Paper Giants: That 70’s Show
Recreating popular culture can be challenging; especially when you’re trying to achieve it on a budget and within limited time. Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo production designer Jon Rohde writes about the importance of design on period productions, and how the design sector is working to obtain the recognition it deserves.
The Southern Star Entertainment telemovie (2x2hr), produced by John Edwards and Karen Radzyner, is set in 1972. It follows two ambitious young upstarts, Ita Buttrose (Asher Keddie) and Sir Frank Packer’s unregarded second son, Kerry (Rob Carlton), creating their own legends in the Whitlam era.
Working on a period production such as this, it’s imperative to create the most appropriate environment for the narrative, and of course for the actors to portray their characters effectively. The scope and scale of the sets for Paper Giants is large compared to the budget; given that this is a telemovie and not a feature film, and there is the added pressure of having to shoot quickly to meet the demands of the schedule.
A lot of research went into creating the look; especially as the director, Daina Reid, wanted to avoid the environments looking old or like a memory. We wanted it to feel fresh, new and glossy and transport the audience to that time.
The seventies are still very present; there’s the generation of those who lived through that era and also the current generation who look at the retro aspect of it. Therefore, you have to avoid everything looking clichéd if you want it to look real. You can’t just use all iconic seventies furniture and dressing because the actual period was a mix of sixties and seventies.
It was a given that we’d be using some archival footage to establish the era, so we’ve tried to come up with interesting ways of making that work with what we’re shooting. Both Daina Reed and the director of photography, Bruce Young, embraced and supported my ideas in relation to the overall style and utilised the sets to their best advantage.
Based on the beginnings of Cleo magazine, the story runs from 1972 to 1975, so we’ve had to find ways to time-travel visually so the audience can relate. Graphics play an important role and the whole graphic process was very different before we had computers. We had several graphic artists working on hero and dressing graphics full-time for well over a month.
MORE GLAMOROUS THAN REALITY
About one third of the six-week shoot was locations; and there were a lot of them! The first two weeks for art department were a constant juggle of different location dresses every day, as well as preparing the main office interior sets for shooting at the end of the schedule.
Originally we were looking to use the actual offices of Australian Consolidated Press for exteriors, but that was proving difficult in matching windows and splitting locations for the various levels we required. Eventually we were lucky enough to find an empty building in the city that we could use for all our office interiors and
exteriors, as well as a few other sets.
We’ve only been able to achieve what we have through recycling of materials in the building and reconfiguring existing spaces to make them work for our story and for the pace of the shoot. I believe our offices are more glamorous than the actual ACP offices were, but this is where artistic licence comes into play to better support the story and help the
audience identify with the characters.
It’s always exciting for me when the characters come on set after the costume and hair and make-up designers have worked their magic. Combine this with the efforts of the set decorating team, wrangle some period vehicles and there you have it; Sydney circa 1973.
It’s the collective efforts of all these people that really works to sell the period to the audience. Of course; it’s not only about the look, but also the technical aspects of designing sets that can facilitate multiple cameras as well as the shooting crew and enable them to shoot efficiently.
When production design is done well it often goes unnoticed. That’s because it has succeeded in creating the most appropriate world for the story and nothing should visually take you out of that world the art department has created. Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo will screen on the ABC in April.
COMING TOGETHER
Production design isn’t foremost in the audiences mind when they are watching a show or film. Directing and cinematography are the crafts that get more attention and exposure through media, audience and peer recognition.
For many years production design in the Australian screen and stage industries has needed better recognition, representation and solidarity. Now, design professionals in the film, television, theatre, and interactive media industries have a guild of their own: the Australian Production Design Guild.
Formed in 2009, the APDG is committed to promote and improve the professional development of design across related industries. The APDG member base is not only production designers for film, television, and theatre, but all design related craft practitioners for both screen and stage; incorporating events, advertising and games. Costume, make-up and visual effects design are all represented.
The APDG aims to raise the profile of design for the stage and screen, highlighting the creative contribution of design and the professional standards in the sector.
In September this year, NIDA will host the inaugural APDG Awards with over 15 categories spanning across the various design media and associated crafts. You can view all the award categories on the website (apdg.org.au). The APDG are accepting entries for awards and nominations now; this represents a unique opportunity for the Australian film, theatre, event and game industries to provide peer assessment and recognition of excellence in the design crafts.
Australian designers excel in their work on productions all over the world and this event will bring together the best, most innovative and exciting of them all. We already have Australian designers winning BAFTAs, Oscars, and Emmys, so this home grown award will consolidate and contextualise the incredible contribution design makes to our industry.
