A Wrap on "The Flight Attendant"

(This is not even all the scripts or all my set files—just the ones that were stashed in a file cabinet 🗄 before March 12!)

The end of a job that stretched out over four seasons because of a pandemic. There’s always that surge of relief at the end of a job but also a twinge of sadness that all of a sudden it is over and the people you were used to seeing and texting all day long and the routes you drove on autopilot are done.

One of my proudest achievements on this job, however, is that I managed to find all the things we needed, within budget and on our crazy timelines WITHOUT once going to HomeDepot or ULINE from August-October (when we started back up after the COVID imposed break). This is something I’m truly proud of.

This past summer (2020) when many of us decided we would be more intentional about how we spent our money: investigate who it supports, doesn’t support, or harms, it felt imperative to cut out spending money at HomeDepot or ULINE. Especially when we are working with substantial budgets shopping frequently at home improvement and hardware stores (like HomeDepot) and wholesale bulk suppliers (like ULINE.)

Because of set decorating work, I can map all the HomeDepots in the NYC and vicinity for you off the top of my head and know the layouts of all the one main ones in New York City by memory.

Our art department coordinator on “Russian Doll,” Mia, did educate me on all the ways ULINE works against many feminist causes, and encouraged me to rethink supporting them back in 2018. …it was so hard to disavow them though, cause ULINE is so convenient. They reliably will ship you something by next day if you get the order in by 6:00pm, they have an amazing selection and good prices, and great customer service…

And same with HomeDepot, they have good parking lots, PARKING LOTS! all around New York City (which is huge when you are driving around a minivan and need to get a lot of things), a much better website and app than Lowe’s, locations everywhere, and unbeatable hours.

…but after this summer I decided despite it all, I really wanted to stick to my commitments of more intentional alignment with companies and try my best when working to not support either HomeDepot or Uline. Thankfully Jessica, the decorator for The Flight Attendant, was totally on the same page about this and supported and encouraged me to try.

I knew it would be harder and more inconvenient and I would have to rethink old default patterns of buying things. But we managed to do it for the last three episodes of The Flight Attendant. We had one set in (you’ll see once it airs and I’m able to post a behind the scenes about the set) which would have definitely been 10x easier with ULINE, but I found a competitor that got the job done! And as for avoiding HomeDepot, New York City actually has a bunch of old school hardware and building supply companies all around and I rediscovered the wonders of Metropolitan Lumber (a place I first starting using back when I was working on The Affair in 2016), which I came to learn has pretty much everything you need!

I never used either place once, which gives me encouragement that it is possible for all work moving forward.

The Flight Attendant airs on HBOMax on Nov 26!

Back at Work in a Pandemic!

Opening my old work notebook on August 3…for the first time since March 11!

Well we have resumed work on “The Flight Attendant” (the job I was working on in March when everything shut down due to COVID.)

We are one of the first productions back up in New York City and it feels a little bit surreal and scary to be first out of the gate…

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at our beloved flooring vendor CarpetTime

And then after the new air filters were installed in our production office, we were back in the office which was like discovering a lost civilization…

Everyone's Real Homes

I’m on Day 17 of being stuck at home here in NYC.

It has been a real rollercoaster of anxiety, occasional moments of joyful laughter, and just all the emotions. But one thing I have really been enjoying in these 17 days of being at home, alone, together is all the videos and images people are sharing of themselves in their regular-un-prepped-for-a-photoshoot homes all around the world.

Getting access to so many normal people and images of their everyday lived-in homes has been a real treasure trove for me. I’m loving it on an anthropological level, a design level, and a human level. I love seeing all the little details, what art they chose to hang, what things are left out, what cords are hanging out where, and how they arrange their furniture to actually use their rooms—basically all the little details we try to recreate in a set when we decorate it.

For the first movie I ever decorated “Trouble,” I was struggling to put in what we call the “life layer” of a set. The life layer is the magical pixie dust we sprinkle onto sets to make it look like a naturalistic lived-in environment that a real human occupies and not the fictional set that a bunch of people were paid to create (which is in fact the reality hahah).

Life layer is the stray paperclips on an office desk, or the strange accumulation of earrings next to tissues and a cup with a loose subscription card from a magazine on your nightstand, or how layers of post-its are arrayed on a bulletin board. It is always a fun and challenging part of finishing dressing a set: to make this look as realistic, natural, and unconsidered (even though it is totally considered often 3+ people working on it together) as possible.

