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When television production ceased in the spring, some showrunners began running pandemic-themed series that can be filmed basically from afar. But will the audience need even tighter stories?
By Alexis Soloski
On a sunny morning in early July, actor Leslie Odom Jr., ready for another take. On a marble-covered table in a Los Angeles bungalow, he pecked on a laptop, waiting for the actress to bet on his wife. In the middle of a three-day session for “Love in the Time of Corona”, a limited version of Freeform. series to premiere on August 22.
A comedy-drama about couples traversing the pandemic joins HBO’s “coastal elites,” NBC’s “Connecting,” and Netflix’s Social Distance, all taking place amid the Covid-19 crisis and have been knocked down with all restrictions. safety precautions. and the alternative solutions that such a crisis requires. The bungalow belongs to Odom, the computer and the table as well. His wife plays his genuine wife and fellow executive producer, actress Nicolette Robinson. The hidden production wizard that has frame support? His sister-in-law.
In early March, as infections in the United States began to increase, film and television production froze and, despite the rise and charm of reopening, the freeze remained largely blocked. But a handful of writers and manufacturers have refocused the crisis as an opportunity, presenting content that can be created remotely or with the use of minimal and socially remote equipment. The resulting productions, which mix accidental self-fiction and indie can-doism, will air in late summer and early fall.
“It was a thrill to figure out how to do things in the middle of this and feel a little more human again,” said Martin Gero, author of “Connecting.”
In March, a few days after filming was discontinued in Los Angeles, writer and producer Hilary Weisman Graham monitored her pandemic anxiety by texting some of her former colleagues “Orange Is the New Black.” “I have a crazy idea,” he writes. This idea: a series of anthologies produced and filmed remotely. She temporarily set up a presentation montage and Netflix illuminated 8 episodes.
“They bought it at the Zoom,” Graham Weisman joked.
Most of the other creators have described a similar trajectory, a frantic adventure from terror to inspiration, from presentation to series and production. The scripts for “Coastal Elites,” a series of similar monologues originally conceived as a live-shot event, are the only ones that precede the pandemic. When the live game, 3 nights at Manhattan’s Public Theatre, became impossible, Paul Rudnick adapted the monologues to a new remote reality. (The 90-minute special, starring Dan Levy, Bette Midler, Issa Rae and others, begins on September 12.)
As the virtual screenwriter rooms expanded, casting began, with a specific about friends, couples or families already living together. “We couldn’t have an open cast,” said Joanna Johnson, who created “Love in the Time of Corona.” “You call the agents and say, “Who do you have that are quarantined together?”
Because the actors had to roll in their own houses and gardens, genuine ownership was also a factor, but not overwhelming. “We haven’t chosen to release someone yet because they’re in a very small one bedroom apartment,” Gero said.
Once the actors were gathered, the screenwriters began designing stories and then reconsidered them to take into account the actors’ contributions. Robinson and Odom presented the roles of online dators, driven by something closer to their own delight: as a married couple with a girl.
“We like the concept of doing something with couples in this period, however, pretending that you don’t know us is very little what we’re looking for,” Odom said.
The stories also expanded to include existing events, namely the death of George Floyd and the protests that followed Black Lives Matter. “There’s no way I’m going to create a screen at that point without adding it,” Graham said.
Global occasions have evolved rapidly, which has been a challenge: minute scripts are dated an hour later.
“You just have to give up, because I think everyone thinks, “My God, what’s the next step? Will there be a tsunami? Will there be a hurricane? What else can happen? Rudnick said.
In June, SAG-AFTRA, Teamsters and related unions released “The Safe Way Forward,” a white paper that suggests how film and television production can be safely resumed, highlighting the need for common testing, protective devices, and limited contact. Each Covid-themed production negotiated with the unions, discovered the most productive practices and received approval from the lean teams.
Producers have opted for a remote design process. Through the webcam, customers bought the actors’ cabinets and then supplemented them with online orders. Hairdressers and makeup artists have created remote looks and ready tutorials.
“Actually, I spent my 40 like a lot of people, with the same black tracksuit pants and black T-shirts, and it wasn’t like for television,” Odom said.
