty brawl or stylized fight? A thousand extras or isolation? Moody lighting or sunlight? At that first concept meeting, you may not yet have all the answers, and it’s okay to say that. You can say, “I’ll have more specific information about that later, but for now, the general direction we’re heading in is ….” Nevertheless, at the very beginning of prep, the director provides literal direction; that is, in which direction in the universe of choices do you want your department heads to go?

For most productions, the primary departments relating to production design are: art, props, costumes, makeup/hair, and transportation. Other departments that may be a part of a production, depending on the script, are visual effects, special effects, choreography, and stunts. (Animals generally fall into the Props department.) All of these departments execute the director’s requests to the best of their ability, and their work takes place primarily in the preproduction stage, unlike the production stage, in which departments like camera, electric, and grips come to the forefront. But it all begins and ends with the director, who initiates and/or approves every single choice that appears in every frame of the production. From hairstyle to architecture, choreography, and colors, it’s your choice. Whether you have a multimillion-dollar budget or you’re making a short film on home video on the weekend, it’s all your choice. And here we’re talking about production choices. In postproduction, you will continue to make choices in sound and music that also help you tell the story.

 

 

Scripts very seldom offer details of production design; nor should they. Writers use their vivid imaginations to create the story and the characters and no doubt “see” the film in their heads, but if a writer were to dictate the myriad details of production design, they would be closer to writing a book than a script. It is up to the director, with the production designer’s input and effort, to visualize the film’s environments and make them become the stage upon which the characters come to life.

The director’s choices illuminate the characters’ exterior lives and, more important, their interior lives. The production design lends a feeling that the audience picks up. Are the characters rich or poor? Happy or sad? Sick or well? Determined or depleted? Loving or hateful? Determining the answers to these kinds of questions tells the director (and by extension, the production design team) how to proceed. You did this work already when you broke down the script for story and character. Now you just need to share that information with your production designer.

So let’s go back to the hypothetical London Blitz story. We know that architecturally, it’s necessary to be accurate to the period. But the housing of the characters could be relatively new, or (as was the case in much of London then) the building(s) could be hundreds of years old. Which choice tells more about the mental and physical state of the characters? The director tells the production designer what his concept is, and together they flesh out the basic idea. Generally, after a lot of discussion (“I like this, but I’m not sure about this; could you give me more of this?”), a set design is decided upon. Both the director and the production designer speak the same language when discussing the concepts that are fundamental to this process.

THREE KEY ELEMENTS TO PRODUCTION DESIGN

Let’s go over the three elements of choice in production design that are relevant to all departments. They are:

1.  Style

2.  Color

3.  Impact

When we talk about “style,” we’re referring to incorporating time or period specificity with artistic design choices. Style can be as big as creating a whole world (Avatar) or as small as two chairs and a table in a stark police interrogation room.

Basically, a film or television show creates an environment in which the characters interact, and that environment helps to inform the story. So the job of the production design in terms of style is to effectively “set the stage” for the story.

The production designer is the director’s right hand in creating the environment of the story. The production designer has an art and architecture background, enabling him to take ideas and artistic concepts and shape them into a concrete reality.

The director discusses her ideas, and the production designer incorporates those ideas into set design, as well as offering his own artistic contributions. The designer then presents drawings, computer or physical models, and blueprints as the preproduction process continues in order to hone in on the specific style that the director is proposing.

So the first element of production design is style. The second is color. And this choice has an amazing impact on the storytelling. Color elicits an emotional response, universally interpreted. You could be watching a foreign language film, but if a sexy young woman enters the story wearing a bright red dress, you instinctively know that she’s trouble. Conversely, a young woman entering the story in a demure white dress is likely to be an innocent (or the director wants the audience to perceive her that way). Almost any scene has more energy when the environment’s color is heightened, and when a director wants to tell a story of deprivation, the lack of color is important. Think of the movies The Devil Wears Prada and Out of Africa. In the first film, the rich saturation of color is essential to illustrate the vibrant, busy, intense world of high fashion in New York and Paris. Conversely, the muted savannah-like palette of Africa gives an open, airy, languid feel to illustrate the wide extent of this beautiful and inviting—yet not widely explored—continent.

