Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1526889
1 4 P E R S P E C T I V E | S E P T E M B E R / O C T O B E R 2 0 2 4 Venice Having scouted and designed Lasse Hallström's Casanova almost twenty years earlier, I was familiar with every street, canal, piazza and palazzo in Venice. So, I had no problem imagining where to create Tom's palazzo. And after presenting Steve with many other options, I was happy to land back at Palazzo Contarini Polignac. A bit trickier was finding Peggy Guggenheim's palazzo. Originally, the scene was written as a nighttime exterior, which we hoped to film on the terrace of Peggy Guggenheim's Palazzo Vernier dei Leoni. When we were denied the location—and realized a nighttime party scene on the Grand Canal in January was risky—we set out to find an interior location somewhere in Venice or the Veneto that could match the interior of Ms. Guggenheim's palazzo, a tall order. But quite remarkably, the Venice scouts found a starkly renovated apartment almost directly across the Grand Canal from Palazzo Vernier dei Leoni. Set decorator Alessandra Querzola did a spectacular job procuring a collection of paintings and sculpture by Italian artists from the period. And assembling the perfect pieces of furniture, lighting and objet —including recreating Guggenheim's iconic white leather sofa which had to be hoisted by crane to load in through a fifth-floor window. Trains and Terminals For Roma Termini and Santa Lucia Venezia, I was faithful to those stations built in 1950 and 1952, respectively. But for Napoli Centrale which opened in 1960, the year our story takes place, I decided to celebrate the grand 19th century station that preceded it. With no physical evidence to rely on, we tracked down archival drawings of the station, as well as troves of historical photographs and engravings. For the Napoli Centrale train platform, the crew built three hundred feet of platform at a train maintenance yard in Rome and imported five period coaches from Milan. For the interior of Stazione di Napoli Centrale, I chose Ospedale Forlanini in Rome. Opened in 1934 as a sanatorium for tuberculosis patients, the building had many of the architectural attributes of the 19th century Naples' train station. Using the archival drawings, the Art Department built a 3D model of the station platform which was handed over to VFX along with the concept illustrations and research to create the set extensions. Elements like the departure and arrival A. INTERIOR TOM'S VENICE PALAZZO. PALAZZO CONTARINI POLIGNAC. BUILT MID-15TH CENTURY. SET PHOTO. B. INTERIOR OF PEGGY GUGGENHEIM'S PALAZZO VERNIER DEI LEONI. CREATED AT A PRIVATE RESIDENCE IN VENICE. SET PHOTO. C. NAPOLI CENTRALE PLATFORM. CONCEPT ILLUSTRATION BY FRANCESCO SERENI. A B C