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  Q: You worked with Production Designer George Jenkins on several Alan Pakula films and on The Paper Chase, which was directed by James Bridges. How did you collaborate with Jenkins?

  A: George comes from the old school, which is very helpful when you're shooting certain kinds of movies because he understands how things have to be done in order to shoot properly. Certain sets have to be on a platform, spaces have to be between sets and walls, certain things have to be done in glass and so on. George is a very good reproducer. He reproduced the Harvard Law School in The Paper Chase beautifully, and he reproduced the newsroom in All the President's Men-that was a huge set. It took up two stages at Warner's--they took down the walls between two stages.

  Q: Was any of The Paper Chase actually shot at Harvard?

  A: Very little, just the exterior of Harvard Yard, but not the interiors. They were done on stages up in Toronto. George did a lovely job. He used to get disturbed because if I didn't like something, I just wouldn't light it.

  Q: The alteration of compositional size was very effective in The Paper Chase.

  A: That one was very well thought out. The whole front end of that movie with John Houseman and Timothy Bottoms related to who had command of the situation. We used huge close-ups of John, and demeaning shots of Timothy. Then, as the movie goes along and Timothy begins to get on top of it, you'll notice the shot sizes begin to diminish on John and begin to get a little bit bigger on Timothy-until finally they're equal partners shooting back and forth. It works from an audience point of view-it takes over. I recommended that movie be shot in anamorphic. I felt it would play better because of the schoolroom and the graphics in the film.

  Q: The visual style of Woody Allen's films changed dramatically with Annie Hall. How did you get the assignment to photograph this landmark film?

  A: He called me up. I went and read the script in his apartment-he wouldn't let it out. I was sitting there all by myself, laughing. I got the job and shot movies for him for ten years, a very good group of movies. Zelig and The Purple Rose of Cairo were both interesting technically, it was not easy to do either one of them.

  Q: Do you think you helped contribute to the visual style that Woody Allen is now known for?

  A: In some ways, but it can happen related to writing and dealing with actors. You're always doing something which is predicated on what the director will finally want to execute. Sometimes you can bring more to it when you're together for a long time. Not a lot has to be said, and sometimes it's better that way. It's their movie, but there's an overlapping related to structure and concept.

  Q: A film like The Panic in Needle Park, photographed by Adam Holender, takes place on the fashionable Upper West Side, as does Manhattan, but Holender makes it look like a war zone.

  A: Right, because you bend it another way with your point of view. It's what you choose to show. We both perceived Woody's New York as this wonderful, unthreatening city. It's a comforting, wonderful place, and then you can turn around and do a claustrophobic, uncomfortable, threatening movie. It's all how you choose to do it.

  Q: How would you define the photographic look you brought to Manhattan?

  A: Manhattan is what I call romantic reality.

  Q: The Purple Rose of Cairo must have been a tremendous technical challenge.

  A: When you look at it on the screen, it looks very simple, but actually it was very difficult because the movie within the movie had to be shot first. We shot the interior in an old movie theater in Brooklyn. The actors up on the screen had to talk to live actors down in the audience-all the eyelines had to match. I had to plot on a piece of paper where they were in the audience. The first thing I discovered was the eyelines change, just like moving a camera around on a set with an actor. You have to think of it in terms of photographing a live actor on the stage, only we can't move the actor, we have to move the camera to make the eyeline shift. If you stood in the middle of the theater, the actor was looking where he was supposed to, but maybe if you moved to the right or the left, the eyeline from the actor up on the screen changed. So if he had to look from left to right to somebody in the audience, that had to happen, but you may be in a different place, more to the left, more to the right to make it work. It always ended up in the right position, but not by the original design. I had to keep moving the camera because the eyeline doesn't automatically fall in. You think, "It's on the screen, the eyeline is fixed now" It's not fixed! The minute you move the camera in the theater, the eyeline of the person who is talking to somebody on the screen changes. In the wide shots, we were photographing the people in the theater and the actors on the screen all live at the same time using front interlock projection of the movie on screen. No matte shots. It was time-consuming, but it finally became entertaining and effective.

  Q: So the editor, Susan E. Morse, had to cut all the sequences in the black-and-white film first.

  A: Yes. I photographed the black-and-white first. She had to cut everything, then it was projected on the screen with the audience in the theater and I photographed it again-this time in color.

  Q: What was the concept behind the warm colors inside the movie theater?

  A: If you were to take the premise of somebody going to the movies to escape the depression, what you want to do is shoot it in black-and-white and have them walk into a color world. Here we had a color movie, and she was walking into a black-and-white world. What you have to do is make this color movie work so when she finally walked into the theater it was something special to watch this black-and-white movie. It had to be a warm, comforting place.

