March 8, 2022 • 57 mins
When you admire CTU, the Presidential Retreat and the overall look and feel of 24, you have Joseph Hodges to thank.
Joseph shares the inspiration of his set designs and the importance of the word "re-purposing"! In addition to 24, you have seen his work everywhere from Apollo 13, The Shawshank Redemption, Virtuosity and several Star Trek iterations.
Gamers, including us, also appreciate his contribution to Need For Speed: Undercover.
Joseph was an engaging guest, both on the podcast and at the 24 Convention in November!
Check him out at:
http://www.josephhodges.com
https://24.fandom.com/wiki/Joseph_Hodges
https://www.EventsOccurInRealTime.com
Musical jumbalaya lovingly prepared by Lp. https://lyndonperry.bandcamp.com/music
Joseph shares the inspiration of his set designs and the importance of the word "re-purposing"! In addition to 24, you have seen his work everywhere from Apollo 13, The Shawshank Redemption, Virtuosity and several Star Trek iterations.
Gamers, including us, also appreciate his contribution to Need For Speed: Undercover.
Joseph was an engaging guest, both on the podcast and at the 24 Convention in November!
Check him out at:
http://www.josephhodges.com
https://24.fandom.com/wiki/Joseph_Hodges
https://www.EventsOccurInRealTime.com
Musical jumbalaya lovingly prepared by Lp. https://lyndonperry.bandcamp.com/music
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:33):
It's perfect for Netflix because you canyou can spend the weekend watching it.
I mean they did some crazy thingson twenty four. Oh yeah season No,
I mean the sort of the showbehind it. We had a competition.
There was a competition. People cameand sat in the bunker. They
watched the whole series in one weekendin the bunker. They've won. They've
(00:59):
won a compety issues. So theycame and watched it. People would call
them, they said, no,it's a family gathering. People would go
to work, go home off ona Monday night, go home, change
shower, go back to work tobe with their coworkers, co workers to
watch the show. It was amazing. People, you know, families would
(01:21):
get together and I you know,and they'd say even the three year old
and was like, oh really.It was like, yeah, I know
it's a bit too young for them, but you know, the whole family.
There was a gathering. We're sopleased to have Joseph Hodges joining us
today and talking about twenty four andthe twenty years of twenty four. How
did you get connected to the show? Just my agent, I mean I
(01:42):
interviewed for the pilot and Joel actuallygave me the job. Well, he
called my agent and said, look, I really want Joseph to do it,
and I'm not sure, and Ireally can't remember. I'm not sure
if he said I really want himto do it, but because i'd also
into viewed with some somebody at thestudio and I didn't and Joel called my
(02:06):
agent and said, I really wantedJoseph to do it, but the studio
won't go for it because he doesn'thave as much experience as this other person.
So, and my agent did representthe other person, so I guess
that's why he knew. This otherperson got the pilot, and so they
shot the pilot and then from whatI was told, that that person didn't
(02:31):
want to do the series because hewanted to just do movies. He was
quite happy to do pilots, buthe didn't want to do the series.
And so Joel called my agent andsaid, would I do the series?
The same guy at Fox made meinterview with him again, so I remember
going in and I'm sure I didn'tget the job at that point, and
(02:52):
I remember walking out of his officeand as I was leaving his office,
I turned around and I said,you know, he had this painting behind
him. Really liked it. Itwas very It was a bit it was
obscure, but I could tell withthe colors and its shapes and things,
and it was very Spanish, youknow. To me it looked like tiles
Spanish houses. And I said,oh, by the way, I like
(03:12):
your your Spanish villa's painting. Andhe was like, what you can see
that? And I was like,yeah, I like it. And I'm
left and I think, I don'tknow if that convinced him that perhaps,
like you know, I hadn't theeye great detailed. So so so then
I started. So I started ontwenty four and I remember, as you
say, I watched the pilot,okay, and I fast forwarded the VHS
(03:37):
tape because I wanted to know whatI knew. There was no other but
I fast forwarded it till the endof the tape finish, and so I
watched it and I asked Joel.So I went back to Joel and I
said, listen, you they shotit all on on locations. See you's
location. I want to make ita bit more high tech. There was
brickwork and the ceiling it was allwood. It was They shot it into
(04:00):
Fox Sports a Fox Sports set wherethey not the set, but where the
Fox Sports people were in journalists orI don't know. So Joel said,
sure, you can. You canmake it more high tech. And we
also shot. We did the thewhole to three minutes of the opening in
(04:25):
the Kuala Lumpur streets. I builtthat in the parking lot when the guy
goes into this hut and makes thetelephone call and then the other guy that
gets the phone call that there's goingto be assassination. That was all added.
That wasn't part of the original pilotNoel and Joe, so I think
(04:46):
we were. I had been therefor three days and Stephen Hopkins, the
director of the pilot, who wasthen going to do every two episodes,
every other two episodes, he cameto my office. I think, I
don't know if I ran into him. I think he came to my office
and he said, so little Birdstold me that Joel's a little not upset,
but he's a little worried that hehasn't seen you for three days.
