Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1500164
1 3 2 P E R S P E C T I V E | M AY / J U N E 2 0 2 3 A. PERSPECTIVE ELEVATION OF A STONE BUILDING FROM THE 1990 FILM DICK TRACY. INK ON TRACING PAPER AND CLEAR PLASTIC, BY HAROLD MICHELSON, ART DIRECTOR. The 1990 film version of Dick Tracy, directed by and starring Warren Beatty, was based on Chester Gould's 1930s comic strip of the same name. Production Designer Richard Sylbert was tasked with translating the world of the comic onto the screen and leaned heavily into the primary palette of the Sunday strips. Made in the era before CGI, the world of Dick Tracy relied on miniatures and mattes to extend the Universal backlot into the urban landscape that Tracy watched over. Visually the film was heralded as a great success, with Academy Award wins for Sylbert and set decorator Rick Simpson for Art Direction, as well as a win in Best Makeup and nominations for Costumes and Cinematography. It was the most successful film based on a comic book source up to that time, and its vibrant expansion on this source material set the stage for later films based in the DC and Marvel universes. This drawing of a stone building on a city street is credited to Harold Michelson, who was the Art Director on the film. Michelson had a long career as a storyboard artist, Art Director and Production Designer of films such as Star Trek: The Motion Picture and HIstory of the World: Part I. He and his wife Lillian Michelson are the subjects of the documentary Harold and Lillian: A Hollywood Love Story, an entertaining look at both their careers and family life in the 1950s-90s, outlining their contributions to some of the greatest films of those decades. RESHOOTS B Y D AV I D M O R O N G , E D I T O R S E L E C T I O N S F R O M T H E A D G A R C H I V E S A C O U RT E S Y O F T H E A D G C O L L E C T I O N S AT T H E M A R G A R E T H E R R I C K L I B R A RY, A . M .P. A .S .