CONTENTS
Seventh Annual Comics in PERSPECTIVE
16
A Virtual Taste of Comic-Con by Patrick Rodriguez
Unlikely Heroes
36
The Production Design of The Boys by Dave Blass, Production Designer
Stumptown
44
Building a World of Graphic Reality by Corey Kaplan, Production Designer
Hunting Down
50
The Design of Hunters by Curt Beech, Production Designer
The Unwritten Law of Two-Thirds
58
Designing The Crown by Martin Childs, Production Designer
Ugly/Beautiful
66
The Visual Language of Dare Me by Michael Bricker, Production Designer
Bringing It Home
72
Homeland’s Final Season by John D. Kretschmer, Production Designer
Snowpiercer
78
Survival of the Fittest! A conversation with the Production Designer Barry Robison as told by Supervising Art Director Tom Wilkins
A Fairy Tale with a Twist
86
Gretel & Hansel by Jeremy Reed, Production Designer
Storyboarding Jon Favreau’s
92
The Mandalorian, Season One by Dave Lowery, Head of Story, with special thanks to Susan Prestine
6 C O N T R I B U TO R S 12
E D I TO R’ S N OT E
14
NEWS
112 PRODUCTION DESIGN 114 MEMBERSHIP 1 1 6 R E S H O OT S
ON THE COVER: STORYBOARD FROM EPISODE 3 OF THE MANDALORIAN, SHOWING MANDO WITH HIS NEW BESKAR ARMOR LEAVING GREEF KARGA. DRAWN BY PHILL NORWOOD. J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 2 0
|
PERSPECTIVE
3
CONTRIBUTORS CURT BEECH’S
film career started after getting his FA in theatre design at CLA. is Art Direction credits include Star Trek, Greenberg, est Picture nominees The Social Network, The Help and Lincoln, winner of the Academy Award for Art Direction. Since returning to New York City, Curt has been the Production Designer on BlacKkKlansman and both seasons of She’s Gotta Have It for Netflix. e has also worked on season one of both Wayward Pines for Fox and Good Behavior for TNT, on the film Carrie Pilby, on November Criminals, and on The Dangerous Book for Boys for Amazon Studios. Hunters marks Curt’s first foray into the s and ’ s, and he hopes to go there again soon.
DAVE BLASS
grew up in Ashland, assachusetts, and received his degree from Emerson College in oston. pon arriving in Los Angeles, he followed in the footsteps of many who had come before, working at Roger Corman’s shop in enice, learning how to design on a dime and create a multitude of sets in every style and form. After some twenty films, he made his first foray into television Production Design on the sci-fi superhero series Black Scorpion. Since then he has worked in a wide assortment of genres. e has been nominated three times for Primetime Emmy Awards, twice for Justified and once for Constantine, and three times for the Art Directors Guild Awards, for Justified, Preacher and The Boys.
MICHAEL BRICKER
is currently designing the first season of the Netflix international thriller Hit & Run. In addition to establishing season one of egan Abbott’s Dare Me, ichael recently won both an Emmy and ADG Award for his Production Design of Russian Doll.
6
PERSPECTIVE
|
J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 2 0
eyond film, ichael is the founder of People For rban Progress, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit that advances good design and civic sustainability through material reuse and repurposing. Through P P, ichael’s work has been featured in Dwell, The Huffington Post, CityLab and the Exhibit Columbus Architecture and Design Symposium.
MARTIN CHILDS
has been Production Designer on every season of the Golden Globe-winning Netflix series The Crown, winning an Emmy for season one. e won an Academy Award for his work on Shakespeare in Love, directed by ohn adden having first worked together on Mrs Brown and more recently, The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel . is other credits include Quills with director Philip aufman, the ughes rothers’ From Hell, Nigel Cole’s hit ritish comedy Calendar Girls, . Night Shyamalan’s Lady in the Water, ark erman’s The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, adonna’s W/E, and ill Condon’s Mr. Holmes. In all, he has received two Academy Award nominations, six AFTA nominations, two Emmy nominations and four ADG Award nominations.