When I was struggling with life layer on “Trouble” I called an older more experienced decorator, the very kind and generous Karin Wiesel Holmes who was the set decorator for “Girls” and “Sex and the City” (I was an Art PA for Season 6 of Girls for little bit). Karin gave me some ideas and then told me this nugget of wisdom: “just think about all the things you would tidy up or put away when guests come over” as a guiding principle for life layer. I always think about this when I get stuck on life layer now. (Thanks Karin!)

So the great thing about all these videos and photos people are sharing of themselves stuck at home around the world during the spread of COVID-19, is you get an unvarnished view into peoples homes FULL OF LIFE LAYER. I mean maybe they did some tidying up before they hit record, but it still looks way more natural than most interiors we get access to in magazines, shows, and publications that showcase interiors.

Because most interior photoshoots of homes in interior design magazines are TOTAL FICTION. It took a team of many professionals to make it look like that for the shoot and often it is not even what the featured celebrity’s home actually looks like day to day. I heard a rumor from a friend in the industry about how the cover shoot of highly regarded New York actress’ home for a super prestigious and popular interior design magazine involved a decorator colleague sourcing and bringing in and swapping out new furniture and etc just for the shoot. Like I said, total fiction.

Also I subscribed to some of the premier interior design magazines and realized instead of inspiring me they actually bum me out. Because it is less about creative interiors expressing personality and interesting off-beat combinations or telling a story through design but about expressing wealth, prestige, generating “aspiration” and maintaining status quo “good taste.” barf emoji.

What I sometimes fantasize about it is creating a magazine of normal people interiors as a balm to that barf emoji. Like everyday people and how they create solutions for small space in their homes, or have off-beat design styles, or decorate their homes in a way that does not look like a generic instagram or catalog photo. Often I get stuck at the issue of “but how do you get that access???” and make sure people don’t self-consciously clean up before you arrive to take photos? It is such a human impulse to want to put your best foot forward and hide the things that make you feel less-than.

And that’s where all the self-quarantine, socially distanced, on lockdown because of COVID-19 videos and photos people have been sharing from around the world comes in. All of a sudden a wealth of images and glimpses into regular everyday peoples homes! People who decorated without a team of professionals guiding “their taste.” People who set up their home to make them feel comfortable, cozy, and as an expression of their passions and interests. AND I’M LOVING IT.

The last reason I’m loving it (hahah this turned out way longer than I expected) is because it also now this precious catalog of reference photos. Set decorators are always on the hunt and collecting good reference photos to help us re-create realistic interiors true to the character and setting of the story in the script. We study reference photos together with the production designer and try to catch key details from often grainy small photos that we will then try to find somewhere to then dress in to our set.

I feel like I always spend a good amount of time ingesting and really digesting reference photos whenever I start work on a set so that it can guide me when I’m out shopping and looking for things and particularly when it comes time to dress the set. And not just for period pieces, but contemporary sets too.

Whenever I see a good “reference set” in the wild, like a store’s cash register that has a lot of good little details, or an office with a lot of great layered memos and post-its on the wall, I snap a photo and treasure that little reference. Closely observing the mundane details of life like on an almost anthropological level to re-create is one of my favorite parts of set decorating work. And now with the all the homes people are filming themselves in, it is like a wonderful encyclopedic catalogue of reference photos of contemporary life.

Sigh, just writing this is making me miss the work of set decorating. …but it’s going to be while.

I’ll try to update this post later with photo examples of the interiors I’ve been loving getting a glimpse of while at home these last 16 days.

Stuck in a Period Film

Ok that is my dream in life to be stuck in a period film (preferably one in the Victorian era or Art Deco era) vs actually teleporting to the past because you get to bathe in the aesthetic while still having access to modern plumbing and human rights.

Anyways, like every other production the job I’ve been on is down which is why I find that tweet particularly amusing. With all this time at home I’ve been reconnecting to old hobbies and interests (been drawing, taking ballet classes, drinking a lot of tea) and coming up with creative projects for myself.

