“Look at me, look at me, look at me now! It’s fun to have fun, but you have to know how!”

–The Cat in the Hat

 

For close to 50 years, Theodore Geisel (a.k.a. Dr. Seuss) has delighted children of all ages with the fanciful Cat in the Hat books. Now, producer Brian Grazer, production designer turned director Bo Welch and cinematographer Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki, ASC are bringing that series to the screen with the help of comic actor Mike Myers as the infamous Cat in the Hat.

“Bo and I formed a great relationship when he did the production design for The Little Princess and The Birdcage,” says Lubezki. “So, naturally, when he asked me to help him bring his first feature directing project to life, I jumped at the chance. Actually, I said ‘yes’ even before I read the script. Part of the reason was Bo. But, to tell the truth, the real reason was that I have two kids who are avid Cat in the Hat fans,” Lubezki says.

As the two began pre-production, the fantasy end of the story was uppermost in Lubezki’s mind. However, given the talents of their lead, Lubezki soon realized their Cat was going to have a more comedic edge. “Even though the story was going more toward physical comedy, with pratfalls and kitschy sketches, I still wanted to maintain that Cat in the Hat fantasy,” he says. “To that end, we decided that absolutely nothing could be naturalistic, whether it was the children’s home or the town they lived in. Everything had to look like an illustration. No texture in the carpets or the grass. The idea was to have broad areas of color very much like what we see in the picture books.”

Welch and Lubezki studied several films, one of the most important being The Grinch. “We wanted to do exactly the opposite of what was done in that movie,” Lubezki admits. “The most radical being the use of the camera. We wanted simple, unobtrusive camera moves. We did not want the audience to feel that the camera was trying to be funny. No extra-wide lenses or unusual angles. We wanted to feature Mike (Myers) playing the Cat.”

To capture the story, Lubezki decided to use Panavision cameras (Platinum and Gold), Kodak’s Vision 200 stock for everything, shooting Super 35mm in the 1.85:1 format. Welch and Lubezki also decided to go to the wide end of the normal lens (21mm and 27mm), and keep the camera slightly lower so that the audience would feel as if they were seeing the story from the point of view of the children.

“By going the way of Super 35mm, but keeping the 1.85:1 format, we used the largest part of the negative that we could. When we went to the digital intermediate, we scanned at 4K and worked at 2K. The final product at 2K doesn’t quite equal the amount of resolution on film, but it comes closer to what you would see on film.

“Going this way allowed us to use more tools, like the ‘softening’ tool that E-Film helped create to work on The Cat’s face,” he explains. What began as an almost latex cat face with a beautiful texture morphed into several smaller prosthetic pieces during pre-production testing on Myers. This allowed more of Myers’ own character to come through.

“We had to find a balance between showing this real face within the cat framework and not distracting the audience with either,” Lubezki explains. “This tool allowed us to smooth out the skin in a way that would only affect the skin on Mike’s Cat face, without losing focus on his face or anywhere else in the shot.”

In the beginning, Lubezki thought about going completely against his type of lighting and make the visuals very flat and high key. “But, when I did the tests, I realized that not only would it be boring to do, it would be boring to watch,” he admits. “Production designer Alex MacDowell did an incredible job with the sets, and I really didn’t want the light to overpower them. We wanted to do everything we could to keep the images as close to a Dr. Seuss illustration as possible.”

Lubezki and special effects supervisor Kurt Williams also made decisions to do things such as replacing the sky in every shot, to be consistent with the look of the book’s illustration.

Lubezki and Welch also decided to use the PreVis system to help them design often difficult sequences in the house and the town early on in pre-production. “It’s something that David Fincher uses extensively,” says Lubezki. “Bo took to it quickly. And, when Alex McDowell, who was also a fan of the system, got into the movie, we were able to find the best solutions for shooting difficult sequences.

“We were able to figure out shots, color code them for real sets, physical effects, CG and special effects. The system went a long way in keeping the communication flowing between all of our crews,” he adds.

“It was especially effective for us when we were trying to figure out the sequence where the ‘Things’ walk on the ceiling of the house,” he adds.

