Opus Jazz - 2010 - Jerome Robbins` NY Export: Opus Jazz the Film

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Short Takes : La Premiire
Production Slate: A Prophet' NY Export: OpusJazz
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African-American and Latin-American
inf lu-
ences on its dancing and music, Opus Jazz
seemed destrned
to burst the
confines of
the stage Bar and Suozzi became executive
producers on the f lm and enlisted Lipes,
whose credrts nc ude the documentary
Brock Enright: Good Ttmes Wrll Never Be
the Same and the Ieallre Afterschool,
along with his coleagues Henry Joost (codirector and associate producer) and Arrel
Schulman (associate producer and art direc-
tor). Lipes and Joost wrote the adaptation
for the piece
The first stage of filming took shape
in 2A07 , when the producers rarsed funds
I
The Return of Jerome Robbins
I
ey.loHn Calhoun
on
the performers going about their daily lives,
transitions bridging the five movements,
and a verite montage of youths on the
to shoot "Passage for Two," the ballets
foufth movement "Ellen and Sean wanted
to shoot one scene from the larger film in
pretty much
order to rarse more money, " says Lipes. The
York City streets. Spectacular skyline views
all dance for rts 46-minute length Relreved
location was Manhaltans High Line Park.
and visrts to derelict locations populated by
of the requirements of telling a linear story
rt also has the feel of pure cinema Each of
pedormance of the ballet from lhe Ed Sulli-
Finger-snapping dancers
New
athletically graceful, multi-racial young
people A jaz4r soundtrack punctuated by
bursts
of romantic feeling. Sound familiar?
Maybe so, but |Vest Srde 5tory is not
the movie in question, ll's NY Export: Opus
Jazz,
a
new dance film scheduled for
a
March 24 broadcast on PBS The common
feature
to both
is
the late Jerome Robbins,
choreographer and director
and screen versions
choreographer
of
1.4/est
)pus lazz
is
the five movements is shot entirely in
own style the first with a
its
locked-off
Story and
a
van Show in the late 1950s, the filmmakers
decided
to do the five-minute duet mostly
mounted on a dolly to capture the dancers
an expansive view,
Opus Jazz came after New York City Ballet
But aparl from a prelude showing
i.4/est Side
crane and dolly And the frame rs anamorphic, giving the dancers and therr backdrop
5ide Story and
Leonard Bernstein, the kinship is clear
both
in a single take, using a 30 limmy
According to co-directorkinematographer Jody Lee Lipes, the inspiration for
of the original ballet ,NY
Referencing
camera, followed by Steadicam, handheld,
stage
of both
Export. Opus Jazz, which premiered in
1958. Though the latter rs a more formal,
abstract work, with music by Roberl Prince
as opposed to the Broadway sounds of
L1;ri llrll
streets, /VyExport.
revived
the dance, in 2005. "Two of the
Jib
from as many ang es as possible.
"We knew the piece was going to
determrne how the rest of the film would
go, so we were very ntent on doing it the
right way," says Lipes, "We gave ourselves
two days
dancers in the restaging, Ellen Bar and Sean
because we wanted it to be at
magic hour " Shooting all day to give them-
Suozzi, started talking about how cool this
selves backup footage, and as
would be as a movie, and they conceived
the story and the idea of shooting it in real
practic ng
locations," says Lipes. They recognized that
a means of
the complex take, Lipes and his
crew completed more than 20 takes, but
got the best one at the last moment. "lt
with lts kinetic rhythms and the
was overcast, but at the very end of the day,
American €inematographer
popular
the clouds broke on the hor zon, and there
was a beautiful sunset," he says, Shooting
Kodak Vison2 250D 5205 with a PanArri
435 and a Z5A 40-200mm
Panazoom lens,
"l opened up
T4
5
Super
all the way
and ended up pushing t 2 stops. lt was the
absolute last take, and
rt was
perfect,
thanks in pafi to my great focus puller, Joe
Anderson. "
What helped the team achieve it
to prepare detailed
photo storyboards. "We took pictures of a
was Joost's decision
dance rehearsal with a digital SLR, and
Henry made a big board of all the key
frames with the crane n'roves," says Lipes
"We went through it with the crew and
then rehearsed it for half a day " For this
movernent, and throughout the shoot,
constant collaboration with Bar, Suozzi and
a ballet master from the Robbins Trust
helped to preserve the choreography while
enhancing it for the carnera. "The choreographer
is
th nking about movement as its
seen straight from
the front, and some-
times it works belter to alter that a bit for
the camera, " notes L pes. "One example of
that n
'Passage
for Two' is when
the
camera rises up above them. The guy
is
who makes a sort of X with
her body. Usually thats done toward the
audience, but n this case, we had her do it
toward the sky, where the camera was."
holding the g
rl,
With "Passage for Two" in
hand,
the f lmmakers were able to raise the capital to film the rest of Opus lazz by 2009.
The stylistic approach to the remaining
movements had mostly been worked out,
Of
American Cinematographer
course,
the decrsron to shoot in the
anamorphic format, with Hawk C-Sedes
and V-Series lenses, was paft of the equa-
was shot onstage in an 80-year-old theater
tion from the beginning. "Jerome Robbins
in Jersey City, N.J , and it was determined
that a dolly would be needed for optimal
was a pedectionist, to say the least, and he
coverage
made his only film on 70mm," says Lipes.