COREY KAPLAN
was born in ueens, New York. She proudly admits to being a child of the T generation. er introduction to the Art Department was working on non-union music videos with adonna, Counting Crows, and -film making with Roger Corman and Fred Olen Ray. These experiences taught her what it takes to pull a show together creatively. One of her strong passions has been a constant devotion to photography. To pay for that nonprofit art habit she taught Production Design with Gene Allen at CLA for five years while she utilized her Production Designer skills on The X-Files. Following that she designed a series for ichael ann called Robbery Homicide. She worked for seven seasons with Shonda Rhimes on her successful T series Scandal, also working on Grey’s Anatomy and Station 19. Presently, Corey is working on one of the first Apple T shows Truth Be Told and now Stumptown. She is pleased that the use of technology has helped her to create beautiful works of art and call it Television.
EDITOR’S NOTE The Comic Art Issue B Y D A V I D M O R O N G , E D I TO R I couldn’t really call it the Comic-Con issue anymore. The cancellation or postponement of almost every aspect of routine and production has cascaded across our lives. As this issue goes to print, the twin impacts of the COVID pandemic and the protests against police brutality toward minorities have absorbed the nation. It’s a challenge to attend to normalcy when the worid is upside down, but we have also witnessed how important the contribution of the entertainment media has been to helping the world get through this imposed isolation. This is the seventh year the pages of the early summer issue of PERSPECTIVE feature stories about art and productions focused on comic and graphic novel sources. Planning for this issue dates well back into that pre-COVID era that seems so distant, when Comic-Con tickets were sold out, and we all looked forward to beating the summer heat with blockbuster films and excited crowds in air-conditioned theaters. The cancellation of the convention doesn’t diminish the impact of the form, and while some productions inspired by this genre show up in every issue, a concerted effort is made to showcase a number of
A SET PHOTO OF THE FINISHED ENTRANCE SCULPTURE FROM THE BOYS (PAGE 36), DAVE BLASS, PRODUCTION DESIGNER. NOW IS A GOOD TIME FOR HEROES...BUT MAYBE NOT THIS GROUP. 12
PERSPECTIVE
|
J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 2 0
projects that are inspired by or derived from the graphic novel/comic world in this yearly issue. Here we pay tribute to the form and celebrate the artistry of those who practice it. This issue offers ten feature articles representing pretty much every source, feature film, streaming, premium cable, network and cable outlets. Due to economic concerns accompanying the crisis and shutdown, the number of pages in the issue could not expand to meet the wealth of contributed content, and all of these articles had to be pared down to keep the overall book at a reasonable size. The idea that being concise is a virtue is often true with text, but doesn’t translate to imagery, and I want to thank the contributors for their understanding and forebearance as some words were lost and many images had to be either left out or made smaller to fit into the available space. (Like the image from The Boys below.) The digital versions of the articles available on the ADG website, where space constrictions are not an issue, will include some of the images that had to be left out here. I encourage readers to take a trip to the PERSPECTIVE webpage to see this additional material.
“A WONDERFULLY IRREVERENT...AND STYLIZED DRAMA” – IGN
OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES
AND ALL OTHER CATEGORIES INCLUDING
OUTSTANDING PRODUCTION DESIGN FOR A NARRATIVE CONTEMPORARY PROGRAM (ONE HOUR OR MORE)
VISIT CONSIDERAMAZON.COM/TITLE/THE-BOYS TO EXPLORE BONUS CONTENT ABOUT HOW THE PRODUCTION DESIGN TEAM BUILT THEIR SUPERHERO UNIVERSE.
A
B
Unlikely Heroes
THE PRODUCTION DESIGN OF THE BOYS BY DAVE BLASS, PRODUCTION DESIGNER
What if superheroes were real? It’s a simple idea, which takes you deep down a rabbit hole of logic questions and design possibilities. Suspend belief and what would the world be like?
Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy really changed
Garth Ennis project from page to television. I had
the game for graphic novels. How did Bruce Wayne
previously designed Constantine and Preacher; Seth
get the Batmobile and why wear a cape? Creating
Rogen and Evan Goldberg also produced the latter.
the backstory to these classic elements paved the
I knew with their guidance that the level of insanity
way for the current “Era of the Superhero.” It took
would be pushed on every level. Showrunner Eric
logical questions that people had glossed over for
Kripke really pushed to ground the show in the
years and brought them into a tangible world. My
present day. No future tech, no floating space
first foray into the superhero genre was Roger
stations, it was going to be just like a switch was
Corman’s The Black Scorpion for the Sci-Fi Channel
flipped and the heroes were real. In our first meeting
back in 1995. Whenever I would say, “Hey…this
we talked about the realities, of the world building.
