We built over 60 sets. Like we built all the houses, the monastery, and all the frescoes there. We built the chapel at the end where all the rats are. I built all of that so it could be decaying as well. The roof is falling but you can’t quite see it, which is a shame. We built the Romanian Village. Yeah, we built a lot for this film. All of that was built so for two reasons. One, so that we could get that decayed look, and also because Rob and Jarin liked to do very elaborate specific shots, and camera movements.
I loved the Casa Santa Marta. Its function was very useful. We didn’t have a lot of space and not much money. It had the longest corridor we could afford. Only one room, but it’s on trucks flat, so they squeeze in and out to create slightly different environments depending on whose room we’re in. I love how well it worked on camera. There’s not much ornamentation on it, it’s pretty simple but the simplicity really worked. The balance between the ornate, beautiful balustrades of the church and then this brutal underground bunker, a hermetically sealed prison was perfect.
The Art Directors Guild (ADG, IATSE Local 800) has announced the nominees for its 29th Annual Excellence in Production Design Awards. The ADG Awards celebrate excellence in production design across theatrical motion pictures, television, commercials, music videos, and animated feature films. The 2025 Cinematic Imagery Award will be presented to Academy Award®-nominated director and filmmaker Jason Reitman, whose body of work includes “Juno,” “Up in the Air” and “Saturday Night.”
I feel like the strip club and the Vegas segments have a different color scheme and are quite different with their purples and the blues as well. I felt like those vibrant hues were nice to showcase the fantasy version of reality, whereas then all the colder stuff is kind of stark real New York.
When we first started prep in Atlanta, Dan Aykroyd was there with Jason and they were doing a pickup shot on the Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. So I’m in my office and all of a sudden Jason comes in with Dan in front of this big model. We asked him questions about how accurate was this set we built. Jason posted it on his Instagram. It was wild to get that sort of validation in a way. It was really fun getting his feedback.