Plus watching my favorite thing: period pieces! I finished the latest season of Babylon Berlin (1920’s Berlin!!!) and probably should do a whole appreciation post of the phenomenal wallpaper in those sets. Actually I could do appreciation posts on each set they were all so good. Those wallpapers really got me through the initial high anxiety of the first few days of abruptly no longer having work and being at home.

One of the projects on my list of things to-do during this indefinite period of unemployment and sequestered time at home is (finally) updating this website from the time Russian Doll was nominated for an Emmy last July (lol) to now March.

stay tuned!

Art Directors Guild Awards 2020

We really did not coordinate our outfits! But we are just so in-sync.

Russian Doll was nominated for an Art Director’s Guild Award for Outstanding Production Design for a Half-Hour Single Camera Series.

Russian Doll’s Production Design Michael Bricker and Art Director John Cox, were both on location in Israel, so Jessica Russian Doll’s Set Decorator and I were able to attend to attend the Art Director’s Guild Awards Ceremony in Los Angeles represent Russian Doll’s Art Department!

Jessica and I were both in NYC deep in the craze of filming The Flight Attendant but took nighttime Friday flights cross-country and flew back on Sunday morning the first weekend in February.

Here’s our fun fill packed weekend and my first time attending one of the Hollywood industry awards ceremonies:

for all women, awards ceremonies mean full on pre-show primping

Jess getting ready

classic Jess, just fitting in a little bit of work where you can after she was done with Hair and Makeup. Hey you don’t become an Emmy Award Winning Set Decorator this early in your career by just talent alone. It is called serious. hard. work. that Jess is so good at pushing out.

Thanks to the studio who covered our car service for the night!

our first red carpet together

Yes, my first official red carpet and the carpet is not even red. !!!!?????!!!! I mean, it is scripted “red carpet” how did the set decorators mess up so colossally on this floor covering??? hah.

Anyways, the beginning is an open bar cocktail hour and it was a lot more people than I expected. So many unfamiliar faces and then we saw David Schelsinger, a fellow New York City based set decorator who Jess has worked with, and who was nominated for two different projects (John Wick 3 and Knives Out) that night!

Even though I’m from California (I hung out with my parents Friday night and Saturday morning and afternoon), in that space we definitely felt like “New York people” out of water.

Tip to my future self and anyone reading this: drink more at the cocktail hour, cause it is no longer open bar after dinner!

So then it is dinner time and it is like a wedding banquet/reception people seated in round tables in a hotel ballroom. We were lucky to be seated with the John Wick 3 people so seated with David and John Wick Art Director Chris Shriver who I know because we worked on In the Heights together!

We thought there was a good chance that Fleabag or Glow would win. …but Russian Doll won!

Thanks to David Schelsinger’s wife Leslie and Kevin Kavanaugh’s (production designer for John Wick 3) wife for taking the photos of us on stage for us. They are both moms so they were thinking like moms when they generously took this photo for us. I’m sorry I’m feeling very anti-feminist for only remembering them as their husband’s wives but that was the context in which I was meeting them. It’s shameful, I know.

looking out into the crowd, it was very very white. filled with older white men. when we exited the stage, it was so exciting to see the friendly and familiar face of Nelson Coates! The Production Designer of “In the Heights” (that’s how I know him) and “Crazy Rich Asians “and so many more things!

Nelson is also the president of the Art Directors Guild so he was there to greet us as winners, and it was so nice to hug someone I actually knew in such an unfamiliar setting and my first time at an experience like that.

AND THEN IT WAS PARTY TIME!

Jess and I vowed to dance it up at the after party like we did at the Broad City Series Wrap Party (still the funnest wrap party I’ve ever been to).

Here’s Nelson and I on the dance floor. …as you can see I’m quite sweaty from the dancing.

An “In the Heights” Art Department reunion on the dance floor! Sorry I don’t know who the lady is, Nelson the Production Designer, Chris Shriver the Art Director, and then me the Set Decoration Buyer hahhaha—we missed you Andy (Andy was the “In the Heights” Set Decorator).

The afterparty was fun. It was also surreal. At one point I was in the bathroom and a stranger came up to me and said “congratulations” and I did literally look behind me because I didn’t realize she was talking to me.