doesn’t make any sense,” the writer would always
There wouldn’t be any Batcaves or Fortresses of
say, “Well, it’s comic book logic” and that would
Solitude, it would be a business environment run
be it. But I wanted it to make sense, and I think
by a megacorporation. Apple meets Marvel. The
fans do too. Enter The Boys, a new R-rated series
show’s Vought Corporation is part law enforcement
for Amazon about a team of superheroes and the
and part advertising company. They rent out the
band of misfits who are working to take them out.
superheroes to cities to solve their crime problems and add the marketing spin as well. The heroes
What if superheroes were real... Well, they would
would have their own movies just like Marvel and
probably be egotistical jerks that would embody
would be slapped on billboards hawking whatever
the idea of absolute power corrupting absolutely.
they could sell. The offices had to be slick and
They would be a Kardashian mixed with a pro
unique. I didn’t want to go futuristic, it had to
athlete combined with a politician; capable of
feel like Vought had just called up Zaha Hadid
doing whatever they wanted. That was the idea
or Santiago Calatrava and threw a ton of money
at the core of Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson’s
at them for the tallest, most forward-thinking
series The Boys. It was my third time taking a
building in New York.
A. THE SEVEN COMIC BOOK COVER. GRAPHIC LAYOUT BASED ON ONE OF THE ORIGINAL COMIC BOOK COVERS BY DARICK ROBERTSON. B. PANORAMA OF VOUGHT TOWER BOARDROOM, BLENDING THE NEOCLASSICAL STYLE OF WASHINGTON, DC WITH AN OVER THE TOP AESTHETIC WHERE THE SUPERHEROES SEE THEMSELVES AS GODS. PART POLITICIAN, PART REALITY STAR. PHOTO BY JAN THIJS.
THE BOYS
|
PERSPECTIVE
37
I always approach my designs based on reality.
Working with Henry Fong, a round colonnade with
One can design whatever they want, but if it is
a massive floor to ceiling vista of New York City was
unaffordable or has limitations that can’t be met
created. I would like to say that the Doric columns
on a TV schedule or budget, then they have put
were a stunning design choice, but they were a
themselves into a corner from the beginning. I
simple necessity. The set would be built in an old
knew it would be necessary to go in and out of a
warehouse with support beams every twenty feet,
practical building, and that would really set the
so something was needed. Rather than running
tone. Several weeks were spent looking at possible
from it the issue was embraced. The view of the city
venues but nothing was found that really worked.
would be an issue as well as two of the structural
Then one night I was driving past Roy Thomson
columns would end up right outside the windows.
Hall, all lit up and I knew that was our spot. It
Henry came up with this wonderful swooping
had been crossed off the list early because of its
column detail that not only hid the posts but also
association to X-Men, but I thought it deserved a
added a beautiful foreground element to break up
second look. For me, the logic worked perfectly.
the massive backdrop.
Of course, the audience would believe that superheroes could work in this building. They had ALREADY seen superheroes here and accepted it. All of the show’s heroes were a satirical version of other heroes, so its locations could be too. I worked with Concept Artist Henry Fong who created an epic phallus that spiraled to the heavens and A. THE PENTHOUSE AREA VOUGHT TOWER. CONCEPT ART BY HENRY FONG. THE APEX OF THE TOWER FORMS A GIANT ILLUMATED “7” FOR THE VOUGHT 7. B. VOUGHT TOWER SHOWING THE VFX EXTENSION OF THE PRACTICAL SET SHOT AT ROY THOMPSON HALL, ALL THE WAY UP TO THE PENTHOUSE BOARDROOM FOR THE “VOUGHT 7.” THE WIDE SHOT SHOWS THE SWOOPING GOLD “7” THAT IS ILLUMINATED AT NIGHT. CONCEPT ART BY HENRY FONG.
A E
turned into a giant “7” at the top to symbolize the seven superheroes. Once I had landed on the starting point for the architecture, I knew that the building could be twisted and changed. The penthouse area would house the boardroom of The Seven. They are the seven top superheroes in the world, brought together to protect America. I wanted their space to be bold. It wanted to play to their egos. I looked to Hollywood and Washington for inspiration. What do the homes of the rich and famous look like, and what do they have in connection with the White House? The idea was that sycophants catering to their every whim would surround these heroes. Stroking their egos. There would be statues and murals to celebrate their godlike abilities.