(05:10):
And I was like, you shouldgo and talk to him. So I
said, okay, I mean Idid talk to him, and I'm making
a high ten and it's just threeday, I've got to do drawings and
blah blah blah. So anyway,so I went to Joel's office and I
remember what I wanted to say wasJoel, I hear, you know,
he might be a little worried.I want to tell you. You know,
the way I work is, Igive a you know, I'll do
(05:30):
the whole design and then I'll presentit to you rather than piecemeal. And
all I got out was Joel,the way I work is, He goes,
no, let me stop you there, let me tell you how I
work. And he proceeded to tellme how it was a hands on producer
and blah blah blah, and heneeded to see everything. I said,
yeah, no problem, Absolutely noproblem. So I finished the design,
(05:54):
showed it to him through, andthen from then on I would present everything
to him. We would walk thesets and he would, you know,
just walk through the sets with meand perhaps make a little I remember walking
through some kids' bedroom once and hemade some changes. But then and I
can't remember. I thought it wasfive episodes in, but now I'm thinking
(06:16):
about it. What it must havebeen season two when Keifer, I mean
Jack is in a police station,he's arrested and he's in a in a
cell. Right, yes, sothat's season two, okay, So so
that must have been the whole waythrough the first season. Joel hands On
(06:39):
producer, he needed to see everything, and I showed him everything that episode.
I went to him, I said, so the police station, what
are you thinking? He goes,oh, you know, ye have police
station and the NYPD bleue that kindof look, and I said, Joel,
I'm trying to give you a coollooking show. I'm trying to do
I'm I told him, in mymind, I was always doing James Bond
(07:01):
that it was. It was real, but there was a there was a
style style to it. At thetime on television you could only watch West
Wing and Er and it was allbased in the real world. I really
even when Palmer had an American flagin a painting behind him, I had
(07:25):
done that painting. It was veryobscure. I know in the first season
when Palmer is doing his speech,the massive American flag there. But that's
what they produced. But I triedto I tried my best to just make
a World of twenty four. Soanyway, Joe that so I said to
Joe, look I'm trying to giveyou a cool looking shut and I'm trying
(07:46):
to create a look. And soI said, there's this police station in
North Hollywood that I don't know whatthe interior looks like, but the exterior
glass block and it's quite kind ofsleep So I want to do, you
know, the scene in the Matrixwhere Keano's mouth getting zipped up, just
light green. I want to dothe whole police station like that. Okay,
(08:11):
give it a go. Wow.So I designed this police station and
as you can see, it wasall it was very much like no other
police station you'd seen except in ohit wasn't really a police station in the
Matrix, it was just this room. So it's that green anyway. So
I'm walking Joel through the set,and Joel finishes walking through the set and
(08:31):
at that point he just turns tome and goes, Okay, you're my
production designer. We don't need totalk about sets anymore. I leave that
out to you. I trust you. Yeah. So that must have been
a year, you know, thebeginning of season two and from then on
for the next well, I dideight seasons. So so for the next
one hundred and seventy episodes or minusthe first season. I never talked to
(08:56):
Joel about sets, and directors wouldarrive and they would say, Oh,
I shot this location last week andI really want to go back there,
and I'd look at pictures and Isaid, no, I'm afraid that that's
not twenty four they would want toshoot. There's no craftsmen houses, there's
none of that. Directors would bewould be shocked that I had, But
no, that was it was.I know that the when they were doing
(09:20):
pilot season, Bruce more Garlis,the guy who was sort of the go
between between the studio and our production, he came to me and he said,
oh, it's pilot season again.There's a lot of upset production designers
out there. And I was like, why because they don't believe that they
all asked for the same money tobuild the sets as you do, or
(09:43):
as they want the same money astwenty four gefts, and they don't believe
me when I tell them they've alreadygot more. Wow. Because I had
to warehouses, we had this hugespace that I could leave sets up.
I didn't have, like I saythat parking lot was. The crew would
be sometimes upset because they couldn't partthere. They had to park on the
(10:07):
street because I built the construction sitethere the Colquala Lumpur streets. Then when
the girls are being chased through somethe the warehouse, it was kind of
two warehouses and a corridor that ledto all the offices up the front,
but then above there was this otherfloor. So I knocked these whole walls
(10:31):
out and I could hang backings.When we did a I can't even remember,
was it the first season where wedid the bomb shelter and there was
a spiral staircase that went down thatcould have been the second seas right,
Kevin Dillen, Yeah, yeah,I mean I would. I'd be able
(10:52):
to. I had a lot ofspace and I could leave stuff up.
