The Thrill of the Ride
08/08/2023
After the thrills of Haunted Mansion, Waldron rode straight into writer-director Nicole Holofcener's dramatic comedy You Hurt My Feelings, about married couple Beth (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) and Don (Tobias Menzies) and the strains on their relationship after Beth overhears her husband's candid comments. The gear-shift from one project to the next offered a creative rush for Waldron, who recounts the journey's twists and turns in this Q&A.
Panavision: How did you become involved in each project?
Jeffrey Waldron: Justin Simien and I clicked on the first season of Dear White People, sharing a love of film history and a lot of visual instincts. When he reached out about Haunted Mansion, I was so excited, not only by the idea of getting to shoot with Justin again but because I love the visual world of the source material, the original Disneyland ride. Actually landing the opportunity was an uphill battle like Justin, I was coming from independent film and television, so I worked hard to prove my potential and communicate a big vision for the film.
During the final stretch of shooting Haunted Mansion, I got a message from Nicole Holofcener we had shot together on HBO's Mrs. Fletcher and had stayed in touch and she asked if I might be available for a movie in New York City. I was heartbroken that I wasn't able to do it. When we wrapped Haunted Mansion, I checked back in to see how it went, and she told me it had been pushed. Suddenly our dates matched up, and we did You Hurt My Feelings together.
How would you describe the look that you and the director sought to create for each film?
Waldron: Well, these are very different looks!
For Haunted Mansion, we wanted to create a rich world built upon the visuals of the ride. To me, that meant a lot of color contrast between warms and cools, a lot of practical lamp sources, candles, firelight, shafts of moonlight, and a soft, dusty, painterly feel. There are a number of other looks in the film, from a flashback told through a crystal ball to the Ghost Realm' an astral plane painted in stark colors inspired by everything from a film negative to Hitchcock's Vertigo.
The script for You Hurt My Feelings managed to balance a very natural flow with a bit of a heightened, satirical edge. I took my approach from there: a softened realism lit from real-world sources but heightened to emphasize drama or lightness in parallel with the characters. We shot a lot of exteriors in New York in the spring, which fell into this soft, pastel approach well. I like to think of the result as natural and realistic but filtered through Nicole's nuanced writing and directing voice for the film.
For both projects, were there any particular visual references you looked at for inspiration?
Waldron: For Haunted Mansion, Justin and I brought in a lot of references: Hitchcock, The Twilight Zone, The Cincinnati Kid, street photography of New Orleans. I looked at lighting references from Crimson Peak and Tim Burton films like Beetlejuice and Alice in Wonderland. I'd say the biggest visual reference for all departments was consistently the ride itself. How did it strike this balance of scary and funny, and how do we bring that into a timeless-feeling but visually modern film?
For You Hurt My Feelings, I put together about a page of images I'd pulled from New York City photographers and some smaller personal films that leaned pastel and soft but felt real. Nicole looked at them only long enough to feel we were headed in a unified direction and then just started putting together the movie.
Rather than trying to emulate the entire look, there's often one small thing I like in each reference. I might use the picture to communicate a kind of green or cyan I love, or a specific kind of framing, or how they're using a super-wide lens or whatever it is. For me, rather than looking at a few whole images, it's about putting together a lot of them that each have one or two things I'm inspired by to add to the soup.
What brought you to Panavision for each of these projects?
Waldron: In early testing for Haunted Mansion, while they were building the sets, I took a camera around with a handful of lenses. When we put these images on the projector for Justin to see, it felt like a no-brainer that we wanted to shoot anamorphic the way they bend and fall off and everything, it just felt very haunted? Right off the bat, I had a lot of ambition for the film lens-wise. I knew Panavision had a long history of anamorphic optics to pull from as well as the ability to match them or modify them, plus the Herculean organizational ability to put all of this together in time.
For You Hurt My Feelings, it was a Tier 1 film with not a lot of money for a camera, and I appealed to Sal [Giarratano] at Panavision New York for help!
You used a mix of optics for Haunted Mansion. How did you determine which series to use for any given scene?
Waldron: I wanted to differentiate our waking world, which we shot with T Series; Madame Leota's crystal-ball story, shot with a special portrait' anamorphic lens set; and the Ghost Realm, which was shot with modified G Series. Each of these felt perfect for their role in the storytelling. The Ts felt more classical and buttoned-up; paired with a subtle bit of filtration, they looked great for the bulk of our scenes. The portrait lenses had heavy, glassy smears all around the
LINK: | https://www.panavision.com/highlights/highlights-detail/the-thrill-of-... |
See more stories from panavision |
More from Panavision France
24/04/2024
Authentic Perspectives
The first feature film from writer-director Shaun Seneviratne, Ben and Suzanne: A Reunion in 4 Parts depicts the struggle between love and duty as Ben (Sathya S...
