Shooting My Summer of Love
Whilst the financing was being sorted out, a crew was also being assembled. Pawlikowski was keen to crew up with people he had worked with before and so they brought on many of his previous collaborators Ryszard Lenczewski (director of photography), David Charap (editor) and Julian Day (Costume Designer). The production designer who Pawel had worked with previously wasn't available so John Stevenson - who'd worked with Collins on Tomorrow La Scala - was hired. Hair and make up artist, Tara McDonald, completed the individual departments.
A first assistant director was also brought on board. Pawlikowski hadn't used one on Last Resort and Chris Collins had doubled as a first, but "we decided we did need a first assistant director on this film as it was a more complicated shoot," says Seghatchian. "But we kept to a relatively small crew for as long possible and brought people on a daily basis when we needed more manpower."
Location Scouting and Production Design
Pawlikowski also did much of the location scouting himself. "His films are informed by a very strong sense of landscape. He didn't have a location manager scouting for locations for him - he found them himself, early on in the development process, as they were to inform the nature of the film as much as the cast or script," explains Seghatchian.
However, a location manger was employed once the film was in production to manage the locations, set them up and tidy them up.
Pawlikowski and his Art Department then worked on the look of the key locations. For example, the big country house that Tamsin's family lives in was completely overhauled: floors were sanded, wallpaper put up and furniture hired in.
The Shoot
And then production began. Originally the plan was to shoot the film chronologically. But as the film started shooting, Britain was gripped by a mini-heatwave. Wanting to take advantage of the wonderful weather and fearful that it might not hold, a decision was taken to move all the exterior shoots to the first week.
Unconventionally, the Producers had also built into the production plans at the outset the opportunity for a split shoot - which would give Pawlikowski more freedom to experiment and reflected the looseness of his desired development and filming processes. Two thirds of the film was shot, then edited together, before the final third was filmed.
PR firm McDonald & Rutter were hired to take care of production publicity during the shoot and a unit photographer, Suzy Allnut, was brought on board to take Unit stills. "We'd decided we didn't want much production publicity, so we agreed to limit location reports to one feature. Andrew Pulver of The Guardian wrote a piece which came out whilst we were filming in August 2003," says Seghatchian.
During editing, attention turned towards music for the film. An Edith Piaf track 'La Foule' was already scripted in, but the idea of using Goldfrapp emerged during the editing process when Pawel decided to use their track 'Lovely Head'. Whilst clearing that track for usage, the team approached the band about writing some original music for the film as well.
A first assistant director was also brought on board. Pawlikowski hadn't used one on Last Resort and Chris Collins had doubled as a first, but "we decided we did need a first assistant director on this film as it was a more complicated shoot," says Seghatchian. "But we kept to a relatively small crew for as long possible and brought people on a daily basis when we needed more manpower."
Location Scouting and Production Design
However, a location manger was employed once the film was in production to manage the locations, set them up and tidy them up.
Pawlikowski and his Art Department then worked on the look of the key locations. For example, the big country house that Tamsin's family lives in was completely overhauled: floors were sanded, wallpaper put up and furniture hired in.
The Shoot
Unconventionally, the Producers had also built into the production plans at the outset the opportunity for a split shoot - which would give Pawlikowski more freedom to experiment and reflected the looseness of his desired development and filming processes. Two thirds of the film was shot, then edited together, before the final third was filmed.
PR firm McDonald & Rutter were hired to take care of production publicity during the shoot and a unit photographer, Suzy Allnut, was brought on board to take Unit stills. "We'd decided we didn't want much production publicity, so we agreed to limit location reports to one feature. Andrew Pulver of The Guardian wrote a piece which came out whilst we were filming in August 2003," says Seghatchian.
During editing, attention turned towards music for the film. An Edith Piaf track 'La Foule' was already scripted in, but the idea of using Goldfrapp emerged during the editing process when Pawel decided to use their track 'Lovely Head'. Whilst clearing that track for usage, the team approached the band about writing some original music for the film as well.