 

 

Part of the director’s storytelling includes color-coding the story. This element filters throughout the production, including the lighting design, which you will discuss with your director of photography (DP). As a generalization, blue light is moody and cool, warm light (orange-red) is happy and sensuous. Blue light is for night; warm light for day. Blue light is for danger and emotionally constricted characters. Warm light is for love and laughter. And of course there are many settings between these opposite ends of the lighting scale. We discuss many more specific lighting aspects in Chapter 11, but for now, we’re talking about how color influences story.

Color influences the environment of the story, too. Bethany learned this in Toronto when she was directing a Danielle Steel book adaptation as a TV movie. The story was about the emotional turbulence of an upscale family. The homeowner had made dramatic decorating choices that served the script perfectly. The foyer floor was covered in a dramatic checkerboard pattern of black and white. Immediately to the right was the living room, where the walls were a vibrant yellow. Just to the left was the dining room, painted a deep and inviting red. The scenes that took place in that house were much better with those color choices than if the walls had been drab. If the story had been about turbulence between characters in a mental institution, then the walls would probably be white to signal to the audience that the environment was lacking emotion. Just a coat of paint can contribute immensely to the feeling of a scene.

According to the book Signs and Symbols, these are some of the attributes of colors:

red: fire, war, love, passion, blood

orange: renunciation, splendor, fidelity

yellow: sun, treachery, homecoming

green: nature, youth, fertility, jealousy

blue: divinity, naivety, calm, class distinctions

purple: imperial or priestly power, wealth

pink: femininity, gay pride

black: evil, mourning, age, death

white: surrender, innocence, cowardice, holiness¹

Everything within the “frame” has color or lack of it. There is immense opportunity here for a director to subtly or grandly influence audience perception by choosing colors that elicit emotional response. And everything within that frame is chosen: there is nothing that magically appears without thought and effort, although it may seem that way when watching a movie or a TV show. In fact, if the choices fit seamlessly into the story, enabling the audience to go on the journey with the characters without having anything pierce the veil of believability, then the director has done the job well.

That brings us to the third element of production design: impact. And this is a tricky one, because sometimes you want to have everything blend in, and sometimes you want an element to stand out. That is part of the storytelling. We said at the beginning of this chapter that the essential part of production design is to remain true to the period and environment of the story. That is true 99 percent of the time. From the architecture to the interior design, from the hairstyles to the cars—everything is doing its part to help tell the story. But it’s a continuum of choices—from a one to a ten, the yin and the yang, the bold and the whisper. And everything in between.

 

 

Think of Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. There is absolutely no choice in that movie that is timid. The environment of the story is the story, because Alice fell down a hole into a subjective reality. The production designer of that movie (Robert Stromberg) just couldn’t go to IKEA and pick up a few things for the set. Following Burton’s lead, he had to design and model and form and create every single element, from the dishes on the table at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party to the watch that the White Rabbit carried. Each of the choices were all high-impact, meant to be observed, meant to create an atmosphere of wonder, meant to exaggerate the realistic world.

On a quieter note, consider the television comedy Modern Family. There are three (related) families as characters, and each family has a distinct environment. The richest (patriarch) has a modern home of glass and steel. The gay couple has a cozy Spanish bungalow. And the typical American family (a couple with three children) has a traditional home. Within each of these environments, there are thousands of elements that have been chosen to depict the life of those characters, with varying degrees of impact. Which kind of sofa does each family have? Beds? Decorating touches? Here the impact of the production design is subtle, with nothing standing out but everything fitting in.