  The interior of the theater was tricky to light because I had front projection, which has to be exposed properly, and then I had little glowing lights in the theater, which has to be done properly. Even though it's a fantasy, you've got to believe it. The film on the screen had to look like 1930s' black-andwhite. Zelig is done very well, but a lot of it is not exactly the way it was, it's what you perceived it was. It's the same in the black-and-white movie in The Purple Rose of Cairo. What is reality? It's what you perceive reality to be!

  Q: How do you achieve that?

  A: I have to go with what I think is working. As in Zelig-does this feel like Hitler in the 1930s? I'm using a reference all the time, but many times you have to bend the reference in order to make it work, so it's not exactly the same. If you go to the heart of the imagery used in Zelig, the original newsreels, you'll find they were a lot better than that.

  Q: You denigrated the quality of it?

  A: Right, but in many cases if I made it better than that, you would not perceive it correctly. In The Purple Rose of Cairo, the period photography on the screen is a little bit over the top. It's a little bit bigger-than-life, it's got more air in it than it should have in order to make it work in these particular circumstances.

  Q: Because of the nature of Zelig, was it scheduled differently than an average movie?

  A: Yes, I had to pick out footage after Woody had chosen what he wanted to use. You have to photograph shots like Woody with Hitler so it would intercut. The lighting has to be the same when you photograph it as it was with the Hitler material. To make it match, you had to know what was going to happen to it by the time you've finished duping it. That was a lot of work.

  Q: In the Woody Allen movies you photographed, there are many examples of scenes where the camera is shooting in an extreme long shot. In the opening of Annie Hall, there's a shot of Woody Allen and Tony Roberts walking where the camera is so far away we can barely see them. We hear them in close-up perspective, but we don't see them until they walk into the camera. It this something you contributed?

  A: It's something I talked Woody into. I said, "You can start talking way up there-we don't see anything. You can materialize, and then we'll start dollying with you."

  Q: Another technique often utilized in the Woody Allen films you photographed is characters will walk out of a shot and continue to talk as the camera holds on the empty frame.

 
A: Right. Woody would say, "But they won't see me," and I said, "But they'll hear you, and then boom-you come back in again." It's got a certain pizazz to it, it's got a kick in the pants that's very funny.

  Q: What is the role of the camera operator and the assistant cameraman?

  A: Operators and the assistant cameraman work for the cameraman. The camera operator physically executes the shot at the level its been discussed. You lay it down, you rehearse, and then you shoot it. I lay the shot out with a director and the camera operator executes the shot at the level its laid out. He has to keep his eye on everything so he can properly communicate what's happening. Video assist has been helpful. Although I can really stand in back of the magazine and see whether the operator is doing the right thing, it takes the guesswork out of what's really going on from an operating point of view. It won't take the guesswork out of actors performing, and many directors still make the same mistake-they watch the monitor. You really can't see what's going on. The next day in the screening room, every performance they thought was great on the monitor won't be good, and every one they thought was bad will be good. It is entirely different performance-wise on the screen. That's why cutting on videotape is not a good idea, because you've got to constantly relate to it up on the screen. You've got to take it in and look at it on the screen-it's different!

  A very good operator is helpful because they've got to see and relay information. They're the closest person to communicate with the actors. Some actors won't hit their mark properly; the camera operator has got to communicate that he or she missed it. So it's an orchestration of people, getting the right information-without stepping on toes.

  Q: I would think the camera operator has to be able to anticipate the movements of an actor. There isn't a lot of camera movement in The Parallax View, but the camera often follows Warren Beatty, who is constantly moving.

  A: Yes, you really have to anticipate to follow Warren, because most of the time he's not doing the same thing twice. It's like playing the piano-as an operator, you don't really think about whether you're going to turn the wheel to go this way or that way, you just go. You have to be good technically, but you also have to be good in explaining to some actors that this is okay, this is not okay.

  I was an assistant cameraman for many years. The assistant has got one of the worst jobs on the set because he's responsible for all the camera equipment, all of the gear, all of the mechanics of keeping it running, all the mechanics of film changing, loading, and the filters. Everything happens very quickly. I may ask for a filter, or you might make changes at the last minute. The assistant has got to be ready. They've got to have all of that at their fingertips. They must have a lot of technical information when you ask him for it. The focus puller is the first assistant, and then there's a second assistant who does the slate and loads magazines. It's a chain, and a good second assistant cameraman is very important to a first because they keep all the mags and all the paperwork. They keep the running time on scenes because you want to see whether you can get another take on a magazine, you don't want to cut it too short. The better an assistant is, the better it is for actors and certain shots because they won't miss focus. There are some assistants who are remarkable the way they can pull focus, others are not so good-it's a tough job.

  A good camera operator is very important. There are cameramen in this country and in Europe who like to operate at the same time as they are acting as director of photography. Operating for the director of photography is a kind of disease because you want to shoot it the way you picture it, but then you never want to give that up. When you're operating, it's very difficult to understand what's happening with lighting. If you are completely imbedded in operating, you're unable to watch what the actors are doing in the structure they are supposed to be doing it in.

