American Cinematographer - December 2016 - 24

Production Slate

Family Matters
By Trevor Hogg

Written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by
the Sea met with raves when it premiered at this year's Sundance
Film Festival. The feature tells the story of Lee Chandler (Casey
Affleck), a reclusive Boston janitor who's forced to grapple with a
past tragedy when he returns to his hometown and assumes
guardianship of his teenage nephew, Patrick (Lucas Hedges).
With Manchester, Lonergan was helming his third movie in
16 years, following You Can Count on Me and Margaret. Hired to
shoot the family drama was cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes, whose
credits include Tiny Furniture (AC Jan. '11), Martha Marcy May
Marlene (AC Nov. '11) and Trainwreck. "Even though the story is
tragic, there's a lot of comedy and warmth in the finished product,"
Lipes muses. "Kenny didn't want the look to be as dark as the
subject matter, and that choice helped maintain the film's life-affirming quality. I view what I did on the film as getting out of the way as
much as possible and not being a distraction for the things that
matter: the performances and script."
Lipes and Lonergan had their first meeting to discuss the
script at the Waverly Diner in New York; among the topics of discussion were the script's numerous flashbacks. "After we debated how
to visually differentiate past and present, Kenny decided the writing
was clear enough without a visual cue," the cinematographer recalls,
24

December 2016

"so we ended up treating the past and present exactly the same on
set.
"I learned a lot watching Kenny discuss story with the
actors," Lipes continues. "That's where he shines. It's a clear, factbased decision-making discussion." The cinematographer was similarly inspired by the cast, which included Kyle Chandler as Lee's
brother, Joe, and Michelle Williams as Lee's ex-wife, Randi. "Watching Casey Affleck was one of the highlights of my professional
career," he says. "He makes smart, interesting choices about every
detail. It was a pleasure to be in the room to witness his performance."
Principal photography commenced in late February 2015 and
continued into May. The production employed locations in the actual
Manchester-by-the-Sea, Mass., as well as the nearby towns of
Gloucester, Essex, Rockport and Beverly, all northeast of Boston.
"Snowfall in the Boston area broke records that winter," states Lipes.
"But the snow was disappearing fast and it was a struggle to keep
the cold feeling of a Massachusetts winter that Kenny was going for.
[The production] had to bring snow in and fabricate it, and we had
to frame shots to show as much [snow] as possible.
"The prep period was very short, and there were a lot of locations we didn't secure until the last minute or, in some cases, until
after we started shooting," Lipes continues. "The hardest location to
find was the Chandler house. There was a lot of debate about the
socioeconomic background of the family, and how that would

American Cinematographer

Manchester by the Sea photos by Claire Folger, courtesy of K Period Media and Amazon Studios.

Lee Chandler
(Casey Affleck,
left) is forced to
grapple with a
past tragedy
when he returns
to his hometown
to take
guardianship of
his teenage
nephew, Patrick
(Lucas Hedges),
after the death
of Lee's brother
in the feature
Manchester by
the Sea.

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