"ln that spirit, we wanted to shoot on a
high-quality format. And when you're
working with big groups
of
dancers,
of the choreography. The open
loft space in Red Hook, Brooklyn, that was
used for the second movement, "Statics,"
became the Steadrcam sequence largely
because of its structural properlies, which
lot easier to use; people can
all stand in a line together; and you can get
included columns.
tighter on them and see their whole bodies.
Also, it calls back to an older style of filmmaking "
tor for "Statics," a nighttime sequence that
Lipes shot on Kodak Vision3 500T 5219,
widescreen
is a
Dave Ellis was the Steadicam opera-
opening up to T4 and pushing one stop.
This kept 1st AC David Jacobson on his
toes, as he had to pull focus "with the
camera flying around the room at 360
degrees," says Lipes. The most frequently
used lens in this sequence was a 40mm,
which was about as wide as Lipes went on
the shoot. "All of the Hawks open lo a12.2
or T3, and I shot the first couple of setups
at T4. My favorite colorist, Sam Daley at
Technicolor, called me at one point, frantic
about extreme distortion. He said T8 was
A similar gesture to the past was the
decision
to use Ben Shahns abstract
back-
drops from the ballets original production as
a starting point in determining which locations to use. "We chose places that were
run down, places that were once something
else and are now 'old New York,"' explains
Lipes. A case in point is Brooklyn s McCanen
Park Pool, a crumbling, Depression-era relic
used
for the
film
s
opening number,
"Entrance: Group Dance." After a prologue
that shows the dancers making their way to
this space from various locations, the
members of the ensemble enter the pool
and take their positions. "Something we
took away from Wesf Side Story was the
importance of trying to make the choreography exist in the space," says the cinematographer. "We didn't want to just take
choreography and plop it down in McCarren Pool; we wanted to integrate the movements into the space."
"Entrance/Group Dance" was shot
with a locked-0ff camera, a time-consuming
choice given that the shoot employed only
one camera, an Anicam Lite. The movement requrred more than 100 takes. This
sequence became
the films
static-camera
movement almost by process of elimination.
"lt was pretty arbitrary"
"l'm a
to limit
says Lipes.
big fan of making rules for yourself
what you can do. Deciding to make that
movement totally static, or this movement
on a dolly, makes us think about how to
capture the dance while emphasizing
Cooke0pticsi...
distinct styles of photography."
It was clear that the third movement,
"lmprovisations," which was shot
in
a
gymnasium in Brooklyn, would benefit the
most from
a freewheeling handheld
approach. The last movement, the eightminute "Theme, Variations and Fugue,"
:
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really where I should be. That dictated a lot
of the look of the f ilm, because I wasn't able
to shoot at low light."
Lighting the Steadicam sequence,
set entirely in a sixthJloor walkup, was a
challenge for Lipes and his gaffer, Josh
Allen. "l hoped to light from the street, but
there were construction scaffoldings with
black knitting over them," says the cinematographer. "So I turned to the inside,
where there were construction lights hang-
shooting them down through the skylights.
My key grip, Matt Walker, had teams of
people with nets and flags running around
to keep out the
that resulted from these 60-odd
ing in the ceiling. I started thinking we
might as well use practicals because we
behind the camera, trying
were going to see 360 degrees. So we put
the highest-wattage bulbs posible in there
bulbs. "
and put several Mighty Moles on the roof,
the
shadows
Lighting for the final movement at
was also a major
Jersey City theater
slage." 24 Source Four Lekos in the wings
and 24 above the stage added flares and
edging to the theater seats, while a 4K and
other units in the lobby and two Mighty
Moles on the theater floor brought out wall
details. "We also had 15 or 20 shop lights
in the upper tier of balcony seats, so when
we looked up there, there was
instead
distance
ofjust black."
At press time, the filmmakers did not
know whether )pus lazz had the potential
for exhibition beyond television. "At
undertaking. The dancers perform on the
to an empty auditorium, a spectacle
viewed from a number of dolly positions in
stage
The Huft
sor Richard Stutsman was incorrectly
identified as Robert Stutsman.
ln our coverage of Avatar
(Jan.
'10), some technical specs were incorrect. The two primary lenses the filmmakers used were both Fujinon zoom
lenses, a 6.1-101mm and a custommade 7-35mm. The original aspect ratio
and lmax presentation were 16x9. Stan-
K
TECHNICAL SPECS
1,78:1
(2.40:1 mask)
it look nice, and then I realized it3 supposed
Anamorphic 35mm
a
of
this
went through a lot of options to try to make
krds putting on
coverage
Locker (July '09), special-effects supervi-
point, we're not doing a print," says Lipes.
"But we've had offers for a theatrical run in
New York, which is pretty amazing, considering that the film is only 46 minutes long. "
the house and finally from the stage itself. "l
to look like a bunch of
ERRATA
ln our
X
Arricam Lite; PanAni 435
show, and it should therefore feel kind of
homemade," says Lipes. "So we put a 20K
Hawk, Cooke and Panavision lenses
up in the balcony and just pointed it at the
Vision3 250D 5207, 500T
Kodak Vision2 250D 5205, 50D 5201;
5219
O
dard theatrical presentations
2.40"1.
were