 

 

 

The look of a television series is usually established in the pilot and then it evolves as the story and characters evolve during the course of the episodes. So Jason Winer (director) and Richard Berg (production designer) of the pilot of Modern Family created the template with input from the producers, the studio, and the network. And all of those voices must be considered, especially the ones who are paying for it (the network.) Money talks, and paychecks are at stake. The executives at a network (broadcast, cable, or web) are buying a property that has been pitched to them as having certain qualities. It is therefore the responsibility of the director to see that those qualities are present in the finished product.

So if a network bought “a stylistic family drama set against the highstakes world of Las Vegas,” then all of those elements should be there: style, family, drama, high stakes, Vegas. And everything the director chooses as part of the production design should complement that concept. Often, the first choice the director will confront is, “Where exactly will we shoot this story?”

SHOOTING ON A SOUNDSTAGE OR GOING ON LOCATION?

The initial two choices that a director has regarding the set(s) are to build a set or shoot on a practical location. We talk more about locations in Chapter 9, but the basic factors as to which way a production goes include the following:

1.  How much of the script takes place in a specific set? If it’s a lot (more than ten pages), it’s likely that building a set would provide the director with the most options and keep a crew located in one place, which is less expensive generally than going to a location for a long period.

2.  What is the budget for the production? It requires a decent budget to rent stage space, hire a construction crew, and create a set from scratch. It might be cheaper to shoot on a practical location (but see the following factor).

3.  Can you shoot what you need in a practical location, where the walls don’t move, the windows might not open, it might be a noisy environment, and there is limited access? Does the practical location provide everything you need to tell the story, or is compromise required? (Compromise is not always a bad thing, especially in television. It sometimes forces a director to think more creatively.)

This decision will be made in concert with the producing team because ultimately, this choice balances creative needs against financial ones. This is otherwise known wryly as art vs. commerce. It is the daily internal dilemma of every director: you always want more, in every possible way, to tell your story. But more of anything will undoubtedly mean that it costs more, too.

Do you have a budget that will support steak choices, or are we talking tuna in a can? And there is also the balancing aspect of meeting the needs of all the scenes in the script. If the script has 20 different places in which the story takes place, it’s likely that some of those places will be sets and some will be practical locations. (The exception in television is for pilots or television movies, which are one-offs, that is, the producing team will not want to spend money to build sets for a show that stands alone without further installments. For a pilot or TV movie, a director will probably be required to shoot the entire script in practical locations.) For a feature film or a television series, sets will be built. And the director and the production designer, together with the producer, will decide which scenes require building sets and which will be shot on location. Whichever is chosen, further work must be done.

 

DECORATING THE SET AND SELECTING THE PROPS

Rarely does a director pick a location and deem it perfect as it is. There may be things that need to be added or subtracted, requiring construction and/or painting. A location might be almost perfect, except for (let’s say) the handicap ramp that needs to be added or the wall that needs to be torn down. Under the supervision of the production designer and the art director, those things would be addressed. (The art director assists the production designer primarily with creating the blueprints and administrating the department.) And then there will be work for the set decorator to do, whether it’s a location or a set. The decorator and her team turn a set from bare walls to finished room. Whether a show is a period piece (requiring perhaps a throne) or a contemporary one (requiring an up-to-the-minute media room), the job of the set decorator is often that of an elite scavenger hunter, finding just the right piece. What does the furniture look like? The window dressing?

FIGURE 4-1 In this photograph from a Brothers & Sisters episode entitled “An Ideal Husband,” actors Dave Annable, Matthew Rhys, Christopher J. Hanke, and Brock Cuchna are in the midst of a bar fight. (Brothers & Sisters trademarks and copyrighted material have been used with the permission of ABC Studios).

What kinds of dishes are in the kitchen? What kinds of toiletries are in the bathroom? Each choice needs to be in line with the production design and the intention to illuminate each character, and the director approves each significant choice. Figure 4-1 shows the set of Café 429 in an episode of Brothers & Sisters. It was designed by Denny Dugally and decorated by Brian Venegas. Note the bar decorations—the scene took place during a harvest-themed charity event.