People called when we did the OntarioAirport and as up in the ceiling of
the airport, like we've been tothat location, there is no ceiling space
up there. I was. Ino, I built it on stage because
it was I had a set thatI had then repurposed and put something else
(11:13):
in. I know, we couldyou could change it up for whatever you
wanted it to be. That BlackEven movie and he's in a sewer and
they had called us because they wantedto know what sewers we shot in,
because they Health and Safety wouldn't letthem shoot in any sewers. I know
we didn't cheat them in the sewers. We only shot. I built it
(11:33):
on stage here and again because Iwas in control of it. Here you
placed the camera. It was onlytwenty feet long and a t junction.
But because I had placed you know, it was art directed. You placed
the camera here, and that's yourshot. He discussed it with the director.
That's all he needs is Jack orwhoever was coming into that. So
(11:56):
the show looked much more expensive.Like when Jack is on the oil rig.
We went to an oil rig andwe did shoot there briefly, but
because it's so dangerous, I builtin a tank in Downy, like the
legs that came down into the seaand the shot of them going in the
(12:20):
dinghy towards the oil refinery. Theoil rig oil platform is on stage in
a parking lot. I did thebit where there's a helicopter coming in and
there's a big explosion and all ofthat. That's in the parking lot.
Again. Wow, but it justYeah, they obviously gave us extra money
(12:43):
for certain things. I remember whenwe scouted the David Palmer's at the White
House. At some point the endof the season something or other. He
talks to Jack on the phone andJack is out between some palettes. Anyway,
we had checked out the West Wingset. We drove out there,
(13:05):
we'd check it out. It wasgoing to cost us to rent it,
rent the set, and when youtake a crew on location, let's say
it's sixty grand a day. Lookby the time you pay, you know,
all the fees, the rentals,having people catered out there rather than
on the stage. So let's say, so, I you know, we
(13:28):
scouted this and it was going tocost us sixty And I said to John
Cassar was directing the episode, andI said, for thirty grand, I
can build this by next Wednesday onstage. Obviously not all of this,
but we don't need all of thisbut corridor. John, you just need
a long wall with windows and willput columns in the foreground. And John's
like, yeah, sure that worksfor me. So of course we all
(13:50):
go back and Michael clicked, Ithink there was the upm at that point,
and I do the drawings and Isaid, so I've got thirty grand,
right, he goes, no,I know, you've only got twenty
five. And I was like,well, but I said I could do
it for thirty. Well, yougot twenty five negotiation, So we did,
and for years I just said,when something costs twenty five grand,
(14:13):
it costs twenty five grand. Andeventually I was so beaten down. I
was like, okay, so Isaid, to my cause I'll play the
game that everybody plays. This isgoing to cost forty grand. Oh,
well, you've only got thirty.And I remember doing that once and Michael
said you've only got thirty. Iwas like okay, and I walked out.
He says, that's all right.I was like, yeah, it
was only going to cost thirty anyway, but you made me play this game.
(14:37):
Yeah, exactly exactly it was.It was when I said it was
going to cost that much, itwould cost that much, and then so
the other the only other thing Isticks because then the CTU changed at the
end of season three to season four. Right, yeah, and again only
because Joel had that faith in me. So I went to So I heard
(15:03):
we were moving, right, theywere knocking down our studio. There's apartments
there now this warehouse and so we'removing up to Chatsworth and I'd seen this
building on Scouts before and it wasthis amazing glass block front and it had
these two massive feet concrete feet thatoriginally I'm sure when they built it because
(15:28):
there were no trees there, thefeet were reflected in the glass and it
was just to me, it wasjust so beautiful. Now behind beyond that,
beyond that facade is just a warehouse. It literally is trucks parked at
angles down the side. But soanyway, so I loved that. So
(15:50):
Joel, so I heard we weregoing to build. Joel said, yeah,
we're moving stage and so I wentto see him and he said,
well, just rebuild ct you andI may. We've been living in it
for three years. Can I designa new CTU? And he was like,
oh well. And I didn't takea holiday that year. Usually you
(16:11):
get a month off, and Istayed at home and I remember doing build
the built the model in the computerand I had it pinned up in my
house on the windows. Joel said, I said, look that draw it.
The design has been done. Comeand see them, because bring them
to the office. I said,no, look, come to my house.
(16:32):
He only lives around the corner.So they came and they approved,
but it had these huge concrete feetin there because people were always a bit
confused because we never really established theoutside right. No, not no,
we did. We did a carexplosion there, but you know we didn't
really catch those fee you can ifyou're quick about it. So I was
(16:53):
able to design this really really coolspace and again still had what we called
the magic try angle, which wasJack's office or whoever, and again that
space because twenty four was all butalways about shooting very wide angle, lens
up tired, very long, lensare far away, and television, the
(17:15):
law of television. The sets intelevision changed because they were all can't you
know the west wing? You know, you can tell, I can always
tell when they've just done the sameloop, right. Spielberg actually said to
I think John Spielberg once, andSpielberg said, the thing he liked about
twenty four was even though you don'tdo establishing shots, you always knew where
(17:38):
you were. Somebody asked me onceabout the boldness of the colors, and
it was like, because we don'tshoot wirds, you need to know exactly
where you are immediately. So eachlook had to be distinct. Yeah.
