Below the Line | Below the Line: When Oscar-nominated production designer Barbara Ling first read Quentin Tarantino’s screenplay for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, she had the reaction one might glean from reading a novel. “When you finish it, you are gob-smacked,” Ling said of Tarantino’s script, laced with both fictitious and real characters. “He has all of these asides about who these people are—the enormous scope of this world, which is a way to tell the story.”
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Once Upon a Time in Hollywood was the first Oscar contender that I saw this season (also my first Tarantino film ever), and immediately knew that Barbara Ling’s production design would be nominated. As someone who spent a significant amount of time growing up in LA, I knew that she hit the designs head-on. It was extremely evident that she did her research on this classic time in Los Angeles history—from signage to facades to cars from the time. I think it’s a perfect initial approach to her research to have wandered around LA by car with Tarantino, to fully delve into the feel of the landscape. I’ve always been curious while watching movies like this how they filmed on location, especially in a city like LA, where life never seems to stop moving, and there’s always so many people around. I’m not surprised that the people of Los Angeles were so on board to support the production of this film, because I know that LA has a deep-rooted culture of cinema—it was great to read that the building owners were having fun with their spaces being transformed (and a nostalgia factor too). From this article, it seems like the production crew had to be especially all hands on deck for overnight turnovers of buildings and freeways, kudos to them for such a success!!!
This film was really very stunning. You could tell how important the costumes and production design were to telling the story. It was a film that lived in such a specific situation and time and so many real people were incorporated into the story and a huge part of it was the believability that the fictional characters lived alongside the historical figures. The production design of this film was stunning and very consistent throughout the story. It also brought a very believable and real aspect to the obscure story being told. It also worked as a strong unifier for the film as it covered a lot of historical and fictional events, all experienced by the main characters. I also think it is very interesting to hear the process behind recreating this world that is so iconic and well known to the people creating the film. Details become very important in a work like that and I think that was taken to heart and executed very well.
This article really gives insight to the different scale of production design in film vs in theatre. There is such an enormous difference in struggles. While film has a lot of money, for films like this that are so location specific yet have to take place in a different time period, it is probably extremely difficult to have gotten everything exactly how she wanted it. She describes having to close down the freeway for hours to get the period cars on the freeway, and film them. I can't imagine being in LA and having the freeway closed. Im very lucky I live like an hour away and didn't have to deal with that. I love her description of Tarantino's role in it. It really seems like while he emphasized what was important to him, he still let her have her creative liberties. I also thought it was interesting to read about how permits work because that is not something we have to consider in theatre as much.
This article gives insight into multiple aspects of filmmaking and makes a few connections between film and theater. I have to say I didn’t realize the scale of this production, specifically in creating the look of the film. I can only imagine how much detail was put into capturing Hollywood in the 60s/70s. It’s something that has a very specific look. And the production designer absolutely honed in on these details, like changing street signs on the freeway. While I admire the level of detail that was put into the design, I also admire the letting go of control that the designer probably had to do because of the short amount of time she was given. On this note, I found it insane that for some scenes, the crew had an hour to dress the set, like the one on the freeway. That’s like a wardrobe quick change but for a set. I’m also really happy to see the collaboration that went on between the director and the designers. The director had very specific visions to the design of the film because of his memories but he in no way imposed on the designers nor restricted their creativity!
I loved the costume design in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood! I thought that from the very beginning of the film, it was really rooted in the late sixties. The costumes did exactly what they needed to do in a movie like this, not to mention I really want Leonardo Dicaprio's yellow turtleneck and brown leather jacket. One thing that sometimes stunts the costumes in a period piece is being stuck on one certain type of person from that era, but I felt like Once Upon A Time... did that really well. The hippies felt really different from the actors and Sharon Tate really stood out. I think all of this was really really effective. I agree that the production design was really great, but it didn't strike me as much as the costumes did. But the settings and props seemed to be chosen carefully and you really could tell. I think Jojo Rabbit or Parasite should win the production design Oscar and Little Women should win the costumes one.
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