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Governmental
Gleam
For cinematographer Tom Del Ruth, ASC, The West Wing is a rare venture into the grueling realm of episodic television. After shooting the pilot, the dedication of the program's producers, talented ensemble cast, powerful scripts and magnificent White House sets proved an irresistible lure. While conversing about the technical aspects of The West Wing, he raises one other relevant factor "Television is a cultural force that embodies our hopes and aspirations and also the chinks in our armor," he says. "We hope West Wing is entertaining, but we also believe it provides insights into important facets of our lives." Produced by Warner Bros, TheWest Wing is the baby of creator/ writer Aaron Sorkin (Sports Night, A Few Good Men), along with producers Tom Schlamme and John Wells as well as various political insider consultants, including pollster Patrick Caddell and former President Clinton aid George Stephanopoulos. The cinematographer characterizes The West Wing as a "dramedy" that puts human faces on the characters holding the reins of power in a fictional Oval Office. Del Ruth observes that White House politicians seem larger-than-life when seen through the microscope of television news. In reality, however, these individuals are human beings with strengths and frailties. "Its very fast-paced
show without taking on a maniacal form of camera movement," Del Ruth
says. "The dialogue is off-handedly informal. It shows the President
at his best and worst. The idea is to put the audience inside the White
House." The rapid pacing floods the audience with information, and
a feeling of urgency accompanies line delivery while camera moves are
notable for kinetic energy. Occasionally, Del Ruth employs an angle that
visually punctuates the President's authority, but he is sparing with
techniques that call attention to the camera. Primarily, this sense of
supremacy emanates from President Josiah Bartlett (Martin Sheen) like
an inner light. "It's what you expect to feel in proximity to the
President - it stirs your emotions," he says. "I shot almost
all of the scenes in the pilot episode with the President in amber gold
light. It had a painterly, sunset quality, and is a form of reverence
for the office that we all feel. The President himself is a fatherly figure
with a bum leg that gives him a human quality. He's an ordinary guy who
happens to be surrounded by the aura of power." By the age of 10, Del Ruth had already chosen cinematography as a career path. He worked his way up through the ranks as an assistant cameraman and operator for 13 years. His work on such films as The Sand Pebbles, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Tora, Tora, Tora and other classic pictures provided a solid foundation when he started shooting in 1977. He has subsequently compiled some 70 credits on movies like The Breakfast Club, Stand By Me and The Running Man, plus movies-of-the week and pilots, including Simon & Simon, E.R. and The X Files. "My dad was a pretty prominent director, my mom was a musical comedy star, and my uncle was the head of production for Vitagraph [which became part of Warner Bros.]. When I was six years old, my dad was directing The Babe Ruth Story. He took me to the studio one day - it was a thrilling experience. The camera operator handed me this paddle that he called a 'lily.' He asked me to hold it in this scene. The actor was Bill Bendix. I held this 'lily' in front of him while they measured the light." When Del Ruth was 10, his father directed On Moonlight Bay. The cinematographer was Ernie Haller, ASC, and the young lad found himself gravitating towards the camera. Haller took him into a little portable darkroom where he was studying negative tests. "I walked over to my dad on the stage," the cinematographer recalls. "He was talking to one of the actors - I think it was Gordon MacRae. I showed them this strip of film that Ernie had given me, and my dad told me, 'That's the movie.' After that, I got my first Brownie camera and started taking pictures of people, landscapes, dogs and anything that I could put in front of the lens. Sometimes I would cut the prints up and make a collage." Bob Surtees, ASC lived three doors down the street, and James Wong Howe, ASC was also nearby. Both cinematographers knew the senior Del Ruth, and all three of them owned darkrooms. As a child, the cinematographer remembers being utterly fascinated watching these men manipulate imagery. After completing his military service in the paratroopers, Del Ruth began his career as a messenger at Walt Disney Studios. His first camera department job was in the loading room at Fox, which led to opportunities to work as a second assistant cameraman. His first film was The Sand Pebbles, which Joe McDonald shot in the 65mm format. He was loader/ second assistant. His next job was with Bob Surtees on Dr. Dolittle. During that period, Del Ruth also worked with such legends as Conrad Hall, ASC, Jordan Cronenweth, ASC, Bruce Surtees and Jacques Marquette, ASC. Learning How to Wing It Del Ruth composes The West Wing in 4:3 format while protecting the