Yeah. And then also we usedto do things like we shot an airport
once or no, we shot whatwas supposed to be an airport once over
(18:00):
seven different locations. Because somebody askedme, was it a signature of mine
to paint lines on the you know, strikes on corridors and things, and
I was like, I like itbecause it blocks it, it breaks up
the space, but mainly because I'vegot seven different locations that all of different
(18:21):
architecture slightly that when you just seethis big blue line down it, you
go, oh, I'm still inthe airport or something. So that was
a trick I used a lot soas a point of reference for the audience
to say, oh, this iswhere we are now. Yeah, yeah,
you know, because of the realtime aspect, like we used to
(18:41):
shoot a shoot the location, andthen the following episode that they hadn't written
yet once we got that. Ithink there was an episode where Jack is
somebody's in a safe room and atthe end of that episode they're still in
the safe room or they are comingout. Anyway, I had to build
the corridor of that house plus awall that looked like they had just come
(19:03):
from the living room so we woulddo those things because it was only a
couple of hours to shoot that onescene. We didn't they didn't want to
go back to the back, tothe to the location just for that couple
of hours. What I mean,what what season was it where Audrey gets
kidnapped at the beginning her and herfather? Oh? Season four, yeah,
(19:26):
which which was the abduction, right, right? So the abduction because
I think the season before i'd donea little bit of second unit. Not
it's not second unit directing. Itwas literally inserts, right, perhaps because
of that telephone thing I was,or you know, they gave some of
(19:47):
their stuff. I remember doing somesome inserts. But then Audrey gets kidnapped
in that first episode of that season. So John was John Cassar was directing
that episode and we couldn't squeeze inthree hours of filming, and John Gazar
said, well the whole thing withAudrey getting kidnaped, the terrorists coming down
(20:07):
the street, and let Joseph directit. And everyone went, are you
sure, Yeah, yeah, yeah, he'll be fine, he'll be fine.
So because I you know, storyboarddied, this whole sequence, great
going down because I had three hoursand John that I remember breakfast, showing
him the storyboards, and John's like, you got thirty set ups here,
(20:27):
I need three shots. I needthis shot, the truck pulling up,
lad this and that, this andthat. Just make sure you get those
three shots and you can do whateveryou want. Was like, all right,
So in my usual way, Ikind of made sure. I knew
I was going to get what Johnwanted. But I did what I wanted
(20:47):
to do. I walked my waydown the street. I did all these
shots, got everything that I hadstoryboard and what John wanted. John turns
up after three hours he go,so did you get my three shots?
And I'm like yeah, and ifyou see you didn't have time to do
yours. I said, no,I got everything. I did it all.
(21:07):
I had it planned. We didthis, this and this, and
when you do second unit, peoplemove up, like the focus puller is
now the camera operator and the gafferis a DP and everyone's moved up.
So everybody's really enthusiastic. You know, they want to shoot as much as
they can because it goes on theirreel. Right, so everyone like works
(21:27):
like a charm. So so Job'slike, well, the crew are still
on their way, so let's doit a couple more. So, I
think we do a little. There'sa shot of somebody leaping over the bushes
or something in the front yard.And and from then on John used to
(21:48):
give me or I used to getto direct second unit. I'd be downtown
La three o'clock in the morning witha small cruise car chases and oh yeah,
I mean that was the first timeyou had done that was the Heller
abduction scene. Yeah, that wasmy first that first scene with the with
the terrorists, the truck screeching toa halt, the guys jumping out,
(22:11):
walking down the street, hitting theguys in suits ran backing up, and
the door opening. I'm not sureif I had a double or John did
that bit. It's a long timeago. M hm. Well, I
mean everybody that's listening this should goto your portfolio site, because I watched
that on your portfolio site yesterday,the abduction scene, and that you directed
(22:34):
that, and that led obviously tomore directing, which is which is pretty
ama is it? Because we gotbecause we did the prequels, That's when
I got to do most directing isthe well, no, they so I
didn't know at the time, becauseso every year you re negotiate your deal
and part of the following year orsomething. Because they didn't want to pay
(22:55):
me any more money as the productiondesigner. My agent got thirty days to
directing guaranteed, which were only meantfifteen because the DGA rules are you get
one day of directing and you getpaid one day of prep. I would
much prefer to have got the thirtydays of directing for the same money.