24/04/2024
Melanie Georgieva Joins Panalux as Long Form Sales Director
LONDON, England (24 April 2024) Panalux, a leading rental provider of lighting and power solutions for the motion-picture industry and part of Panavision'...
22/04/2024
Adapting to Landscapes With LEE Filters
In this video, LEE Filters ambassador Jordan Banks ventures into Snowdonia National Park in Wales. Faced with less-than-ideal weather conditions, he adapts his ...
16/04/2024
A Spirit Between Worlds
Directed by H l na Klotz, La V nus dargent (aka Spirit of Ecstasy) presents the tale of Jeanne Francoeur (played by Claire Pommet), a young woman striving to es...
13/04/2024
Lighting a Horror Scene With LEE Filters
In this video, gaffer Elena Armellini takes viewers behind the scenes as she lights a horror scene. She and her crew black-out the locations windows to give the...
09/04/2024
For the Family
Co-written and directed by Thomas Cailley, The Animal Kingdom (Le r gne animal) follows a father and son's adventure to find their family's matriarch af...
08/04/2024
How to Light a Horror Scene using LEE Filters with Elena Armellini
In this video, Elena Armellini shows us how she uses LEE Filters to create the perfect lighting for a horror scene....
06/04/2024
Lighting a Night-Interior Bar Scene With LEE Filters
In this educational video from LEE Filters, cinematographer Simon Rowling welcomes viewers on set and discusses his creative and technical approach to lighting ...
29/03/2024
Women Making History, Part 5
In the final installment of Panavision's Women Making History interview series, Panavision President and CEO Kim Snyder focuses the conversation on the part...
26/03/2024
A Collaboration With Panavision: Pedro Luque, SCU
Cinematographer Pedro Luque, SCU's credits include the features Body Cam, Antebellum and director J.A. Bayona's Best International Feature Oscar-nominat...
21/03/2024
Women Making History, Part 4
In Part 4 of Panavision's Women Making History interview series, the conversation turns toward career highlights. Prompted by Panavision President and CEO K...
18/03/2024
Vintage Allure
Released this past January, the music video for Ariana Grande's yes, and? brings a modern approach to vintage allure. The video was directed by Christian ...
14/03/2024
Women Making History, Part 3
The Women Making History interview series continues, with Panavision President and CEO Kim Snyder steering the conversation toward mentorship. Here, the partici...
13/03/2024
The Making of Ferrari
I like to work with directors that have a real distinct sense for what they want out of their film, says Erik Messerschmidt, ASC. This was certainly the case w...
08/03/2024
Women Making History, Part 2
In this installment of Panavision's Women Making History interview series, the conversation turns to key advice that has helped guide the participants as th...
01/03/2024
Women Making History, Part 1
The month of March marks Women's History Month and, on the 8th, International Women's Day. These are important opportunities to focus on stories from wo...
27/02/2024
LEE Filters expands LEE Direct e-commerce platform to Canada
TORONTO (February 27, 2024) LEE Filters, a leading manufacturer of high-quality lighting gels and photographic filters and a member of the Panavision family o...
27/02/2024
The Making of The New Boy
ACS member Warwick Thornton wrote, directed and photographed the feature The New Boy, about a 9-year-old Aboriginal Australian orphan who arrives at a remote mo...
26/02/2024
Light Iron Colors Penelope in the Cloud
MovieLabs, the technology joint venture of the major Hollywood motion picture studios, recently announced that Light Iron is among the latest group of 10 partic...
25/02/2024
Look, Flow & Legacy
Directed and co-written by Nicholaus Goossen, Drugstore June follows the vigilante detective-work of a self-obsessed social-media influencer, the eponymous June...
22/02/2024
The Panavision Group at BSC Expo 2024
BSC Expo 2024 recently wrapped in London, and Panavision, Panalux and LEE Filters were all on hand to showcase products from across their range of innovative so...
21/02/2024
Vital History
With its fourth season, the National Geographic series Genius presents a dual portrait of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, inspirational leaders who paved ...
14/02/2024
The Making of Saltburn
I always want the film to tell me what it needs, says cinematographer Linus Sandgren, FSF, ASC. In the case of writer-director Emerald Fennell's feature Sa...
13/02/2024
Worthy Company
Cinematographer Ricardo Diaz joined the HBO series Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty for Season 2's third episode, The Second Coming. Depicting...
08/02/2024
The Making of Killers of the Flower Moon and Barbie
2023 saw the release of two features photographed by Rodrigo Prieto, ASC, AMC: Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig, and Killers of the Flower Moon, which reteamed ...
31/01/2024
Panalux welcomes Sandro Leone as Long Form Sales Director
LONDON, England (31 January, 2024) Panalux, a leading rental provider of lighting and power solutions for the motion-picture industry and part of Panavision...
