A day with the Americans
Nov. 7th, 2014 10:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jae posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
theamericansYesterday, sistermagpie and I got the chance to spend about five hours as guests of the The Americans team that is currently filming season three. It was every bit as amazing as that makes it sound and then some! The guys who took over scheduling my visit (it was complicated to plan since I had to come in from so far and book my flight well in advance) were friendly and responsive from the get-go, and once we arrived at the studio, all of the cast, crew, and creatives we met went above and beyond anything we had imagined.
When we arrived, we were given a set of sheets with information about the day's filming. The top sheet included information about who was in charge (in terms of executive producers, the producer, and the director), a weather forecast, an address of a nearby hospital (just in case!), as well as a list of cast members and stand-ins and the times they had to be on set for which purposes (for hair and makeup or on set ready to perform). It also included special instructions for the various scenes (such as props that needed to be present), and a little bit at the bottom about the advance schedule for the following day's shooting (which scenes they were going to do, etc.). The pages that followed were excerpts from the script for the day's scenes.
First we watched a bit of filming, then we were taken on a long and very thorough tour of the various sets and production offices by a couple of very generous crew members, and finally we came back to watch more filming. We met and briefly spoke to creator Joe Weisberg and Daniel Sackheim, Stuart Zicherman and Molly Nussbaum from the writing staff, as well as Matthew Rhys (Philip), Keidrich Sellati (Henry), Noah Emmerich (Stan), and Annet Mahendru (Nina). We also saw Holly Taylor (Paige), Keri Russell (Elizabeth), and the director for episodes 303 and 304 (we'll let the team reveal who that is as they see fit) up close but didn't talk to them.
What follows are our (completely spoiler-free!) thoughts about what we saw. We've tried to put together a description of the kinds of things that we as pretty hardcore The Americans fans would want to hear about if one of you had been lucky enough to get to do what we did.
• They have two groupings of sets in two different large warehouses in New York. There's a bit of distance between them, to the extent that they need to travel between them with a van.
• The outsides of these buildings are really unglamourous. You'd never know by looking at them that they contain all of these extensive fictional worlds.
• The sets are so intricate! All of the little homey details in the Jennings' living room, with just the right magazines on the coffee table, the period throw pillows, the pictures on the walls, the 80s fireplace. The kitchen with kids' drawings and younger photographs of them pinned to the fridge and the 80s potholder hanging from the stove. The FBI offices with little pinup sheets about employee rights on a bulletin board and the period computers and the bulletin board full of photos of "bad guys" (including the sketches of our Illegals!) and other clues. The Rezidentura with its "marble" (they're actually styrofoam, but you have to touch them to tell--even from close up they're really authentic-looking) walls and statues on the fireplace and the tea set and the enormous Lenin picture. But look up from any of these sets and you're suddenly in a different world: the tall ceilings of a warehouse, with metal beams and suspended lights and sprayed-on soundproofing insulation everywhere.
• The two scenes we got to see filmed consisted of one with Paige and Henry from episode 303, and one with Paige, Philip, and Elizabeth from 304. Episodes 303 and 304 have the same director.
• The sets where they filmed those two scenes were each very small and enclosed, so we (and members of the production team) watched filming as it was occurring on a pair of two screens on the other side of the set. We were each given a headset attached to a receiving device (labeled "WRITER") that allowed us to listen to the various takes, as well as the direction the actors were getting. As we watched, we sat on "director's chairs" that read THE AMERICANS on the back with the show's logo. Directly behind us were the chairs that read "Joe Weisberg, Executive Producer" and "Joel Fields, Executive Producer." Further back there was a second set of chairs with the names of each of the Jennings family.
• There were so many people on set! When you watch the show it's easy to forget that there's so much more to a production like this than just the cast and the writers and directors. We met or saw camera operators, caterers, people in charge of the background actors (i.e. "extras"), props professionals, and dozens of other people whose jobs weren't clear to folks not in the industry, but who were clearly working really hard. To a one, everyone was delightful. This is a terrific team.
• There was a sign up in the viewing area that said: "Please RESPECT THE SET. This is a workplace, please do not eat, sleep, or lounge on set." (Not that there was any time to eat, sleep, or lounge! Seriously, everybody was working so hard.)