This was an extremely complex move (and one of Lubezki’s favorites). “There were so many elements,” he explains. “When the creatures come out of the box, they aren’t affected by the physical laws of gravity like we are. They walk up tables, walls and ceilings. We shot some of the pieces at 18 frames-per-second and combined them with CG elements.

“The PreVis system helped us break the sequences up. Some were done by the first unit, some by CG and others were done by a splinter second unit. John Buckley did a great job matching shot for shot and complex lighting set ups on that unit. We knew that the sequence, which actually plays only one minute, but involves hundreds of cuts, would be a moment that every kid watching will go nuts over.

“We used another amazing tool for this and many other sequences,” adds Lubezki. “It’s call the Aerohead. This is a three axis remote head that allows us to do multiple passes, record and play back the moves with motion control accuracy.”

In pre-production Welch and Lubezki also worked hard at storyboarding what they felt would be the strongest introduction to The Cat in the Hat world. “We envisioned an opening that would start in the mind of the Cat, go through his eyes, through what he sees in the town as he flew above it, approach the facade of the family’s house and then go through the peephole to reveal our characters.

“Okay, so it was a little over ambitious,” he laughs. “We realized we couldn’t really afford the brain part, but the flying camera could still work to allow us to establish the world our characters existed in.”

Shot in Simi Valley where the mythical town was built, the sequence was brought to life using Jim Rodnunsky’s Cable Cam System. “What is unique about this rig was that Jim had to end the shot ten feet from the door of the house,” explains key grip Mike Anderson. “To do this, we had to design a 20 foot jib with a Geo Libra III stabilized head.”

Originally, the shot was scheduled for a particular time of day. However, a glitch in equipment due to heavy wind forced the team to wait four hours. “It happens,” shrugs Lubezki. “That’s part of the things you can’t count on when you are doing any kind of movie.”

Since the story is supposed to take place over one single day, Lubezki and team strove to keep the lighting consistent with the time of day in the story. However, because of time conflicts with Mike Myers’ schedule and the minimal hours allowed for children, they had to be flexible. “Fortunately, we are in a fantasy house and a fantasy town, so we could fudge it a little,” Lubezki says lightly.

“We ended up shooting scenes night for day. John Buckley and Mike Anderson are the best at what they do. John put in a lot of time on the film Open Range, learning how to use the BeeBee light for best effect. To us, it is a much better tool than any other lights of its kind because it is far more film friendly. We had it with us for most of the shoot.

“It was necessary because we were shooting in winter and knew we would lose the sun at 4:30 p.m. We had the kids in the morning, but we couldn’t start with Mike Myers until about 3:30 p.m. So, Buckley and Anderson were ready with the BeeBee and other equipment, to extend the day, make the reverses with Mike look like morning and keep us moving to complete our day’s work.”

“We had them re-wired so that we could turn the fans off and use them right on set without making noise,” Buckley explains. “We then built a frame so that, again, we could double diffuse the source. It was all attached to the arm so that, most of the time all we had to do was move the arm and everything went with it. No stand. No cable. It worked wonderfully.”

“Because of the configuration, we could say ‘next shot’ and within 15 minutes, we were able to move and set up again. This was a great time saver.”

The interior of the house was a challenge for everyone, requiring a lot of prep work to make the sets workable for the time allowed with the children and allowing for Myers’ three-hour makeup schedule. “One of the challenges we had to address was the wilding out of all the walls,” says Mike Anderson.

“This was extremely important because the normal lens we used was the 21mm. So you would see everything in the house. Usually, I like to leave the walls in to make the shots look real. But, in this movie, we weren’t going for real. So, wilding the walls helped with the illustrative look,” says Lubezki.

“Since we had exterior shots on the stage, all of the walls were double sided. This made them extremely heavy to work with,” key grip Mike Anderson adds. “With the help of my rigging key grip Don Selsor, all of the exterior lighting was set up to fly in and out as well. All of the walls were also designed to be stored up high. This kept the perimeter of our set clean and allowed more room for production.”