But anyway, it doesn't matter.I found out really since or later on,
(23:18):
that that doesn't apply if you're actuallyworking on the show. I could
have directed thirty days, got it. But one of the producers, I
don't know how many years he was. I think he was only there,
perhaps two years. I remember whenI got that deal. He called me
to his office and I walked inand he says, close the door,
(23:41):
and I closed the door. Hegoes, what the fuck do you think
you're doing? Taking food off myplate? And I was like, what
you get him directing? Because hewas directing some of the stuff, And
I was like, I don't know. It was the beginning. There was
it. You can see if youwatch the show. You don't have to
watch it carefully, but you cansee I peeked at the President's Retreat.
(24:06):
Yes, yes, Joel, youknow there was me just doing water because
again the sixties themed one, yeah, that was that was supposed to be
Camp David was Camp David, andI think I'd seen Camp David on the
West Wing. And again I waslike, Joel, it's old cottages in
(24:27):
the woods. It's just nothing spectacular. Can I design? He has horses,
his family has horses. It's thePresident's retreat. I built this pool
outside, which not a pooled,but just some water that you never do
on stage because of leaks, soI could reflect the light in. It
had this ceiling so you wouldn't shootoff it. People would call to ask
(24:48):
where the location was because they wantedto shoot it, and it was on
stage. And that's when I thinkI peaked. And I love that set
so much that off happened that yearand then I just you could see by
the time I left at season eight, did we do division? That's just
a gray box, right right,I kind of given up. It was
(25:11):
like I was so beat and that'swhy I left. It was like I
can't carry on right, And youcan say I was thinking about it the
other day you could see it inthat set. I just I wasn't even
going to try and persuade anybody thatthe FBI or wherever it was should be
a cool space. It was like, okay, I'm just designing an office.
You held the torch as long asyou could. Yeah, yeah,
(25:34):
yeah. No. One of thethings that stood out that really prepared us
to talk to you today, HowardGordon used the phrase twenty four was always
five minutes ahead of everything else,and nothing describes that as much as the
set design of twenty four was that, like you said, this is the
standard that I wanted to be andI don't want it to look like everybody
(25:55):
else. And we knew that rightfrom the beginning that this was knowledge,
this cinematic. This wasn't just anormal, regular old TV show. This
had a sheene to it. Andwhen you reference James Bond, I totally
got it. They totally understood itwas meant to be five minutes ahead.
I've got tears in my eyes andstumps because I tried so hard. Yeah,
you succeeded, You succeeded. Iappreciate that because I always argued that
(26:22):
we I'm not the writers are thereto entertain. The actors are there to
entertain, and I'm there to entertainas well. Where to entertain like a
Bond movie. Yeah, I had. Yeah, I mean it was eight
long years. They were the firstfive or six years with Fight. The
(26:44):
last two. Well, I leftbecause I asked to direct some episodes and
if I didn't get to direct,i'd believe, and they said no,
and I left because again I justcouldn't wrap my head around it because I
think I know what's when? Didwe have the writer's strike during seasons seven?
(27:04):
Between? Yeah, seasons No,it was before before before Redemption,
just before because Redemption kind of camein as the interim, right, yeah,
after season six, right because Igot I had done a shoot for
a friend for Black the video game, and then I did this shoot.
(27:26):
Well, I was prepping this shootfor Need for Speed Undercover and listen,
yeah that one, oh yeah,oh yes, and thank you for thank
you for that. By the way, I love racing games. I just
did the the live action stuff inthe middle, right, yeah, And
(27:49):
the week before or two weeks beforewe were going to shoot here, the
writers strike ended. We went backto work on twenty four. But I've
been working on that prepping it fora month at least, and I think
I called the UPM to tell himthat I wouldn't make the production meeting the
(28:10):
following week because I was directing thisthis video game. And he came to
my office and he closed the doorand says, say, you have to
make a decision. You either dotwenty four or this video game. And
I was like, well, i'vebeen I can't fun a video game.
They've been they expecting me to.So I think it was like a Tuesday
(28:34):
or a Wednesday. I said,look, I'll work till the end of
the week till you find somebody else, but I have to go and do
this video game. And he didn'teven walk out and let me sort of
think about it. He kind ofstood there and went, oh, well
that changes things all right, Wellwe'll have to work around it. And
I was like, again, Iwas sort of so deflated that they would
(28:56):
even try and pull that on me, because you know, twenty four was
everything to me. I died forthat show. I worked so hard and
I loved everything. I'm pissed peopleoff because I pushed. I didn't realize
that everything you do doesn't have tobe the best it can be all the
time. I guess that's your standard. Though. That's a standard I know,
(29:19):
and I try even today, youknow, not to be like that.
My daughter helps having a family.Having a daughter and having to have
a job. I guess to feedthem makes a bit of a difference.
But I didn't then and or mybaby was twenty four. Yeah, and
I get so upset when I watchan episode and there was an orange ladder
(29:42):
in the background or a piece ofplywood on the floor, and you know,
John can't cook. I used towalk on set. I didn't go
to set towards the end because Iwould just get upset John because I would
say, oh, here comes witheagle eye Hodges. I literally walk past
the monitor and go, is thatthat's not the shot? Right? Yeah?