29/01/2024
Family of Fighters
Written and directed by Sean Durkin, the feature film The Iron Claw shines a light on the tragedies and triumphs of the Von Erichs, a real-life family of profes...
23/01/2024
Panalux announces new London headquarters
LONDON, England (23rd January, 2024) Panalux, a leading rental provider of lighting and power solutions for the motion-picture industry and part of Panavision...
12/01/2024
The Making of The Crown
Over six seasons, the Netflix series The Crown has enthralled viewers with its simultaneously intimate and epic portrait of Queen Elizabeth II and the royal fam...
09/01/2024
Celebrating the Creative Spirit
Since its opening in 1973, the Sydney Opera House has become a globally recognized symbol of Australia and the creative spirit. In honor of the renowned institu...
16/12/2023
Texture of Emotion
Based on Priscilla Presley's 1985 memoir Elvis and Me, the feature Priscilla reunited writer-director Sofia Coppola with cinematographer Philippe Le Sourd, ...
05/12/2023
The Making of The Florida Project
Director Sean Baker's 2017 feature The Florida Project examines the world just outside the gates of the most magical place on Earth from the perspective o...
28/11/2023
Perfect Pairs
Based on the true story of two best friends, Jane (Yara Shahidi) and Corinne (Odessa A'zion), Sitting in Bars With Cake depicts a harrowing journey of matur...
16/11/2023
Seeing in the Dark
Set in 1950s France, The Deep Dark (Gueules noires) follows a group of coal miners who are commissioned to escort a professor through dangerous depths to retrie...
11/11/2023
Wistful Thinking
Writer-director Le Chau was born in Vietnam, moved to the United States when she was 22, and graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television in 2...
08/11/2023
A Collaboration With Panavision: Autumn Durald Arkapaw, ASC
Like the spoken word, visual language is a gift passed down from previous generations and capable of robust growth through shared use and collaboration. For cin...
08/11/2023
Unmistakable Charm
The story of a shy photographer who breaks out of his shell after attending a succession of drag shows, Three Nights a Week offers an honest look behind the vei...
31/10/2023
A Collaboration with Panavision: Alexis Zab, ASC, AMC
An expert in the exacting craft of commercial cinematography, Alexis Zab , ASC, AMC is equally adept at lending visuals of distinct humanity to long-form projec...
16/10/2023
Sam Daley Nominated for HPA Award
The Hollywood Professional Association has announced the nominations for the 2023 HPA Awards, which will be presented on November 9. Light Iron senior colorist ...
13/10/2023
To Be Believed
Director Charl ne Favier's feature La fille quon appelle focuses on Laura Le Corre (Alba Ga a Bellugi), a young woman placed in a vulnerable position after ...
06/10/2023
In Focus: Panavision Manufacturing
This video takes viewers inside the manufacturing department at Panavision's headquarters in Woodland Hills, California. Follow along from blueprint to CNC ...
06/10/2023
A Collaboration With Panavision: John Seale, AM, ACS, ASC
Before going on to serve as cinematographer on such varied and beloved features as Witness, Rain Man, Dead Poet's Society, The English Patient, The Perfect ...
29/09/2023
Launchpad Season 2 Takes Flight
Now streaming on Disney+, Launchpad Season 2 comprises six original live-action short films from underrepresented filmmakers whose unique voices bring new persp...
20/09/2023
A Collaboration With Panavision: David Procter, BSC
It's one of the most powerful mediums of art, I believe, that we have, David Procter, BSC says of motion pictures. Having gotten his start in documentaries...
19/09/2023
LEE Filters launches LEE100 Deluxe Kit+
ANDOVER, England (19th September, 2023) LEE Filters, a leading manufacturer of high-quality lighting gels and photographic filters and a member of the Panavis...
11/09/2023
Tall Tale
Boots Riley writer, director and acclaimed vocalist of the hip-hop group The Coup is the definition of a colorful and exacting thinker. Some five years afte...
05/09/2023
Creative Exercise
Created by Annie Weisman, the 1980s-set Apple TV+ series Physical focuses on Sheila Rubin (Rose Byrne) as she navigates a path toward self-discovery after unloc...
02/09/2023
A Collaboration With Panavision: Ben Davis, BSC
My first day on set, I thought, This is what I want to do,' reflects Ben Davis, BSC, whose credits range from dramas like Three Billboards Outside Ebbing,...
28/08/2023
Kim Snyder Receives HPA Alchemist Honor
The Hollywood Professional Association recently announced the latest recipients of its League Honors. This year's honorees include Panavision President and ...
25/08/2023
Winning Depth
Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty is back for its second season on HBO, pushing deeper into the 1980s as it continues to recount the on- and off-cour...