B
C
D
E
While designing the boardroom, the graphic
Starlight, so he is never seen in the show, which
design team headed by Paul Greenberg had the
was great for everyone except the Art Department.
epic task of creating…Epics. They needed to create
For us, he was like a retired superstar. Every
marketing campaigns for seven superheroes.
image of The Seven that would be seen in the set
Movie posters, billboards, magazine covers and
would need to include this character…who wasn’t
lunch boxes, all would be needed. Anything one
a character. No need to cast an actor or design
could slap a sticker on. The tiny graphic design
wardrobe, or at least not a priority. It was for us,
team had to churn out the entire Marvel franchise
however. I had to beg with costume designer L.J.
worth of artwork in a matter of months. Each hero
Shannon to work with us on an outfit design that
had their own branding that had to be unique to
we could use. They created a rough hooded figure
them, but also work in conjunction to the rest
with a flowing jacket concept that we took and ran
of the group. Homelander was the all-American
with. From there, Henry Fong took the look they
Superman-type character, Queen Maeve was
sketched and brought it to life. He had already
the Amazonian warrior, The Deep, an aquatic
created a stunning 14-foot-tall sculpture design
superstar, A-Train was the show’s speedster,
of The Seven, and we chose to put Lamplighter
Black Noir was a bit of a Batman meets ninja,
in the back to hide him as much as possible so
Starlight was the newest to the group, with her
we could develop the rest. It was all coming fast
Midwest cheerleader charm, and Translucent the
and furious at this point. While one group was
invisible man. The final hero was Lamplighter.
working on the sculpture, another was doing giant
In the story, Lamplighter is being replaced by
23-foot domed fresco of The Seven that would
C. HOMELANDER STANDING AT THE WINDOW IN THE VOUGHT TOWER WITH A PANORAMA OF NEW YORK CITY AND THE IDEA THAT THIS BUILDING IS THE TALLEST IN THE CITY. D. CUSTOM BUSTS OF THE SUPERHEROES IN THE VOUGHT BOARDROOM SCULPTED BY GREG ARONOWITZ. E. CONCEPT ART OF THE VOUGHT TOWER BOARDROOM SCULPTURE OF “THE SEVEN” CREATED BY HENRY FONG.
THE BOYS
|
PERSPECTIVE
39
A
C
B
hover over the room, and the hero statues were
steel structure that cantilevered from the base
being hand sculpted by Greg Aronowitz based off
where Homelander sat. While designing it, we
of early concept art and photos of the actors. We
landed on a logo for Vought and The Seven which
still had no idea what the actors would look like in
was a combination of V and 7 that took me to the
their costumes. Thank goodness Translucent was
next level of self-indulgence, and the whole table
invisible, because he wasn’t cast at this point, so
was turned into the Vought logo. It was massive
every piece of art just became an empty jumpsuit.
and elegant at the same time.
The pace was near insanity. For the backing, I called Phil Greenstreet at Rosco A. THE MASSIVE VOUGHT CONFERENCE ROOM TABLE 18 FEET FROM TIP TO TIP MADE OF STEEL AND GLASS FORMING THE VOUGHT LOGO. B. THE APOTHEOSIS OF SEVEN—THE DOMED CENTER OF THE VOUGHT TOWER FEATURED FRESCO OF OUR 7 SUPERHEROES.
PERSPECTIVE
to help us with a day/night Softdrop. I have used
table. Always a tricky piece of furniture as
these on my past six shows, and they have been
something custom and unique is needed. Is it
a game changer in terms of speed and efficiency.
round, is it rectangular? How is the power divided
One large 120x22 foot panorama of New York
between the individuals at the table, are they
City was created, along with smaller 8x22 foot
equal or is there a power division? (And seven is
backing from a slightly different direction for one
an odd number.) In The Seven, it was clear that
the of the executive offices. There were weeks,
the character Homelander was the leader and let
not months to get it done and I still can’t believe
everyone know it. I thought about a V-shaped table
it happened in time. A Google Earth scout of
with him at the apex with three other members
Manhattan was used to pick a rough location for
on either side. It would give the room a strong
the building, and Phil and his team did the rest.
