Curated by the IndieWire Crafts team, Craft Considerations is a platform for filmmakers to talk about recent work that we think is award-worthy. In collaboration with HBO, we're looking at the subtle craft of "Mare of Easttown" with Emmy-nominated limited-edition editor Amy E. Duddleston, costume designer Meghan Kasperlik, and production designer Keith P. Cunningham.
Creator Brad Ingelsby's scripts for Mare of Easttown were full of local details that permeate a fictional city with memories of the working-class suburbs of Philadelphia where he grew up. In combination with the naturalistic approach of series director Craig Zobel to filming on location, this placed great emphasis on research and the right regional details. Capturing this authenticity was just a starting point for the craftsmen behind "Mare of Easttown".
In a community bond story – about people who grew up in the same town and are now raising their children – those details would also become the building blocks that costume designer Meghan Kasperlik and production designer Keith P. Cunningham used to create the individuality of each Character in Ingelsby's deep ensemble. And as you'll see in the first video below, editor Amy E. Duddleston had to carefully refine a rich tapestry to balance the demands of "family drama wrapped in the conventions of a crime thriller."
The adaptation of "Mare of Easttown"
Duddleston had the unenviable job of not only balancing dozens of main characters, but also educating the viewer about how their lives overlapped. While Detective Mare Sheehan (Kate Winslet) searched dozens of local connections to find out who murdered Erin McMenamin (Cailee Spaeny), the audience needed to understand how these pieces fit together.
When production stopped unexpectedly – with roughly two-thirds of each episode in the can – the editor got an unorthodox opportunity to streamline the complex ensemble piece when she was tasked with editing all seven episodes with the existing footage. "It was great because we had to refine the scripts," said Duddleston.
As you saw the cuts, it became clearer which elements of the story were essential and which were not. During this process, Duddleston found Ingelsby, who wrote each script, to be a surprisingly open-minded contributor. "Brad really took it," said the editor. "He was all-in: open to taking things out or removing dialogue that we could see that weren't needed in the bigger picture. Anything that would make things clearer. "So when production resumed after two months of shooting, the makers refocused on their essential story and what they needed to maintain a narrative drive and underscore the first six episodes hold for an hour.
In the video above, Duddleston breaks the unique balancing act of cutting the first episode in which she not only had to introduce every main character (excluding Evan Peters' Det. Zabel), but also had to find ways to co-protagonist Erin and anchor the viewer in our hero's perspective.
The costume design of "Mare of Easttown"
From the Philly accents to the types of beer Mare drinks (Rolling Rock), regional details were essential in creating a compelling atmosphere that viewers would want to visit – and check out. From a craft point of view, the press from northern Pennsylvania focused on the costumes designed by Meghan Kasperlik and her team.
A handful of local newspapers told the story of how the Los Angeles-based costume designer parked in front of the taverns, hardware stores, and wawa convenience stores in her hometown to examine residents' functional approach to their cloakrooms. But according to Kasperlik, this research was only the first step. The costume designer hired a local shopper to buy dozens of t-shirts from local bands and companies, and she trained Ingelsby about each character's specific job of properly aging and customizing their clothes.
In her early conversations with Winslet – in which the star described her intention to show the hair color roots of her character and make her skin texture look worn-out – Kasperlik knew she had a willing collaborator to uncover Mares emotional distress from costumes. That didn't mean turning the star into a mare was always easy; Kasperlik admitted that the character's date night outfits were her two toughest pieces of clothing in the entire series.
"Kate is so stunning, it was like, 'What can we get away with without it looking too beautiful?'" Said Kasperlik. "We even tried on a few simple Target dresses and it was, 'Yeah, you look too good.'"
In the video above, the costume designer explains how she worked with Winslet to create Mares' armor, as well as her efforts to capture the complexity of her daughter Siobhan (Angourie Rice).
The production design of "Mare of Easttown"
Before working with Ingelsby on Mare, production designer Keith P. Cunningham learned how the writer used the homes of his working class characters to capture their emotional journey as they collaborated on the 2020 film The Way Back. Then Cunningham was forced (due to budget constraints) to translate Ingelsby's Philadelphia-based script into a California setting. He had the rare opportunity to film on location for her HBO series.
Through extensive scouting and trusting the local crew, Cunningham learned how every home was made up of older furniture inherited from parents and grandparents with a layer of contemporary items on top. The production designer and his set designers worked tirelessly to find the right combination of texture, tone, color, and pattern to capture each family's story, but also to provide a quick read that instantly orientates viewers when the series is about to leave home Home jumps.
Cunningham admitted that he was afraid of deliberately designing interiors that weren't pretty or coordinated. "Mare of Easttown" takes place in the inconspicuous places of the everyday working class; It doesn't offer the kind of era, fantasy, or lavish ambiance that traditionally turns out to be catnip for a new art department.
Still, exploring the layers of these characters' lives offered an equally rich palette. "Filming in this location gave us some great opportunities to make the normal more cinematic," said Cunningham.
In the video above, watch how the production designer did just that, using the spatial arrangement of each home to visually tell the story of the Sheehan and Ross families, and how he worked with Zobel to create dynamic compositions that Depth and drama to every scene.
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source https://seapointrealtors.com/2021/08/11/hbos-mare-of-easttown-how-a-fictional-small-town-became-real/
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