edges of the frame for future HDTV (16:9) display. But that practice does have a downside - loose lights have to be further off the set with a longer throw and more set up time. "Sometimes I'd like to bring an actor into the frame for a tighter eyeline, but we can't do that and protect the sidelines," he adds. "The only trade-off is that someday people might see this show with a much cleaner and sharper look." The program is mainly photographed on two soundstages on the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, with establishing shots including characters at locations in the nation's capital, and occasional forays to non-descript locations in Los Angeles. The cinematographer credits much of the show's authentic look to production designer John Huffman. "We have faithfully reproduced a majority of the working rooms of the White House," says Del Ruth. "The sets are quite accurate from the pictures I've seen. Some of them may be slightly larger to accommodate the camera. The exteriors seen through windows are either TransLights or painted backings. We are right up the wall on most sets. I'd prefer TransLights, but in those cases I'm using painted backings with nets to obscure details. I also overexpose enough so it's a little bit soft without being noticeable." "Leo McGarry [played by John Spencer] is the chief of staff; the President's right hand man," he says. "The design of his office testifies to his power. The use of strong colors and wood beams - the architectural work [on the set] - is staggering. There are real brass fittings on doors, large chamber locks, restoration glass in the windows - it's really spectacular. "The Roosevelt Room is my favorite set, because it's open and has a real beautiful texture with the Oxblood-colored walls and slight salmon insets banded in white. It's a beautiful setting for the meetings conducted in the room. My gaffer, Jeff Butters, had the art department drill out the backs of the ionic columns. He used very small lights in those spaces to separate the actors from the walls - that gives you a sense of depth." The cinematographer is also quite involved in how this rich palette of hues appears on screen. "Michael Hissrich [co-executive producer] is our link to the postproduction house [4MC]. He has made a great effort to keep the 'simpatico' between us and our on-line colorist - they are doing a marvelous job. We want rich deep images with degrees of warmth or coolness dictated by the sources of light and mood. We communicate everyday. I use an audiocassette to give the colorist a small visual description of the scene. For example, I'll say, 'The backlight is blue, the key is gold, and there's a splash of strong light across the actor's face.' I also give him a frame with a gray scale chart that has a true color reference at the beginning of each set up." The main lighting instruments utilized on the sets were designed by the cinematographer himself. Each one of these so-called "BAT" lights is about 10 inches high, 18 inches deep and around three feet wide. The fixture itself contains six of the new, 250-watt MR16 lamps. There is a light or full grid in front of the unit with baffles used to control the output. "It produces a substantial amount of light in a very interesting configuration," he says. "The light is relatively low and very wide with a nice spread. There are some 35 BAT lights hanging on the sets, and other overhead lamps that emulate the pattern of window light. There are between 250 to 350 lamps working at any time." The name BAT comes from the word batten, as in the phrase "batten down the hatches." Aluminum housings dissipate the heat generated by the MR16 lamps, which have a burn life of 250 hours. Since all the lamps burn between eight to 12 hours a day, this strength reduces the number of trips up and down ladders to exchange fixtures. Another 175 MR16 lamps are hidden in niches around set. These generate very strong, hard shafts of light that highlight actors' movements. The ambiance itself seems more intense as characters quicken their pace. That combination creates a dynamism that punctuates the sense of motion, particularly on Steadicam shots. All of the lamps are linked to a dimmer board. By following the action on a video tap monitor, the board operator can make instantaneous changes in practical and exterior light levels. Del Ruth notes that this is important because of the numerous long, moving shots which take the characters into different rooms and environments. In the Roosevelt Room, for example, the ceiling is draped with BAT lights while an accent source picks up a painting of 26th U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt on horseback, adding to the setting's ambiance. Overhead, Del Ruth applies bleached muslin. Beams from 8K skirted spacelights bounce straight down off the muslin without invading other sets. With the dimmer control board, Del Ruth estimates, it takes less than three minutes to light this set and others. Some interior scenes include as many as 50 actors. When directors are making 360-degree moves with a Steadicam, an overly populated set does present obstacles. Del Ruth has to produce