(30:03):
Why? You know, Jay andand Guy the two cameras, it's
like, why, what's wrong?I was like, you can't see that
orange ladder and they looked through thelegs. I was like, yeah,
okay, I guess we should cansomeone move that orange ladder? And that's
just my eye. But that's whatyou were hired to be. You were
hired to be the eye of twentyfour. But they did me there was
(30:26):
this there's this scene with the president'swife in the garden. She's meeting somebody.
And I had designed this concrete slaband a big concrete post, only
this concrete slab so that Rodney couldput a light on it, so he
had a light in the middle ofthis black space, so he had some
(30:48):
a reason to have a light outthere. And I remember watching the episode
and the camera comes around and inthe background on this lawn is an orange
ladder and I'm like, nobody seeyou know, no one does that.
But again, that's that was justmy that's my baggage that I needed it
to be perfect and I and peopledidn't like me for that because I just
(31:12):
would push porsch porsch and I didn'tdidn't, I didn't care if i'd John
Casar would have a meeting with theproducers every year too. He tell me,
John, I got that. Igot that meeting again. Oh,
to save my job, He goes, he had to save your job.
He go every year and he'd convincethem that no Joseph does all this and
(31:36):
he saves us this because he heyou know what he does. And then
I think the last time he went, he goes, I've got that meeting
again. I was like, okay, and he went to the meeting.
He came back with his huge smilein his face. He goes, I
don't know what's happened. They musthave heard that you're threatening to leave,
because they saying, what can wedo to keep Joseph here? That's the
right answer, That's the right answer. That was it. But yeah,
(31:59):
I laughed and I loved all thepeople. I mean, I was like
I say, I was. Youcan see I guess you've been online.
There is that there is an interviewwith me in the President's Retreat Beard.
I'm overway, I'm not happy,and I can't remember. Some stuff was
happening in the background, and Iguess that I think it was. The
(32:23):
retreat was so beautiful to me andcalled me to the set on the first
day of the shoot and sort ofeverybody was there and he wanted to congratulate
me for just such an amazing space. But I don't know if I don't
know if something happened and I wasjust you can see I was really depressed
(32:45):
and everyone could see. I mean, I wouldn't say, I wouldn't speak
to people, and it was hot, so like twenty four. To me,
it was the best and best oftimes and the worst of times.
I don't I mean, I knowthat when we did because Redemption was the
first four episodes of season something orother than the studio didn't like and so
(33:07):
instead of writing the TV movie,they just brought out these four first four
episodes or first two episodes of whateverseason it was. And I did go
to South Africa to shoot, andI prepped it all, and see there
was one of those things. Iprepped it all. And then we had
hired an art director there to do, you know, to complete my vision
(33:30):
or you know whatever we had designedand built there. And then I remember
that, you know, the TVmovie came out and they put his name
on the credit of the joint creditproduction designer, and I was like,
he was my art director, andhere's those things that I I mean,
I'm sure he did a good job, but he he just was doing my
(33:50):
bidding, if you say it exactly. But anyway, the best of times
in the worst of times. Youmight if we go back to the presidential
retreat, because I love that said, do you remember what what made you
choose that motif? That look?Yeah, well, it was just thunderbirds.
(34:13):
I mean everything everything has that thunderbirdnineteen sixties just pinpointed it. Wow,
and you've got when Keifer was whenin the presidential because I saved it
and it went into different sets.The first bunker, the desk is a
copy of Jeff Tracey's desk, redleather top and the aluminium strip. Yes,
(34:39):
it's just a copy. It's noteven influenced. I copy the bunker
that I did later on, veryyellow with the big holes in the water.
Those are copies that in the sunkenseating area that's where Captain Scarlett and
the angels. That's the angels.It's bloreed my mind that it's not I
(35:05):
mean originally, I mean those thosepanels that have the ellipses and the circles,
that literally is a copy from thethunderbolt, from the Captain's scarlet fair
the big beams with holes in them. No, and you know it hasn't
that flavor and so the yeah,if if you were doing you know Jeff
(35:27):
Tracy's uh it was it was,Yes, it's the it's a combination of
everything you know to do the LikeI said, it has that flavor that
sixties flavor. You know. Thedesk was my idea was to have this
hue instead of a big square desk. I wanted to cut like a big
redwood. So if you never sawa close up of it, the painters
(35:49):
did an amazing job, as ifyou'd cut a piece of redwood and you
could see. I wanted. Ididn't. I ran out of time,
but I actually before we varnished it, wanted to put kind of dates and
things. This is where the CivilWar happened. This is what this happened.
It would have been amazing peace.But the silhouette is the spitfire wings.