At the same time, production designers, photo managers, and accessory supervisors organized Zoom tours around each house and apartment, observing not only the design, but also the location of each wall plug and circuit breaker. The actors auditioned for pieces, furniture and trinkets. Some accessories were ordered online (the maximum came in sufficient time to secure certain surfaces) while others were disinfected and left on the threshold. No craft-service trucks were deployed, however, if the actors needed food for certain scenes, food and groceries were also delivered.
For “Social Distance,” an imaginative production designer has turned the avant-garde home of a billionaire actor into a ruined studio. (“You couldn’t shoot a scene in that kitchen because it was a fantastic kitchen,” Graham’s Weisman said. Another apartment has become a nursing station.
While actors are generally exempt from pre-production, performers of those projects have their own scouts, design assistants, costume supervisors, hair and makeup professionals, and camera equipment. “It was great to see that they were completely willing and excited to go back to their roots and immerse themselves in functionality and carry a tripod down the stairs,” Graham said.
“Connection” organized for non-contact shooting. “The total procedure is designed so that no one has to leave the house,” Gero said. Each actor won a mini-movie making kit (various iPhones, grip stands, tripods, sound devices) and then attended a mini movie to find out how to use them.
The other screens followed a hybrid model, with equipment nearby, in a van on the outskirts, which gave the shoot the impression of a surveillance operation, or shortly inside, or in a backyard, but never in the same area in it. time like actors.
“It was very, very strict,” Weisman Graham said. He had originally planned to film a scene in a place to eat empty in a different way and in another in an actor’s car. Netflix has made the decision not to take the risk.
The filming of “Love in the Time of Corona” is delayed for all actors and the team to go through Covid-19’s tests. “Coastal Elites” had an on-site manager trained in virus protocol and reduced his team to about five people. (Other members of the family circle were usually helping.
“I paint in big sets with a lot of people,” said Jay Roach, who directed “Coastal Elites.” This limited footprint meant fewer cameras and fewer angles.
“It’s a kind of distilled filming,” said Rudnick, who observed the shots in Zoom. “I’ve read about this type of robotic surgery that’s done remotely, in which you might have a surgeon capable of directing an appendectomy thousands of miles away with wonderful accuracy.” The shooting like that, he says.
He couldn’t look away from the remote filming: “Like I was a submarine commander through a periscope.”
Because administrators worked remotely, they could not use typical techniques such as taking an actor aside for a personal conversation. “You don’t have the ability to whisper in your ears, because probably everyone on our team, besides Korean hackers and Russians listening,” Roach joked. But alternative solutions have emerged, such as Zoom meeting rooms. “Social Distance” hired Zoom D.J. to create and manage virtual green spaces. Other systems used phone calls and text messages.
Would it be playing a character trapped in his own house, regularly in his own clothes, surrounded by his own belongings? From a distance, I saw some shots of “Love in the Crown Era,” and the actors seemed to have more common fun.
“We have to be at home, play pretending, so it’s pretty good,” Robinson said.
They didn’t seem ashamed to side with the production. During this July session, Odom seemed almost ecstatic as he held a slap and was ready to call the next scene. “My dream job!” He said.
When I spoke to those showrunners by the end of July, 3 of their projects had finished production and “Connecting,” the completely remote project, would soon begin. Now, in August, even when the virus has recovered in many areas, adding Los Angeles County, more and more screens announce that they will soon resume production, even limited. Some will even take the artists out of their homes. That is, those 4 series already serve as time capsules, either from the first months of a busy cultural moment and from the limited and sanitized means of production that the moment and entertainment guilds have allowed.
Will the audience play? It’s based on what other people need from television: an attractive escape or a way of thinking about the offer and the recent past. These are small shows, with limited castings, squares and camera work. They can’t be offering much in terms of visual interest, and they face an audience probably already exhausted by the Covid-19 news cycle.
Again, they don’t come with characters who shake hands with strangers or board a plane without a face mask, casually enter a movie theater, or behave with thousands of tactics that suddenly seem so shocking, which can be a relief. They show struggles and conditions similar to those many of us have already experienced, probably with greater dialogue.
I joked with Gero that his display can be read simply as a catharsis or as a 30-minute post-traumatic flashback.
“Well, we wait cathartic, ” he said.
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