presence and all of the actors would have the
C. THE APOTHEOSIS OF SEVEN, MURAL ART BY HENRY FONG. 40
At the center of the room would be the boardroom
|
skyline as a background. The table would be almost
The Vought complex needed a few more sets.
superheroic in its design, a giant 17-foot glass and
First was Stillwell’s office. She was the CEO of
J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 2 0
D
E
F
G
Vought who would interface and ‘control’ the superheroes. She was part studio executive, part agent. Showrunner Eric Kripke was keen to make her seem as real as possible. No crazy architecture. He wanted it so grounded that we put a crib in the corner of the room, as her character was a single mom with an infant, and she might bring the child to work. The walls were filled with the graphics team’s creations. Posters of the heroes, framed movie posters and a stunning portrait of Homelander that looked like it came right from a Zack Snyder film. This office flowed into a grand “walk and talk” hallway lined with more marketing artwork. The Art Department was able to get the actors in costume for one 3-hour photo session where we were grabbing them in every possible position to use in ads, posters, newspaper clips and anything we could think of. I put in a call to Darick Robertson who created all of the artwork for the original graphic novels. He created ten custom pieces for the show based on the original H
book covers, but with the shows’ actors integrated into the artwork. These were framed and lined the
D. STILLWELL’S OFFICE. ILLUSTRATION BY HENRY FONG. E. STILLWELL’S OFFICE. SET PHOTO. F. SUPERHERO-BRANDING GRAPHICS BY DAVE BLASS. G. VOUGHT HALLWAY WITH SUPERHERO GRAPHICS AND CUSTOM VACUFORM WALL TILE. SET PHOTO. H. MAGAZINE COVER. GRAPHIC LAYOUT.
THE BOYS
|
PERSPECTIVE
41
A
hallways as part of the Vought marketing collection.
“Cape Clip” that would hook onto the cape and
The “Real Life Adventures of The Seven.”
automatically pull it up so the person could sit and do their business. Sadly, they never got a chance to
At the end of the long hallway was the one of the
get used.
most unique sets I have had the chance to design.
A. SUPERHERO BATHROOM. SET PHOTO.
There have been many designs for superhero lairs,
Oddly the hero of the show isn’t a superhero at
but I got to design the first superhero bathroom.
all, but a mere mortal named Hughie Campbell. In
The script called for two scenes in two bathrooms,
the comics, he was drawn to look like Simon Pegg,
but we were tight on space. I pitched the idea that
but that was twelve years ago, and Simon was too
these were powerful personalities and since there
old to play Hughie, but was perfect casting for
was only one female member of The Seven, she
Hughie’s dad. For the father and son pair, a Brooklyn
wouldn’t give the guys the satisfaction of being shy.
apartment was designed that juxtaposed against
A grand unisex bathroom was designed with jutting
the steel and glass of Vought Tower. It had a vintage
marble panels with LED accent lights. Set decorator
1970s retro feeling, like the family had wanted to
Cheryl Dorsey found amazing pedestal sinks in the
upgrade but never gotten around to it. Old turned
shape of a 7 that worked perfectly to set tone. The
spindles divided the living room from the dining
stalls were designed to mimic the massive door in
room and wood tones and faded wallpaper helped
the boardroom, and the stalls included an amazing
set the tableau of the home of an unlikely hero. ADG
B. SUPERHERO BATHROOM. ILLUSTRATION BY HENRY FONG. C. HUGHIE’S HOUSE. SET PHOTO. D. PRODUCTION STILL OF HUGHIE’S APARTMENT WITH JACK QUAID AS HUGHIE. E. SKETCHUP MODEL OF HUGHIE’S QUEENS APARTMENT BY SYLVAIN BOMBARDIER. F. CONCEPT ART OF VOUGHT TOWER BY HENRY FONG. B
D
Dave Blass, Production Designer Mark Zuelzke, Supervising Art Director Dean O’Dell, Art Director Adriana Bogaard, Assistant Art Director Jeff Smith, Sylvain Bombardier, Barbara Agbaje, Dwight Hendrickson, Leks Raamat, Anna Lupi, Set Designers Henry Fong, Illustrator Paul Greenberg, Pearlamina Cheung, Graphic Artist Alex Lyons, Barton Rendulic, Storyboard Artists Cheryl Dorsey, Set Decorator
C
D
F
E