(36:10):
They're just like I think there's somebehind the scenes stuff once that I
would just I was so into Formulaone that I would just pick the colors
from a for like the NHS arethe Renault colors, the turquoise, yellow
and white and blue. I thinkI was having fun. I always had
(36:34):
fun, and I wanted the audiencethat had fun. I was just yeah,
I remember we did this one.We did this one set that I
copyed I saw out of a bootiquehotel room. It was just bright yellow
walls and gray plaster and all ofthis. It was an amazing set.
(36:54):
It was actually where Keifer and Jackand Audrey are in this hotel room the
beginning of a season. Yes,I get called to the set because Rodney
had sort of said he hated theyellow. Literally, myself and the painters
were painting the walls gray while helit the set. Because he hadn't lit
(37:16):
the set, he hadn't prepped itso he couldn't be seen to be taking
two hours to light the set,so he said that the yellow wouldn't work.
And it was such a shame becausethe whole set is only lit by
a sliver of light coming through thecurtains, that it's just a black space
(37:39):
because we painted it gray. Butif you'd had the yellow, it would
have just been again another one ofthose like wow. I mean people would
sometimes I shot, I drew stuff, or we built stuff fluorescent greens,
and I don't know. I wasexperimenting. I was in my playground.
(37:59):
I knew, I kind of knewwhat I was doing, but I was
always I was always. It waslike I had an interview with me when
I finished the new CTU and theguy asked me, you know, what
do you you know, how doyou feel about this? And it was
like well, when I was akid, I used to design stuff and
build it on my desk, houses, or you know whatever it was.
(38:22):
Now I just do the same thing, but I have sixty guys that build
it, and people like Joel allowedme to do that. I mean,
Joel was just such a joy toHe would have let you. I mean
you'd walk into his office if youhad an idea. You get halfway through
(38:42):
the sentence and you go no,and then you carry on talking about it,
and you go I said no.At the same time, you'd get
halfway through he goes, yeah,sure, and you carry on explaining us.
Didn't I say yes, okay,And he was like that. It
was like yes, no and yeahno. I mean he was he was
(39:05):
a great fat Like I said,it was that second season. I thought
it was. I've been telling peoplefor years it was like the fifth episode.
It must have been the fifth episodeor the first episode of the second
season, So he must have.I showed him everything in the first season,
and then after that he didn't needto be bothered with me. And
(39:28):
again, like I say, itsaves you money because if you design something
that you know, you know.I've interviewed for jobs and you've done a
design and they love it, andyou start Monday morning and they go,
so we want this, Well,I don't understand that's Victorian and that's going
to cost a fortune with all thatdetail. Again, that architecture that I
(39:52):
that I use, that sort ofsixty stuff. It's very like the laminated
beans. Yes, they take lottake a while to pain, but it's
a very simple form. There's nota lot of waste of money. When
I worked with Neli Rhodis, heshowed me when we did Virtuosity, he
(40:13):
showed me a window. He goesyou see this window, there's no sill.
He goes up like this. Sowhen I was designing the bit,
where ah, what's the actor DenzelDenzel? Yes, when Denzel walked in,
he walked into a room, hetakes his clothes off. He then
(40:34):
walks into another room and he getsscanned. Yes, I was like,
why does it have to be aroom, Let's just make it a cattle
trough. Okay. And then thedoors. If you make a hinge big
enough, you don't need a door. And those doors are just a big
hinge. The doors to the bunker, I'm not sure if they ever closed.
(40:55):
They're the same design that I didon Virtuosity, massive massive hinges.
So you don't waste money on doinglittle things that people won't see. Right,
So again all the money ends upon screen. You don't waste anything.
(41:17):
And then again because I didn't haveto, it wasn't designed by committee.
I remember working on Star Trek.Well, first of all, we
did two episodes at once. Soby the time I got a script,
by the time we shot for thecurrent episode for sixteen days and then started
those two episodes, perhaps I'd havetwenty five days before a set needed to
(41:43):
be built maximum. Now, ona regular television show, you get a
script, you have to have thesets ready in seven twelve days max.
But because I had so much moretime. And then because when you do
a design, then it goes tothe producers. The producers could have their
well, they can approve it,and if they don't. If they don't
(42:04):
prove approve it, you then haveto redraw it presented again. Then now
we're building at the weekend, peopleare on time and a half, so
your set then has to be redrawnand made smaller. So these TV sets
get smaller and smaller and smaller.WHA was on twenty four. I was
like, okay, I know whatI'm doing. This is the set.
I share the director and he goes, okay, i'd need a door here
(42:29):
or you know, we change thelayout, but the look it's mine.
And so the sets could stay onebecause they perhaps reused of other sets.
I mean the President's retreat in thefirst episode. No, in a second
season, he's in a bunker,right, he's in a He's in a
(42:49):
retreat. Palmer is in a retreat, right, yes, yes, yes.
That set is refurbished the year afterfor Division Armas In. It's the
same corridor, it's all, butit's all completely different, high tech,
the Thunderbird, Jeff Tracey's desk,it's still it's still in that set.