Some highlights include:

-TALKING TO THE GAME OF THRONES PRODUCTION DESIGNER DEBORAH RILEY (I was seriously fan girling because I watched each and every behind the scenes on the Game of Thrones sets and she is LEGENDARY. She was the nicest, most gracious, and down to earth person.)

-Jess and I both realizing we didn’t have any money with us and thus realizing we couldn’t get any more drinks (see previously mentioned note about drinking more early on)

-At the end of the night, we are getting in the elevator and Catherine O’Hara, YES that Catherine O’Hara: Kevin’s mom in Home Alone and Moira Rose on Schitt’s Creek", is standing inside with the other passengers and says to us “HEY you guys won tonight! Congratulations!”

people I wish I made an effort to talk to but was too busy dancing to have thought about this in a more intentional way:

-Parasite Production Designer, Lee Ha-Jun

-Taylor Swift’s Music Video Production Design Team (dream job)

-Taylor Swift’s concert designers (ok yes, I’m a total Swiftie!)

The coach turned back into the pumpkin. End of the night back in our hotel room.

the next morning in LA as I heat up some hot water for my morning ritual of warm water.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAH

on the flight on the way home to NYC

Jess and I were both at set at 6am Monday morning in NYC.

Little America is out!

premiered on Apple TV January 17

Last winter, I worked as the Assistant Set Decorator for four episodes of Little America. This was the unusual TV show that had two Art Departments, one for every even episode, one for every odd episode. We were “Team Odd” (which of course we all loved.) But then the number we shot the episodes as (and which ones were odd or even) changed when it came time to air, so I think all our credits are attached to the wrong episodes…

Finally on February 8, the Decorator Lindsay, our team’s Set Dec Coordinator Jackie, and I all went to Lindsay’s place, ordered some really good pizza and watched the episodes we worked on together. Which are the following:

Episode 7, “The Rock” about Farhad.

Episode 2, “The Jaguar” about Marisol.

Episode 4, “The Silence” about a silent meditation retreat in the 1970s.

Episode 6, “The Grand Prize Expo Winners”, about Ai.

It is always fun to watch the finished product with the people you worked on it with. Reminiscing about the crazy little stories, the funny memories, the moments of extreme stress, and the things that gave us grief as we see them appear on the screen. As well as being able to exclaim in excitement when a set comes together in a great way on screen after the editing and plus the lighting, costume, hair and makeup, and of course the actors.

We all shared a few moments of heartbroken disbelief when sets we worked on really hard never made it on screen (scenes in the script that took place in that set were edited out or certain angles of the camera never captured the part we were most proud of in the set).

The real heartbreak was in Episode 6, “The Grand Prize Expo Winners” where they added in new scenes they reshot in Los Angeles after they finished filming in New Jersey, so then used a completely new home set as the setting for the childhood home as opposed to the one we worked on. The home we decorated was so lovingly put together with so much attention to detail and came straight from my heart and personal lived experience…(crying emoji).

…I’ll try to put together a post of set photos from that home so at least the set can live on here even if it never made it on air.

Either way it was such a gratifying show to work on to focus entirely on immigrant stories that were so unique and compelling with some really fun sets. (on Apple+ TV!)

I would like to thank the Academy (hahha)

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an exciting certificate came in the mail

It was super nice of Jess to give the Television Academy my info which resulted in this official certificate of recognition of my work on Emmy Award ;) winning Russian Doll!

Part of why I think it was so exciting for all of us involved that Russian Doll won the Production Design Emmy is we were such a small team in the Art Department and Set Decorating Department. I’ve regularly worked in Set Decorating Teams that are at least 4 assistant decorators and shoppers, a PA (or two), and our own coordinator supporting the key head Set Decorator and a huge Art Department (like 20+ people) infrastructure to prop the work up.

On Russian Doll the Set Decorating Department was just Jess and me. We didn’t even have our own PA! The entire Art Department, including us, was just 7 of us (at our biggest 9) crammed into one room on the 4th floor of an old 19th century tenement building in Soho above a Chipotle and FedEx store. True glamour.

Watching the 2019 Emmy's...with an Emmy!

This year Jess and I watched the Emmy’s together and even though Russian Doll didn’t win any of the big awards (Fleabag sweeped them all! A worthy show to lose to if there ever was one), it was super fun and surreal to watch the show with Jess’s Creative Arts Emmy from the week before right on the table…