interactive pools of light and shadows with above crosslight, emulating reality. Covering such scenes without losing contrast is real trick, in and of itself. Another set features fluorescent lamps with a slightly bluish quality. When coupled with overhead light from the MR16s, the resulting aura produces pools of darkness in a room bathed in cool, bluish light. As a contrast, people walk from that room into the Roosevelt Room, with its warm, golden aura, and vice-versa. The office set for Deputy Chief of Staff Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe) is built so close to the stage wall that shutters had to be put on the windows; even on a TV screen, the backings would appear fake. Del Ruth illuminates that set with 10Ks suspended from a trapeze line, which enables them to be swung into position quickly. In one episode, Seaborn discovers that a lovely lady with whom he had a fling is actually a prostitute. This mortifying realization occurs at sunset. Del Ruth lit the scene with heavy blue light (full CTB) flowing through frames of grids. He attached full CTO orange gels to the bottoms of the frames. The top half of the set's lighting looked icy cold while the bottom retained the warmish quality of a golden sunset. As the scene develops, and Seaborn realizes the depth of his predicament, Del Ruth slowly heightened the blue for an increasingly darker and colder feel. He believes that the audience knows how to read these visual clues - even if only on a subliminal level. Such cues help them find the mood in conjunction with the performances. Generally, the cinematographer shoots with one camera - either on a dolly or Steadicam. His movement mode depends on the scene's dynamics, and whether fluid motion or a more rigid quality with longer lenses is required. Del Ruth tends to avoid a second camera since the variety of photographic angles would lead to a very complex lighting set up (even with the dimmer board), and because he's determined to keep eyelines as close as possible to correct. Extensive walking-and-talking shots are an often occurrence that mimic the weaving machinations of Washington's political scene. "We've shot seven and eight pages at a time without any cuts," he says. "We started one scene at the Biltmore Hotel in a crowded ballroom where the President is finishing a speech. He exits and joins his party in an outer hallway. The shot continues through the hall, down a flight of steps into the kitchen, and then down another flight of steps which leads to a walk through an underground tunnel into an alley behind the hotel where his car is waiting. "We covered several hundred yards with constant dialogue," says Del Ruth. "Operator Dave Chameides, who handles both the Steadicam and A-camera, did a terrific job of picking up on the fluid moves in tune with the dialogue." As far as lenses go, Del Ruth opts for the Primo zoom because it emphasizes a realistic feeling of depth on the larger sets, and also enables him to make quick, seamless focal length changes on moving shots. Now and then, he utilizes a longer lens to afford the audience more intimacy with a character during a particularly poignant moment. On the Steadicam, Del Ruth employs an Ultraspeed lens or a shorter zoom. Consider a sequence that opens with a fluid, wide angle Steadicam shot which brings two characters into a room. A door slams and the scene cuts to a shot made with a 250mm lens. A very subtle dolly move follows, and then the long shot compresses the characters until they literally seem to be on top of one another. This tactic heightens tension and visually suggests an air of conspiracy. From the time that Del Ruth read the first script, during preparation to shoot the pilot, he literally began to feel its lighting. The ambiance of The West Wing was endemic to the words of its teleplay. "It doesn't say 'This is a particularly dark sequence but the dialogue and rhythm of the script define the mood," he expounds. "The West Wing lighting can be either elegant or harsh depending on the scene and setting. There are also scenes in an area where the press and the staff tend to congregate with a quality of light that is quasi-documentary." MTV-style lighting with Xenons blasting through sets in the White House definitely wouldn't ring true. Taking into account the stately subject matter, viewers expect a tasteful elegance. Though Del Ruth alters the imagery to compensate for setting and mood, continuity marks the week-to-week lighting because the same sets are always in use. "If a scene puts the President in a heroic situation, we'll use a low camera angle and lighting to emphasize his power, but there are other times when his personality takes an ugly twist. Each scene has its own tempo and style." According to Del Ruth, TheWest
Wing provides a realistic view of the White House's inner workings.
The program doesn't promote a particular political point-of-view, because
the focus is on characters and relationships rather than politics. Still,
this "dramedy" illuminates some dark areas about American society
while managing to be both interesting and entertaining. Email the author with questions/comments |