American Cinematographer - July 2020 - 51

Television Production

Little America photos courtesy of Apple TV Plus.

the same coin, and you never see both
of their faces on screen at the same
time.
"During prep it became clear
that Derek's style is so 'in the moment'
that the strict rules of Heat were not
going to work, so everyone's approach
had to be flexible.
"After the first 16 weeks of
shooting as Dominick, Mark took a
six-week hiatus and gained 30 pounds
to play Thomas for the last several
weeks of the schedule. This meant we
were re-creating twinning setups for
Mark as Thomas three or four months
after we'd shot Mark as Dominick.
That created some challenges because
we had to match the original look
precisely, and we were shooting on
film. Gaffer Ken Shibata, key grip
Johnny Erbes-Chan and I had to plan
an approach that would be possible to
re-create several months later regardless of the weather conditions or sun
position. To control the lighting to that
extent, I had to bring in a lot of equipment for scenes that wouldn't be
complicated for lighting otherwise.
"The extent of the twinning was
essentially shaped in the edit. While I
was shooting A Beautiful Day in the
Neighborhood, one of the producers,
who had worked on Spike Jonze's
Adaptation, told me Spike and Lance
Acord [ASC] had tried to limit themselves to one connective shot [between
Adaptation's twin characters] in each

scene so the trick wouldn't seem gratuitous. I think Derek and the editors
often followed that concept.
"We shot a lot of motion control
but mainly for safety, in case we
needed those shots later on. A lot of
that footage didn't end up in the edit. It
was a way of giving ourselves a lot of
flexibility. Instead of saying, 'This shot
can't be a twinning shot,' we did the
motion control in case it became a
twinning shot later.
"Derek's style is very much
about extreme close-ups, and that
approach inherently avoids twinning.
So, in a way, the film ended up closer to
the style of Heat than it felt on set."

David Franco
and Paula Huidobro, AMC
Little America
Apple TV Plus
An anthology series that observes
the inspiring and surprising stories of
immigrants in America.
Franco: "I would describe the
look as comedy mixed with drama, but
it's as realistic and grounded as possible. The production hired directors
who culturally identified with the reality of the characters, and with each
episode, we were starting from scratch
with a different cast and director. I
liked being able to do something different each time."
Huidobro: "Every story was set

in a different place. We were trying to
portray different experiences. What
seems normal to the average American
seems exotic and full of promise to the
immigrant. We wanted to capture that
energy without being cheesy."
Franco: "It's not just about
where people come from, but also the
time frame. There are different periods
in the story. We shot the series with
70mm Primos and Sony Venice
cameras provided by Panavision New
York, capturing 5.7K 16:9 mode for a
2:1 4K deliverable. The larger format
allowed us to put the background
more out of focus and hide details that
weren't appropriate to the location or
period."
Huidobro: "The ISO of the
Venice is quite versatile. The 2:1 aspect
ratio seems to be becoming more
common.
"We were always encouraged to
think more about the story and the
intention of the images. It was more
about the characters and then the
people around them - stories in
smaller places."
Franco: "The budget and the
period were challenges, and we had to
shoot it all in New Jersey, Montreal
and Miami. The locations people were
hit hard, but you can always find

Cinematographers David Franco (p, at
right, with director and executive
producer Sian Heder) and Paula
Huidobro (puu) shot in several cities
for the series Little America.
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American Cinematographer - July 2020

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