The Location Managers Guild International (LMGI) is the largest organization of Location Managers and Location Scouts in the motion picture, television, commercial and print production industries. Their membership plays a vital role in the creativ
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22 • LMGI COMPASS | Fall 2021 THE TRAIN "Those trains had to be real, and Alison had to nd a way to get them," says Jenkins. "The trains were the rst things we shot, and the tunnels we built for the trains were above ground. In the rst episode, Cora goes into the tunnel, gets down on her knees and is pounding steel because she can't believe the tracks are real." The key to the trains was The Georgia State Railroad Museum in Savannah. "We took over the entire museum for months," Friedberg says. "It was an incredible amount of work for Alison. The train was complicated on many levels." Alison, KALM David Martin/LMGI and ALM Jeff Williams spent hundreds of hours getting the trains ready for lming. "They found the museum before I started," says Alison, "but I did the deal for the trains to work and got permission to build that giant 250-foot tunnel. Barry picked the trains he wanted. We built a long tunnel above ground and used their tracks and their trains as the underground railroad. We were there for three months building it and shooting it." 22 • LMGI COMPASS | Fall 2021 I had an incredibly unique and personal experience while we were in pre- production on The Underground Railroad. We were on a Director's Scout in Dahlonega, GA, when one of my mother's fi rst cousins, Shirley Vayson, discovered that I was working in Georgia. She texted me: "If you can, go to Madison and take pictures of the Vason Building." She said that her and my mother's great-grandfather and grandfather were born in Madison and that the building was still owned by a cousin. My mother's maiden name is Vayson, so I immediately got excited! I had no idea that my family traced back to Georgia! I told Shirley that I would go and how excited I was to meet our distant cousins. Her response was jarring. It read: "No! Don't disturb the white folks." "White folks," I thought … it had never occurred to me that the Madison Vasons were white. Shirley went on to explain that my mother's great- grandfather was the son of a white man named Vason and his slave; she gave me the whole history. She even explained that a Frenchman had taught my great-grandfather to write and had added the "y" to the name. As it happens, we showed up in Madison the next day to scout. I told everyone the story, so we went to the Vason Building and took photos! Barry and Mark selected downtown Madison as a location, and we wound up fi lming the "downtown Indiana" scenes there. What are the odds of being a Black American and, while working with an amazing fi lmmaker like Barry Jenkins on a project as important to Black history as The Underground Railroad, that I would run right into my own family's complicated history with slavery? It defi es all odds! It is just crazy! It's a perfect example of the deeply complicated history of this country, which is the heart of this story as well. I still have not gotten up the courage to go introduce myself to my distant cousins in Madison—even though I am the chance for the Black and white family to fi nally meet. I suppose that I am afraid of how I will be received. Or maybe I am afraid of how it will make me feel. Or maybe I am just afraid. One day I will be ready, and I will knock on the door and say, "Hello! I am your long-lost cousin Alison." THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD AND MY FAMILY TREE by Alison Taylor/LMGI Location manager Alison Taylor/LMGI with director Barry Jenkins. Photo courtesy of Alison Taylor/LMGI Barry Jenkins directs Thuso Mbedu . Photo by Atsushi Nishijima/Amazon