Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/716619
Opposite page, top: Peter Rubin's sketch shows the critical juncture of the subway platform and the tracks. In an action stunt, the Ghostbusters would need to clamber up off the track bed while being pursued by an express train and a ghost, the kind of nuts-and-bolts solutions to action and stunt requirements that drove the layout of many sets. In a clever scripted encounter with a subway graffiti artist, we reveal the logo the Ghostbusters adopt for themselves. Center: It was an intention of this new film to honor its predecessor, without merely copying it. The solution was often to weave the familiar item into a new story line or background history, and make the use of a familiar symbol seem intrinsic to the new material. Bottom, left: Patty Tolan (Leslie Jones), who will become the fourth Ghostbuster, is a subway transit system ticket officer who comes in contact with a new ghost. Detailed dressing and graphics were copied from an active ticket booth in a Brooklyn subway station. Right: Audra Avery's VectorWorks ® drawing indicated tile colors for the platform. It was important to the style of the Production Design to avoid overly decorative patterns to keep the station feeling mundane and ordinary, reflecting a sense that very unusual happenings take place in perfectly real, everyday settings. This page, top: A climactic moment takes place in Times Square, something that couldn't be cheated on location in Boston. An enormous outdoor green screen surrounded a fragmentary set, approximately 3/5 the size of the actual footprint of 2.5 blocks of Times Square. This would also solve the problem of establishing a fictitious Mercado Hotel in the familiar landscape of Times Square; complete design drawings were provided to place the building between 43rd and 44th Street, where the Paramount Building now stands. Left: This simple white model by Tony Bohorquez allowed the different departments to plan the elaborate car and action stunts, organize moving traffic, count extras, design lighting schemes, and generally solve the problems of the complex sequence that blended live-action photography with elaborate visual effects. Bottom, left: Another detailed model by Mr. Bohorquez is the partial façade of the Mercado Hotel, a forgotten art deco hotel in Times Square, and the headquarters of the evil Rowan Elgin. Right: A set still by Mr. Sage shows the constructed partial façade of the Mercado Hotel with green screen edges. The surrounding buildings, including their ubiquitous electronic billboards, were created digitally. Photographs by Hopper Stone and Jefferson Sage © Columbia Pictures