Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1538080
Next, I decided I did not want any hallways to escape to, no corridors, no exits. There's no retreat. Nowhere to go but forward. Nina is always on display—never quite allowed to belong, yet too substantial to ignore. She has arrived at the center of the bureau's operations, but is at the center of its scrutiny. So technically, the build was one of the show's most demanding. The entire 7,000-square-foot set was visible from any angle. Every surface had to be camera-ready from any direction. Instead of linoleum, hanging fluorescents and painted panels, we used marble, terrazzo, glass and concrete. Lighting it required over three hundred individual coffered ceiling sections; each rigged for independent control. This gave the production pinpoint accuracy—letting us isolate Nina in a pool of fluorescence, or have the lights full blast when all eyes were on her. The conference room and office are metaphors, they are a prison of transparency—an inverse panopticon where power does not hide behind walls, but watches from every angle. And in the middle of it all stands Nina: still, determined, bearing the full weight of being first and seeking revenge. As there were no hallways or interior walls, the design team had to think carefully about how we would accomplish seeing out almost two hundred feet of windows that looked out on a period Phoenix. This wasn't something you could find in a stock or archival library. What resulted was a mini-production of its own to create a 189-foot day/night translight—an effort almost as complex as the interior set, brilliantly led by Art Directors Paula Dal Santo and Madie Hays. The first step was boots on rooftops. We hired a location team and photographers from Phoenix to gain access to a series of buildings that would have roughly matched the elevation and sight lines of the set. From seven rooftops, they shot C. PHOENIX FBI OFFICE. SKETCHUP MODEL BY LUKE FREEBORN. D-G. PHOENIX FBI OFFICE. SET PHOTOS BY JAMES VAN EVERS/HBO. D C F E G