• The crew we talked to all seemed to be working on other shows, too. One of them was also working on Girls, while another had worked on The Affair.
• The set is quite chilly! We were moving around a lot, but we can only imagine what it's like for the cast members to film very sedentary scenes (not to mention scenes where they're not wearing much).
• Both of the scenes we saw filmed began with a blocking rehearsal with each cast member's stand-ins (who seemed to have been chosen because their colouring approximately matched that of "their" cast members), and then the cast members were brought in. They filmed each scene in several takes from a more distant camera angle, and then did several more takes from a closer camera angle, and then yet again from a still closer camera angle.
• Matthew Rhys joked around a little during rehearsal, but never in a way that caused them to fall behind. The joking was also always in character and with his Philip accent.
• Matthew Rhys also does his lines a little bit differently in each take. This is really noticeable.
• Holly Taylor takes direction really well, and is ready to ad-lib if she has to.
• The various stages had signs on the doors describing what was inside (like "Studio 2: FBI Headquarters"). There were also signs everywhere that read "Please close door gently, we take sound seriously. Thank you."
• Different sets are grouped together than you might think: the travel agency is in with both the Rezidentura set and the FBI safe house, for example, and Martha's apartment is in with the basement laundry.
• There was a "craft services" room that served as a lunchroom, and there was so much food there. There were always people coming in and out with various snacks, and the lunch that they were served in the middle of the day was really hearty. (When they ate lunch, Holly Taylor sat across from Keidrich Sellati, just like they do "at home.")
• Annet Mahendru has a little white dog who she brings with her to the set. At one point he got loose from his lead and ran out from the craft services room into the hallway, almost making it out onto the street!
• The bathrooms are all in one hallway, but there is a whole row of individual rooms just in case everyone has to go at once.
• The room where they do their table reads has stills on the wall of various scenes from the show.
• The cast members who were shooting that day each had a little room where they could store their stuff/hang out when they weren't busy. The names on the doors were their characters' names.
We are so excited about season three now, we can't even express it. (!!!!!)
sistermagpie and I got the chance to spend about five hours as guests of the The Americans team that is currently filming season three. It was every bit as amazing as that makes it sound and then some! The guys who took over scheduling my visit (it was complicated to plan since I had to come in from so far and book my flight well in advance) were friendly and responsive from the get-go, and once we arrived at the studio, all of the cast, crew, and creatives we met went above and beyond anything we had imagined. When we arrived, we were given a set of sheets with information about the day's filming. The top sheet included information about who was in charge (in terms of executive producers, the producer, and the director), a weather forecast, an address of a nearby hospital (just in case!), as well as a list of cast members and stand-ins and the times they had to be on set for which purposes (for hair and makeup or on set ready to perform). It also included special instructions for the various scenes (such as props that needed to be present), and a little bit at the bottom about the advance schedule for the following day's shooting (which scenes they were going to do, etc.). The pages that followed were excerpts from the script for the day's scenes.
First we watched a bit of filming, then we were taken on a long and very thorough tour of the various sets and production offices by a couple of very generous crew members, and finally we came back to watch more filming. We met and briefly spoke to creator Joe Weisberg and Daniel Sackheim, Stuart Zicherman and Molly Nussbaum from the writing staff, as well as Matthew Rhys (Philip), Keidrich Sellati (Henry), Noah Emmerich (Stan), and Annet Mahendru (Nina). We also saw Holly Taylor (Paige), Keri Russell (Elizabeth), and the director for episodes 303 and 304 (we'll let the team reveal who that is as they see fit) up close but didn't talk to them.
What follows are our (completely spoiler-free!) thoughts about what we saw. We've tried to put together a description of the kinds of things that we as pretty hardcore The Americans fans would want to hear about if one of you had been lucky enough to get to do what we did.
• They have two groupings of sets in two different large warehouses in New York. There's a bit of distance between them, to the extent that they need to travel between them with a van.
• The outsides of these buildings are really unglamourous. You'd never know by looking at them that they contain all of these extensive fictional worlds.
