Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1485934
lighting to appear sourceless, up- lighting, down-lighting, reflected sources. Based on these models, the Art Department taped out the floor of the stage, set up tables and chairs and began rehearsing. Despite weeks of design and exploration, one question dogged Mark and Peter: How big was too big for realism, and how small too impractical? Every camera crew is excited and terrified by the challenge of a confined location. Mark's approach to the first act was inspired by Robert Altman's Gosford Park, where a wandering camera voyeuristically loses one conversation, casually finding another. It was imperative to overhear the next table's chatter without having them too close. Likewise, we decided never to fly walls for camera, to predetermine just the right dimensions for the story. The decision of square table or round, their size, and chair-backs high or low were agonized over. I think the film's set decorator, Gretchen Gattuso, auditioned thirty tables before we realized we'd need to build them custom. I decided early on I wanted the kitchen to represent a church, with Slowik at its pulpit. The Art Department developed a simple A frame shape with austere symmetry, similar to a temple I once visited in Norway. We buried an I-Beam cross in the back wall that Slowik would stand in front of. When the junior chefs cooked, they would appear to worship him. Construction coordinator Scott Warner pickled oakwood and tried bleaching techniques to maintain its grain and contrast, and routed channels into the ceiling and walls so that the uplight appeared dramatic and sinister. Delta COVID issues, compounded by the reopening of thousands of restaurants, forced Gretchen to fight with Herculean force to get the last commercial-grade oven and freezer nationwide. One of our greatest discoveries was in the back of Common Thread, which would become our favorite Savannah restaurant. Chef John Benhase (who was later hired to be on the crew), had commissioned a local design company to fabricate a steam-punk oven range. Called Grills by Demant, we tracked them down and convinced them to rent us one. It became essential to the film's climax. Their ingenious contraption, which can lower and raise heat from all sides, was like a culinary torture chamber befitting Slowik. In the end, our kitchen was entirely functional. A. REHEARSAL. B. & C. KITCHEN. SET PHOTOS. D. RESTAURANT DINING ROOM. SET PHOTO. E. RESTAURANT DINING ROOM. SET PHOTO. F. RESTAURANT DINING ROOM. SET PHOTO. G. ENTRANCE HALL WITH WAVE CEILING. SET PHOTO. H. ENTRANCE INTO DINING ROOM. SET PHOTO. A B C