  Q: So you'd rather stand with the director and watch the scene. Do you look at the video assist during a take?

  A: I'll watch it for the operating. I can split my vision and look over, then I can see whether the operating is correct-but I can't deal with operating and lighting a movie. Sometimes I'll say, "Do you mind if I make a shot because I want to see something?" I'm a good operator, but I couldn't possibly deal with everything I deal with and do that too-I find it too tiring.

  Q: What are the different aspect ratios available to the director of photography, and what affect do their dimensions have on the viewer?

  A: In their heyday, the principal form of photographing and presenting a movie was in 1.33:1, which is a square format. If you look at old movies on television, you're seeing them closer to what they were on the screen back in the thirties, forties, and fifties. Television cuts some of the sides and the tops off, but it's still square. When television started to come in, the movies began fighting for their life. A lot of other formats began to pop up: Vistavision, CinemaScope, and Panavision. Pictures like The Robe helped to introduce CinemaScope. Then they came out with kind of a fake widescreen, which movies like From Here to Eternity were shot in. Really all it is, is 1.85:1, which is basically the standard format today. That particular system worked when it was first brought about because they would project it at superwide angles, and you got the impression you were really watching something wider than it really was. Then there was VistaVision, which was also a wide-screen format-it used more negative area. Instead of the film running vertically, it ran horizontally across the camera so the magazine was laid flat. You got a picture similar to what you get with a 35mm still camera. It was wider, with more negative area, so you got more resolution. It's used mostly for matte work today. Generally, two formats are used today: 1.85:1 and anamorphic. Of course, both of these formats end up on television. Usually, on television the anamorphic or the wide-screen version ends up with pan and scan. You don't see the whole image all at once, it's too wide to get on television. With standard 1.85:1, essentially you're seeing what you saw in the theater, but with more top and more bottom.

  Q: How do cinematographers work with the sound crew?

  A: I try and make it easier than I used to. In the old days, the director of photography set a key light and the sound people had a mike over the actor's head. You used cutters in front of key lights to cut the spill off the wall. Sound could then move their boom around without throwing light shadows all over the walls. It was a major pain in the ass. That has changed now, with soft light and overhead lighting. Now sound people don't have quite as difficult a time trying to hide the shadows.

  Q: What kinds of scripts are you attracted to?

  A: I like psychological dramas. If you want to kill somebody on the screen, I think it should be elegant on a visual level. There should be romance in it.

  Q: How do directors communicate to you what they want a film to look like?

  A: Directors relate in different ways, but usually how they feel about the emotional content of the movie. It was Alan Pakula's idea that everything in Klute should be underground, claustrophobic. Alan would relate to things emotionally. It's mostly a lot of talking-exchanging ideas. I always ask the director, "What do you want to see on the screen? With most of the directors I've worked with, I'd lay the shot down, they'd look at it and say, "Good," or "Not good, let's do this instead." That was the process. I always picked the lenses and the set-ups, but they were always predicated on what a director wanted to achieve. It wasn't me arbitrarily doing something. It would be a discussion-cause and effect. Many times, a director can't figure out how to do something and he appreciates having an idea on how to get through it. It's a terrible burden a director is carrying. If a director can feel confident he's got a good cameraman, he's relieved of worrying about certain responsibilities. Having to deal with actors and the making of the movie is so difficult. Having to deal with me is difficult. So whatever the director doesn't have to be preoccupied with is helpful.

  Q: Where do you see the craft of cinematography heading in the future?

  A: What's probably going to happen is technology related to movies and the v
isual arts will become a kind of highly polished stainless steel ball, but with very little texture. So you'll be able to do anything. It's happening now because there's a very interesting crossover with digitized imagery in film and video. It is quite wonderful because you can do a lot of great stuff.

  I'm not one of those guys who likes to make film sharper and sharper technologically and make lenses sharper and sharper, because pretty soon there's no distance between you and the audience. The imagery becomes reality-which is no longer fun to watch. You don't have to see every pore, pretty soon you'll have videotape. Pretty soon you'll have an unappetizing image. It's sharp enough now! I enjoy film. I thought film had a much better quality about it fifteen years ago than it has now. The emulsions were better. They were more consistent. They had better repeatability, and the quality of the image in my mind was more interesting. You look at an image on a piece of film and you say, "What's wrong with this thing?" You can't lay your hands on it. It's not doing the right thing. You're fiddling with it. You're looking at it and you're testing it. It's been upgraded and downgraded all at the same time.

  There's a kind of deadening of the senses, at least in this country, so many things have been devalued. It's very hard to deal with things properly when so many people have been so desensitized. One of the big problems with many directors now is they remove themselves from the actors. They're sitting in the back room with a television monitor, talking to actors through microphones. They're not there anymore, and film is a very organic medium-that's what makes it so magical. That's all getting swept out to sea. So I don't have too much hope for good organic chemistry, both visually and technologically. I think it's going to be slick, but I don't think it will necessarily be moving.