First, please know that this is NOT my discovery - one of the anons on GA.win found it.
https://greatawakening.win/p/11SJoXYuFq/waitt-there-is-a-movie-company-c/c/
I think he found something significant, and given the posts here about the "fakeness" of certain things, I thought you'd be interested. Maybe you'd already heard this theory, but it was new to me.
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/04/13/movies/oval-offices-by-way-of-hollywood.html (subscribe wall)
Here's the article content:
NEED A 747 AIRPLANE INTERIOR, a roadside diner, a New York street scene? No problem. Most studios keep such generic sets on hand. But what if a director needs something more specific, say, a semicircular room with a big desk in front of three large windows, a rug with the Presidential seal, a Frederic Remington reproduction of a man on a horse, bookshelf alcoves with fancy woodwork and a big American flag -- in other words, an Oval Office?
It is an increasingly common need, given the number of new films that deal with conspiracies in the White House, the threat of international terrorism and alien invasions. This year at least three movies have Oval Office scenes: the recent ''Absolute Power,'' about the cover-up of a murder committed by the President; ''Murder at 1600,'' opening on Friday, in which a woman is killed in the White House, and ''Air Force One,'' a Harrison Ford film due this summer in which the President's plane is hijacked.
One Oval Office is available from Castle Rock Pictures, which built an extensive White House set -- East Wing and West Wing -- on the Culver lot in Los Angeles for the 1995 film ''The American President.'' The Castle Rock Oval Office has since been used for Disney's ''Nixon'' and 20th Century Fox's ''Independence Day.''
But until recently most productions borrowed the Oval Office that Warner Brothers built for ''Dave,'' its 1993 film about a Presidential impostor. ''It's something that's very distinctive, and a lot of people want it,'' said Gary Credle, president of Warner Brothers studio facilities.
Now, though, Mr. Credle has two Oval Office sets: the one for ''Dave'' in Los Angeles, and one just constructed in Toronto for ''Murder at 1600'' -- because ''Absolute Power'' was already occupying the ''Dave'' set.
Fred Baron, senior vice president of feature production at 20th Century Fox, used the ''Dave'' Oval Office for ''Hot Shots, Part Deux.'' ''It's a good asset,'' he said. ''It was standing at Warners for a long time, and you would just go over and shoot right there.''
Warner Brothers' rental supervisor, Ronnie Wexler, said portions of the ''Dave'' set ''go out all the time.'' Portions of the ''Dave'' Oval Office have been used as many as 25 times for films like ''The Pelican Brief'' and ''Clear and Present Danger,'' and for television shows.
Repeatedly storing and erecting the ''Dave'' set, however, has left it a little shopworn, partly because of the difficulty of storing an odd-shape set. ''There's no real convenient place to break the walls of an Oval Office,'' said Nelson Coates, the production designer for ''Murder at 1600,'' ''so you end up breaking the plaster.''
For ''Murder at 1600,'' which stars Wesley Snipes as a police officer investigating the murder, Mr. Coates created a new Oval Office, entrance halls and the White House grand staircase.
IN AN OVAL OFFICE SET, as in life, God is in the details. ''Ours is the most architecturally accurate,'' Mr. Coates said. ''In niches and alcoves, what had been regular shelves on other sets are really coffered octagons in ours. We have sliding doors that slide -- in Warner Brothers' set, they were hinged. Joe Blow audience member may not go, 'Oh, that's wrong.' But a million visitors see the Oval Office every year.''
<Mr. Coates was one of them. ''We did a V.I.P. tour after doing just a general tour, on two different occasions,'' he said. And he did his homework, since the decor of the Oval Office changes with each President.
He avoided, however, emulating President Clinton's new color scheme and upholstery, which he describes as ''circus stripes.''
''It's a cream, gold and red with alternating-width bands, in Scalamandre fabric,'' he said. ''I guess they were thinking Presidential, but with the yellow drapes and the blue rug, it looks like you're at the circus. If we'd put Clinton's exact fabric on the sofas in our film, people would have thought we were mocking it.'' Instead Mr. Coates used a subdued stripe on the sofas and ''went more toward a Reagan model'' with dark blue drapes.
What about just using the real White House? ''We do get requests to film here,'' said Neel Lattimore, Hillary Rodham Clinton's press secretary. ''And we're as gracious as we can be, but the answer is no.'' ''The White House is a historical property, and it's not used for commercial purposes,'' he added. ''It's not a set. Besides, using it would put all these set designers out of business, and we're for jobs.''