The set decorator provides the surroundings of the set or location that the production designer has dictated, but the person who provides the things that actors physically touch or use in a scene is the prop master. Again, choosing props provides an opportunity for the director (through the prop master) to be specific about story and character. Even something basic and simple—a dish towel, a screwdriver, a purse, a pair of eyeglasses—can speak volumes about a character.

So in the concept meetings, a director can provide direction to the prop master about what to look for. Then, during the prep period, the prop master brings items to the director for approval. By the time the production moves from prep to shooting, all of those elements have been chosen, and each reflects the period, the story, and the character.

DRESSING THE ACTORS

Another department involved in production design is Costumes, sometimes called Wardrobe. This department head (the costume designer) has autonomy and does not (usually) report to the production designer, but they work together to create a cohesive look. Here again, it is the director’s inspiration that provides the basis for all of the choices. And, once more, it is important for the costume designer’s work to remain consistent with the overall look of the production, respecting its basis in time period and environment. During the concept meetings, visual aids are especially important in this department because a picture is worth a thousand words, and it’s difficult to describe a suit or a dress or a set of chain mail, but when the director and costume designer look at photographs or art work that illustrate the possibilities, they can be sure that they are dealing with the same reference point.

Depending on the budget and the script requirements, the costumes may be bought, rented, or built (made). As with the production designer, the position of the costume designer requires someone who can create from scratch or find the perfect piece at a flea market, depending on budget and time—someone who is both brilliant and flexible.

 

 

OTHER PRODUCTION DESIGN DEPARTMENTS

Other department heads with the same type of capabilities are the makeup and hair designers, who—in addition to making the actors look good—also need to be practical psychologists. These are people who deal with actors who have fragile egos and who see them first every day. A good makeup artist does her best to help the actors face the day with confidence. Doing so is difficult if an actor does not feel positive about his “look.”

An actor’s look is especially important in period pieces, whether it’s the past or the future. The actors’ looks contribute to the overall production design by cementing the characters’ place in time and designated space. Contemporary scripts can lead to less specific styles, unless there is an event in the script (a prom, a banquet, a race, or a competition of some kind) for which the characters would change their everyday look. Referencing pictures or movies helps to make sure that the director and the makeup and hair designers are communicating clearly.

 

 

The last general department head with which the director works during prep is the transportation coordinator, who is responsible for “picture cars,” in addition to transporting the company and its equipment during the process of production. Picture cars are those that will appear as part of the production design, whether in the background or for use by principal characters. Just as costumes and hair and makeup illuminate characters, so do the cars they drive. Like everything else, this is a choice the director makes that will help tell the story. Does the character drive a big black Mercedes or a broken-down Ford Fiesta?

 

 

If the script requires it, the director may also work with department heads in special effects, visual effects, stunts, and choreography. That is covered more in Chapter 12, but suffice it to say here that choices will be made that help tell the story and adhere to the overall production design.

This process of creating the production design for a story can exhilarating, frustrating, and exceedingly creative. Choosing the style of each possible choice—whether it’s a set design, a piece of set decoration, a prop, a costume, a car, or an actor’s look—brings the director closer to telling the part of the story that is surrounding the actors. Although all department heads contribute their creativity and effort in each specific area, the director is the ultimate arbiter of the choices that are right for the script.

 

The process of creating the finished product must be one of collaboration because it takes roughly 200 people to put out one episode of a network television show. But it is the director who is hired to provide the creative vision and the leadership required to get everyone on the same team, telling the same story. And when talking about production design, that means that among other qualities required for this multilevel job, it would behoove the director to have a good education in art history, architecture, popular culture, design, and aesthetics. If you’re lacking any of that, you can make up for it by doing your research; seeing what others have done in art, print and film; and then making choices based on your story and your preferences. Just remember that the first rule is always to tell the story.

 

 

 

1. Hodgson, Nicola, and Neil Lockley (Eds.). (2008). Signs and Symbols. New York: DK Publishing, p. 280–283.