Coverage

Francis Lawrence

Once you know the end of the movie and you know some of the reveals, it's interesting to watch the movie again and look at scenes like this, and see what he's saying, and see the hints that he's dropping. Selfishness. Now, this ended up being probably one of the hardest scenes in the movie to shoot. I think it was probably the one that Jen was dreading the most as we were starting production. But, again, great to have Charlotte here. And it was one that Justin and Jen and I really worked really hard on, to get the tone just right, because the idea is that she's really in control, and that it's quite empowering. The tough thing is that when you do a scene like this, you end up spending most of the day getting the coverage that you need, and as you can see in a moment here when she starts to get undressed, that you're gonna spend most of the day completely disrobing in front of an entire classroom of people.

44:13 · jump to transcript →

to the dwelling of the ancient one, to seek the fated sword that matches your brutal rage. Why speak ye my fortune, witch? For where your path of ashes ends. The scenes with the witches tend to be shot, reverse shot, breaking from our long takes, so there's an occasional ping-pong match of coverage here and there. The norms have spun.

33:47 · jump to transcript →

Christien Tinsley

So this is one of the first days of shooting. Art the clown. His body there. That was a combination of both David in a neck prosthetic that we built and them digitally removing his head, as well as a full puppet we made with rod articulation to the arm. So anytime you were over the shoulder, the gunshot wounds coming through him, or...

14:22 · jump to transcript →

Nia DaCosta

You must stand. His little smile here. Just amazing performances in this film, and this scene in particular, I just find so... wonderful. Loved shooting it. And also my editor, because we only had Alfie for three hours a night we had to shoot, like, really out of order. SO, like, I think, on the second day we were shooting this, my editor emailed me, and he was like, "Bro, where is the coverage of the scene?" I was like, "What do you mean?" He's like, "We don't have this or this..." And it was really great because he was just like... I was like, "That's because we don't have Alfie. "So we had to wait for Alfie." But also, it was really helpful just to, like, keep us all on the same page and get a good road map for making sure we get everything we need 'cause it's a complicated scene. It's a long scene, and a lot has to happen. And, you know, when you have one of your actors who can't be there the whole time, you know, it just makes it trickier. So, having a shot list, first of all, helps, but also having an editor who is so on top of it and who is so brilliant. Also, any director will say, "This helps bring everything together."

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