First, please know that this is NOT my discovery - one of the anons on GA.win found it.
https://greatawakening.win/p/11SJoXYuFq/waitt-there-is-a-movie-company-c/c/
I think he found something significant, and given the posts here about the "fakeness" of certain things, I thought you'd be interested. Maybe you'd already heard this theory, but it was new to me.
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/04/13/movies/oval-offices-by-way-of-hollywood.html (subscribe wall)
Here's the article content:
>NEED A 747 AIRPLANE INTERIOR, a roadside diner, a New York street scene? No problem. Most studios keep such generic sets on hand. But what if a director needs something more specific, say, a semicircular room with a big desk in front of three large windows, a rug with the Presidential seal, a Frederic Remington reproduction of a man on a horse, bookshelf alcoves with fancy woodwork and a big American flag -- in other words, an Oval Office?
>It is an increasingly common need, given the number of new films that deal with conspiracies in the White House, the threat of international terrorism and alien invasions. This year at least three movies have Oval Office scenes: the recent ''Absolute Power,'' about the cover-up of a murder committed by the President; ''Murder at 1600,'' opening on Friday, in which a woman is killed in the White House, and ''Air Force One,'' a Harrison Ford film due this summer in which the President's plane is hijacked.
>One Oval Office is available from Castle Rock Pictures, which built an extensive White House set -- East Wing and West Wing -- on the Culver lot in Los Angeles for the 1995 film ''The American President.'' The Castle Rock Oval Office has since been used for Disney's ''Nixon'' and 20th Century Fox's ''Independence Day.''
>But until recently most productions borrowed the Oval Office that Warner Brothers built for ''Dave,'' its 1993 film about a Presidential impostor. ''It's something that's very distinctive, and a lot of people want it,'' said Gary Credle, president of Warner Brothers studio facilities.
>Now, though, Mr. Credle has two Oval Office sets: the one for ''Dave'' in Los Angeles, and one just constructed in Toronto for ''Murder at 1600'' -- because ''Absolute Power'' was already occupying the ''Dave'' set.
>Fred Baron, senior vice president of feature production at 20th Century Fox, used the ''Dave'' Oval Office for ''Hot Shots, Part Deux.'' ''It's a good asset,'' he said. ''It was standing at Warners for a long time, and you would just go over and shoot right there.''
>Warner Brothers' rental supervisor, Ronnie Wexler, said portions of the ''Dave'' set ''go out all the time.'' Portions of the ''Dave'' Oval Office have been used as many as 25 times for films like ''The Pelican Brief'' and ''Clear and Present Danger,'' and for television shows.
>Repeatedly storing and erecting the ''Dave'' set, however, has left it a little shopworn, partly because of the difficulty of storing an odd-shape set. ''There's no real convenient place to break the walls of an Oval Office,'' said Nelson Coates, the production designer for ''Murder at 1600,'' ''so you end up breaking the plaster.''
>For ''Murder at 1600,'' which stars Wesley Snipes as a police officer investigating the murder, Mr. Coates created a new Oval Office, entrance halls and the White House grand staircase.
>IN AN OVAL OFFICE SET, as in life, God is in the details. ''Ours is the most architecturally accurate,'' Mr. Coates said. ''In niches and alcoves, what had been regular shelves on other sets are really coffered octagons in ours. We have sliding doors that slide -- in Warner Brothers' set, they were hinged. Joe Blow audience member may not go, 'Oh, that's wrong.' But a million visitors see the Oval Office every year.''
<Mr. Coates was one of them. ''We did a V.I.P. tour after doing just a general tour, on two different occasions,'' he said. And he did his homework, since the decor of the Oval Office changes with each President.
>He avoided, however, emulating President Clinton's new color scheme and upholstery, which he describes as ''circus stripes.''
>''It's a cream, gold and red with alternating-width bands, in Scalamandre fabric,'' he said. ''I guess they were thinking Presidential, but with the yellow drapes and the blue rug, it looks like you're at the circus. If we'd put Clinton's exact fabric on the sofas in our film, people would have thought we were mocking it.'' Instead Mr. Coates used a subdued stripe on the sofas and ''went more toward a Reagan model'' with dark blue drapes.
>What about just using the real White House? ''We do get requests to film here,'' said Neel Lattimore, Hillary Rodham Clinton's press secretary. ''And we're as gracious as we can be, but the answer is no.'' ''The White House is a historical property, and it's not used for commercial purposes,'' he added. ''It's not a set. Besides, using it would put all these set designers out of business, and we're for jobs.''
(post is archived)