• The sets are so intricate! All of the little homey details in the Jennings' living room, with just the right magazines on the coffee table, the period throw pillows, the pictures on the walls, the 80s fireplace. The kitchen with kids' drawings and younger photographs of them pinned to the fridge and the 80s potholder hanging from the stove. The FBI offices with little pinup sheets about employee rights on a bulletin board and the period computers and the bulletin board full of photos of "bad guys" (including the sketches of our Illegals!) and other clues. The Rezidentura with its "marble" (they're actually styrofoam, but you have to touch them to tell--even from close up they're really authentic-looking) walls and statues on the fireplace and the tea set and the enormous Lenin picture. But look up from any of these sets and you're suddenly in a different world: the tall ceilings of a warehouse, with metal beams and suspended lights and sprayed-on soundproofing insulation everywhere.
• The two scenes we got to see filmed consisted of one with Paige and Henry from episode 303, and one with Paige, Philip, and Elizabeth from 304. Episodes 303 and 304 have the same director.
• The sets where they filmed those two scenes were each very small and enclosed, so we (and members of the production team) watched filming as it was occurring on a pair of two screens on the other side of the set. We were each given a headset attached to a receiving device (labeled "WRITER") that allowed us to listen to the various takes, as well as the direction the actors were getting. As we watched, we sat on "director's chairs" that read THE AMERICANS on the back with the show's logo. Directly behind us were the chairs that read "Joe Weisberg, Executive Producer" and "Joel Fields, Executive Producer." Further back there was a second set of chairs with the names of each of the Jennings family.
• There were so many people on set! When you watch the show it's easy to forget that there's so much more to a production like this than just the cast and the writers and directors. We met or saw camera operators, caterers, people in charge of the background actors (i.e. "extras"), props professionals, and dozens of other people whose jobs weren't clear to folks not in the industry, but who were clearly working really hard. To a one, everyone was delightful. This is a terrific team.
• There was a sign up in the viewing area that said: "Please RESPECT THE SET. This is a workplace, please do not eat, sleep, or lounge on set." (Not that there was any time to eat, sleep, or lounge! Seriously, everybody was working so hard.)
• The crew we talked to all seemed to be working on other shows, too. One of them was also working on Girls, while another had worked on The Affair.
• The set is quite chilly! We were moving around a lot, but we can only imagine what it's like for the cast members to film very sedentary scenes (not to mention scenes where they're not wearing much).
• Both of the scenes we saw filmed began with a blocking rehearsal with each cast member's stand-ins (who seemed to have been chosen because their colouring approximately matched that of "their" cast members), and then the cast members were brought in. They filmed each scene in several takes from a more distant camera angle, and then did several more takes from a closer camera angle, and then yet again from a still closer camera angle.
• Matthew Rhys joked around a little during rehearsal, but never in a way that caused them to fall behind. The joking was also always in character and with his Philip accent.
• Matthew Rhys also does his lines a little bit differently in each take. This is really noticeable.
• Holly Taylor takes direction really well, and is ready to ad-lib if she has to.
• The various stages had signs on the doors describing what was inside (like "Studio 2: FBI Headquarters"). There were also signs everywhere that read "Please close door gently, we take sound seriously. Thank you."
• Different sets are grouped together than you might think: the travel agency is in with both the Rezidentura set and the FBI safe house, for example, and Martha's apartment is in with the basement laundry.
• There was a "craft services" room that served as a lunchroom, and there was so much food there. There were always people coming in and out with various snacks, and the lunch that they were served in the middle of the day was really hearty. (When they ate lunch, Holly Taylor sat across from Keidrich Sellati, just like they do "at home.")
• Annet Mahendru has a little white dog who she brings with her to the set. At one point he got loose from his lead and ran out from the craft services room into the hallway, almost making it out onto the street!
• The bathrooms are all in one hallway, but there is a whole row of individual rooms just in case everyone has to go at once.
• The room where they do their table reads has stills on the wall of various scenes from the show.
• The cast members who were shooting that day each had a little room where they could store their stuff/hang out when they weren't busy. The names on the doors were their characters' names.
We are so excited about season three now, we can't even express it. (!!!!!)
no subject
Date: 2014-11-07 07:49 pm (UTC)-J
no subject
Date: 2014-11-07 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-11-11 08:14 am (UTC)