From walking the dog, to the Old Vic theatre…
Most commissions I receive come from word of mouth. Recommendations between Corporate Affairs directors, picture editors, designers, PRs, and other commissioners of photography. More effective than listings in Directories, as they know what I do, how I shoot. Unlike the time I got an enquiry about shooting some still-life images of industrial products. I was a bit surprised by that; I am not a still-life photographer… It turned out that the designer had seen my listing in one of the CONTACT books (long gone now), but someone had torn a page out of it, so it looked like an image of a nut and bolt was part of my listing. Some jobs come from elsewhere and are unexpected, like the time one Sunday in November, when I was walking my dog early in the morning and saw a post on Facebook, by a theatre photographer I know, looking for someone to shoot some BTS images in London later that day. I got in touch.
He reckoned it was shooting a rehearsal. Another theatre photographer had contacted him. It turned out, after my website had been looked at and I got a phone call, that it was a job for the Welsh National Theatre, founded by the actor Michael Sheen after the previous National Theatre in Wales was defunded. Their usual photographer was ill and unable to travel from Wales, so an Englishman (albeit with a Welsh Grandmother!) soon found himself on a train to London and on to the Old Vic Theatre, near Waterloo. The actor, Matthew Rhys, was about to embark on a tour of Wales, performing the one-man play “Playing Burton”. It was a fund-raising tour for the new National Theatre. To start, two performances at The Old Vic, on this Sunday. It had been many years since I shot in a theatre…
Shooting from the shadows…
The initial brief sounded a bit deflating, frankly. It was explained that, as they were borrowing the set on the stage from the current production, Sunday being the day off, I may not be able to shoot any of the performance. Just the comings and goings in the downstairs bar (think little light) and the foyer. Thankfully, this was not the case when I arrived at The Old Vic, just as the Matinee performance had begun. I shot some images from up high, after the interval and from the side towards the end of the performance. I envisioned them using text on the big black spaces in the images, created by the theatre seating. I think it works well. (They did spell my name wrong…) The joy of silent mirrorless cameras, I well remember shooting in theatres with Blimps, in the past.
Then images in the downstairs bar and the theatre foyer – where fellow thespians came to congratulate Matthew on his performance. It was quite a list. John Lithgow, Sir Gary Oldman, Rosamund Pike, Celia Imrie, Sian Phillips and Matthew’s partner, Keri Russell (We had just finished the latest series of The Diplomat a few days before). The bar was small, full of furniture restricting angles, with a low ceiling and dark. But no flash. No ‘Hello magazine’ style poses. Fire a flash in that space, and all intimacy, any trace of atmosphere, has gone from any images. Even the foyer had strong coloured light casts. Fast primes (35/50/85) and a steady hand and use what light there is to best effect if possible.
I think I got away with it?
The next part of the brief was to get some images of Matthew in his dressing room, as he prepared for the second performance. Not easy in a room with big mirrors on both sides and little space to move. Crouching in the corner, like often photographing actors, just let them get on, no direction, you will get images.
But as I left, I needed to ask Matthew a question. En route to the dressing room, I had crossed the stage, after walking up the centre aisle. I’d seen an angle, dead centre, framing Matthew with the dark walls and just a bit of light hitting the handrails, leading the eye to the actor. But would I be in his eyeline there? He thought I would, so maybe not. But walking back, it looked too good to me. I asked the director, he said up to Matthew? I asked my contact at the National Theatre, Anna and after talking to a manager at The Old Vic, I held back , as far into the shadows as I could, in that centre aisle. Behind me, double curtains, blocking the light. I would have to plan my escape when Matthew was out of view. I crouched down. Two cameras, a fast 35mm lens and a very fast 50mm lens. I liked the angle, it was different. The show started.
What I had not realised was that early in the show, Matthew would peer down the centre aisle and ask ‘Who was there?’. I think I got away with it…
