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PHOTO ESSAYS Fall 2011
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A timeline of DGA Award winners in comedy and drama shows how the range and quality of television has expanded in the last 20 years. A selection of set shots captures directors at work on some of the highlights along the way.
On-set photography is a long-standing tradition that captures a director at work. These Photo Essays reveal in images the careers of some of our most prominent members or showcase our members working in a particular genre, time or location.
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James Burrows Cheers, 1990 "We had this big, square bar at the center, which made the set seem smaller because it was a huge set. I wanted this place to look as good as a bar could look. We wanted people even in areas where drinking was frowned on to want to come to this bar because it wasn’t about the booze. It was about the camaraderie. The show could have never happened without my two partners, the Charles brothers. We were doing this show on our own, so it was our baby, and it was an experience I’ll never forget. Cheers was all our ideas, all of our love, all our humanity poured into the show. It’s still my favorite show I’ve ever done."
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David Lee Frasier, 1994 Although Frasier was set in Seattle, only one episode—the 100th—was actually shot there. Here Lee prepares a scene at the Pike Place Market. "Directing Frasier was a dream. A genial crew, a cast who by sheer force of unbridled talent made the brilliant look easy, and writers who never settled for just OK. Even if something was improved during rehearsal everyone held to the annoying maxim: ‘Better is not necessarily good,’ and dug in and kicked it up another notch. Plus I got to laugh a lot at work."
MORE FROM THIS TOPIC See more articles from Photo Essays Spring 2018 Photo Essay Warner Bros.' Crown Jewel Winter 2018 Photo Essay Survival of the Fittest Fall 2017 Photo Essay The Food of Life Summer 2017 Photo Essay Demonstrably Demme
Christopher Chulack
Spring 2017 Photo Essay Rhythm and Blues
ER, 1995 Chulack directed 43 episodes of ER from 1995 to 2008. "In this episode, 'Time of Death,' the experience of dying was shown through the eyes of a guest star for the first time in the show’s history. We typically examined death from the perspective of the doctors and hospital staff members. Telling the story of the last moments of life from the subjective point of view of a dying person was unique and compelling."
Spring 2016 Future World Photo Essay Fall/Winter 2016-17 A Time Capsule Photo Essay
MORE FROM THIS ISSUE View the Fall 2011 Issue Fall 2011 Declaration of Independents Independent Filmmakers
Paris Barclay
Fall 2011 30 Rock and Roll Beth McCarthy Miller
NYPD Blue, 1998 "NYPD Blue changed everything for me. It was a show that fascinated me right from Greg Hoblit’s pilot. Somehow I knew I could do well in this world. So without a lot of episodes under my belt, fortune smiles and I’m suddenly working with David Milch and Steven Bochco and shown the ropes by Mark Tinker and Michael Robin. I come to the stage the most grateful man in Hollywood. The next year, I’m given the opportunity to preside over the passing of Bobby Simone [Jimmy Smits] and win the DGA Award, and suddenly—I have a career."
Fall 2011 Black Directors in Hollywood By Melvin Donalson Fall 2011 House Directors Movies for Television Fall 2011 Women Directors & Their Films By Mary G. Hurd Fall 2011 The Sundance Kids: How the Mavericks Took Back Hollywood By James Mottram
Thomas Schlamme
Fall 2011 DGA Interviews 2005 - 2011 Excerpts from DGA Interviews
The West Wing, 2000 "There was a moment on The West Wing when we were exhausted and airing our complaints. Brad Whitford interrupted with a powerful statement: 'You know, this show will be the first line of all of our obits.' He was right. It was truly a game changer in my career. I had spent many years dealing with comedy producers and writers who were worried I would make their show too dramatic, and drama producers and writers worried I would make their show too comedic. Finally, there was a show and most importantly a writer, Aaron Sorkin, whose sensibility felt so in sync with mine."
Alan Ball Six Feet Under, 2001 Ball said he set Six Feet Under, about a family-owned mortuary, in Los Angeles and crammed in as many palm trees as possible because "L.A. is the capital of everything in our culture that is a denial of death." He won a DGA Award for the pilot, which he shot in 13 days. He was anxious because he had never directed for television before. "I think if you pick the right people—cast, writers, department heads, etc.—and trust their talents, the best thing you can do as a director is to get out of their way."
John Patterson The Sopranos, 2002 Patterson directed 13 episodes of The Sopranos, exuding a Zen-like calm behind the camera. His colleague on the show, director Timothy Van Patten, once said of Patterson: "He directed without any anxiety whatsoever. He was instinctual, very finely attuned to the stories and performances. If, on the spot, he was pressed for time, six shots could become one shot at a moment’s notice." A veteran TV director, Patterson reunited on The Sopranos with his Stanford roommate David Chase, the show's creator. When Patterson died in 2005, Chase commented, "John was subtle and expert in every way. They called him ‘the Dutch master,' even though he wasn’t Dutch."
Timothy Van Patten Sex in the City, 2003 Van Patten working with the ladies who lunch, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kristin Davis, on Sex and the City. Having directed such shows as The Sopranos, Van Patten says, "Sex and the City was such a nice departure from the usual stabbing, shooting, kicking, choking and general pummeling I was used to after so many years of work in drama."
Jon Cassar 24, 2006 "I worked on 24 as a director/producer for six of its eight year run and directed 58 episodes, and it never once felt the same. It was an incredibly challenging show that virtually changed its cast and main location at the start of each season. An actor described it as a fast moving train that you had to jump on with no hesitation or you’d be left behind. The talented cast that we had every year was what I loved the most about working on the show. Kiefer Sutherland set a bar that was so high, you had to be at a 110 percent just to keep up."
Lesli Linka Glatter Mad Men, 2009 "Since I began directing Mad Men in season one, every time I would be sent a script, I would feel like the luckiest person around. But when I first read 'Guy Walks Into an Advertising Agency,' I panicked! A John Deere lawn mower comes into the middle of a party, wreaks havoc, and runs over an ad executive’s foot—either this would be a complete fiasco or an amazing challenge to pull off. But what’s more exciting than living on the razor's edge? We shot the lawn mower sequence in one day—over 70 setups. From blood splattering on executives eating white cake, to applying the nasty looking shoe (complete with gnarled toes, rigged to have blood gushing out of it), to only having one shot at the tractor shattering a glass wall— thank goodness it all worked! It was exhilarating."
Michael Spiller Modern Family, 2010 "We had this big, square bar at the center, which made the set seem smaller because it was a huge set. I wanted this place to look as good as a bar could look. We wanted people even in areas where drinking was frowned on to want to come to this bar because it wasn’t about the booze. It was about the camaraderie. The show could have never happened without my two partners, the Charles brothers. We were doing this show on our own, so it was our baby, and it was an experience I’ll never forget. Cheers was all our ideas, all of our love, all our humanity poured into the show. It’s still my favorite show I’ve ever done."
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