Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1124104
T H E H A U N T I N G O F H I L L H O U S E | P E R S P E C T I V E 6 7 A few years ago, while I was wrapping a show abroad, a comedy, I got the script for Before I Wake. It was the first time I got to read a horror script. It got under my skin. It made me uncomfortable to continue reading and yet, I could not stop. By the time I was able to coordinate a conference call with Mike Flanagan, the author and director, I only had one question reserved for the end of the chat. "Do you have kids?" I asked. The material was so subtle at first and the horror so easily injected into the readers' feelings, that I told myself if the creator didn't have kids, I would not participate in the project. As a father myself, I thought it would be wrong to use such feelings if they were put forward by someone who didn't know how deep those emotions run. "Yes, I have a son," Mike responded. His kid is about the same age as mine. I took the job. A couple years after that project, I got a call from producer Trevor Macy to design Mike's Ouija: The Origin of Evil. The Haunting of Hill House became our third collaboration. Mike's vision for The Haunting of Hill House was to create the ultimate ghost story. The series was a complex and ambitious project from the get-go, with the scale providing the largest challenge. Hill House itself is one of the main characters, and it is based on the 'Robber Baron' mansions of the late 1800s; the era also known as the Gilded Age of American architecture. It was clear going in that it was going to be impossible to build such a monumental mansion (think Hearst Castle) but nonetheless, I knew that some part of it would have to be recreated to achieve the needed scale. This was a challenge indeed. In order to tackle this issue, I started by breaking down areas and elements, like the foyer, the grand stairs, A. THE HILL HOUSE EXTERIOR IN ITS ABANDONED STATE. SET PHOTO. No matter how overwhelming some projects may seem at the beginning, in my experience, the solutions are found by breaking it all down. Set by set, wall by wall, detail by detail.