“The house is pristine in color and light is supposed to be from a bright and sunny day,” explains gaffer John Buckley. “To give Chivo what he needed, we designed soft boxes out of six to nine lite strip lights that had a layer of grid cloth. They were hung on a truss so that we could raise and lower the rig for each shot.

“Mike Anderson put motors on the trusses so we could pan and tilt the lights, which saved us a great amount of time,” he adds.

“We also used six 20Ks through various windows to create spectral pieces of sunlight coming in through the windows. And, for the Translight, we had 275 5K Skypans, along with 60 Space Lights with silk socks and bottoms.”

When the red box is opened and the house becomes the “mother of all messes,” as the sequence was called, “the proportions of several of the rooms changed,” explains Lubezki. “Think of it as a German expressionistic movie where the perspective and the shapes are altered. The furniture turns into gigantic lamps and couches, and so forth.”

“Chivo wanted this to be lit as a progression from sunlight to soft diffused light,” says Buckley. “The key was usually two 20Ks through two layers of 12 by 20 foot full and light grid cloth.

“When the house changes to the distorted shape, we had 200 space lights as a general level of light. The set was gigantic and hard to access. There was water instead of a floor,” he explains. “We then had two 20Ks on Condors that we could use to access the set for the key. These were also through two layers of diffusion.

“And, when the water takes over, we used 23 1200 watt HMI underwater PARs with purple gel.”

Shooting exteriors presented several different challenges for Lubezki and team. The exterior of the house and the neighborhood were built in Simi Valley. “One of our challenges was to keep certain scenes overcast and stormy,” says Anderson. “This was accomplished by an overhead silk that was designed to work all around the neighborhood.

“The size of this was very critical,” he adds. “Also, the way it traveled was critical. We had to be able to get it out of the way for other shots.

“This silk was 45 by 45 feet, on a truss frame provided by West Coast Industrial. It was mobilized by a 70-ton construction crane that had a base small enough to be able to maneuver through the neighborhood without blocking the streets.”

One of the most interesting and challenging exteriors is at the end of the film where the Cat walks down the street. “It was supposed to be at sunset, but as usual with our schedule, we shot it at dusk, late in the day,” says gaffer John Buckley. “To give Chivo the light we needed, we had 18 Dinos on cranes shooting over the top of the town and back at Mike as he walked the street.”

Lubezki’s favorite sequences in The Cat in the Hat are the sequences with “Thing One” and “Thing Two” because of their sheer complexity to extremely simple moments. “My absolute favorite is a shot where the camera is not moving,” says Lubezki. “It is in the house where The Cat has cut his tail and is sitting at the green kitchen table with his three lawyers behind him. He’s talking about possibly suing the kids.

“I don’t know why it is my favorite,” he adds, “except that, every time I look at it, I realize how we nailed the shot. And how soothing this simple sequence looks, surrounded by moments that are so complex.

“It was a beautiful change of pace,” he continues. “We lit it with just a few Kino Flo lights through diffusion and a 20K coming through a window for the background.”

For Emmanuel Lubezki, making The Cat in the Hat was a challenge––of creativity and technology––made much easier because of the talents of every department and their determination to work together instead of against each other. “Kurt Williams and his CG people didn’t just sit around and wait for us to give them different elements. They worked closely with us on the set and in post to make everything happen. The communication was tight.

“The same goes for the studio people,” he adds, strongly. “I know, a lot of cinematographers today are feeling that studio and production function in an adversarial mode most of the time. Definitely not so here.

“They were there for us when we needed them. And they never questioned our decisions. If we needed tools like the PreVis System, the Aerohead, the BeeBee light, Cable Cam and whatever E-Film could bring to the table, they were there to make it happen.”

Because of the cooperation on every level, Bo Welch and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki could really push the envelope of creativity to bring a children’s icon like The Cat in the Hat to an audience of children of all ages. “It’s a different but nevertheless, very interesting take on a book that my kids treat like their bible,” says Lubezki.

“Now, more people can see Dr. Seuss’ valuable lesson on order and chaos on the big screen. We certainly learned that lesson ourselves while we were making the film!”