(43:10):
I put a black top on itthat time, and the leather. The
ceiling lights have those three strips,the squares, three strips of aluminium.
I remember that. The lights inthe walls that I drill. When you
got a war light, I wouldalways draw holes in them so that behind
an actor's head you didn't just havethe light going up and down. You
(43:30):
had these like high spots of lightbehind them. That's the same set.
It's like the eras family. That'swhat their name was. The Era.
The Era's family home was repurposed forthe bunker, not Palmer. What's the
other president we had, the presidentthat we had at the retreat, logan
(43:58):
Logan, Yes, yes, hewas in a bunker. Yes, yeah.
Now if you watch that again,when the elevator is upstairs and he
comes out of the elevators and downthe steps, well that's the first floor
of the bedrooms for the Eras family. The steps are the same. That
corridor was the hallway to the kitchen, and the room to the left was
(44:21):
their living room and something else.But but yeah, I wouldn't strike anything.
But I could leave things up forperhaps months, and then you know,
just come back to them. Andyou know, if you work on
a lot and you've got one stage, you have to strike a set It
cost you to strike it, foldit, have construction, bring it out,
(44:42):
set it up, and you've onlyset it up. You've spent thousands
and you haven't done anything with ityet. Wow. So again, I
never you know, you never getthat freedom. How did you sorry,
I was gonna say, how didyou So you mentioned Joe sir, now
was the one who hired you tobe on twenty four. So did you
(45:04):
happen to know Joel before twenty fouror no, my agent just I had
signed. I'm my agent. Igot Nilo that I mentioned before, Nilo
Rhodis he he I met him onVirtuosity. He was going to do a
(45:28):
John Hughes movie and he'd production designedsomething for John Hughes, but he didn't
want to design this movie. Andhe told John Hughes that to hire me,
he would come along. It wasa film MO we were going to
do in New York. To hirehim, I would come along, and
then after John was comfortable with me, Neilo would leave. So I guess
(45:52):
all these agents heard that this moviewas going to New York. I was
going to be the production designer,and so I got calls from all these
agents about hiring an art director inNew York. And so I think I
got a call from three or fouragents, and John was John called.
(46:15):
He was with Montana artists, andhe's wanted me to hire any one of
his art and one of his anyway, one of his art directors. On
the Monday night, I literally hadthe ticket to New York in my hand.
That Disney canceled the movie. SoThe following day, I call all
(46:36):
these agents, including John, andsaid the movie has been because every time
I spoke to these agents, theywould say, who's your agent, and
I'd say, I don't have anagent. Oh well we must meet and
talk and blah blah blah. Allof that. I called every single agent,
and every single agent wasn't interested innow hiring me, oh talking to
(46:58):
me as a production because I onlyhad one credit at that time, a
small kids movie called the Legend ofPirates Point or something the Treasure of Pirates
Point. And John at Montagna Artistswas the only person that went, no,
I still want to meet. SoI met him and he got me.
(47:22):
I think he got me. Idon't think i'd done the Legend of
Pirates Point or Treasure of Pirates Point. Then I don't think I had any
credit. Okay, so John gotme that and I literally did this movie.
I don't know how much, becauseI know that I'd built a galleon
and all of that. My budgetwas twenty grand and I handed three grand
(47:42):
back. Wow, that sounds likeyour track record, right, And then
I like people like you then andthen John got me my meeting with Joel
and yeah, I remember I didn'tdo any designs because there was nothing to
really, I don't think there wasa script. I remember doing this poster
(48:06):
that job hated. I understand why, but he still saw something in me
that, like I said, hecalled my agent he said, look,
I think he coordinate. I didn'tget the job, he said, I
really wanted Joseph, but they've gonewith somebody else. And then, thank
god the other person didn't want todo the the series because he came back
(48:28):
and did series. Did they donine or eight? Did I do seven
or eight? I don't know.The last season in La Carlos came back
and took over because I get Iguess he didn't do the movies and things
they wanted to do. Then wentback to television. He took over,
(48:49):
but again he was there was stunningto watch or I heard. So we
had the old CTU and even thoughCTU wouldn't it wasn't going to be I
don't know. I remember people tellingme, I can't believe after watching eight
years of me reusing sets, right, he just struck everything and started again,
(49:12):
and it was like, what awaste? Sure, yeah, yeah,
The keyword is repurposed. You canrepurpose everything, and for our group,
our twenty four universe group online.I guaranteed after this discussion, they're
gonna go back and they're gonna lookat all the sets that you reckon that
you said, well, if younotice this, all the Easter eggs that
are in there, you'll see theblacktop over the desk. You'll see that,
(49:34):
which is amazing. Our group willdo that kind of stuff. They'll
do that kind of research and pullthat up. So no, we appreciate
those again, stories of repurposing andsaving money. Because always there's my whole
every episode. I could watch itwith you guys and go, oh,
you see that there in the background. Yeah, that's that is me paying
(49:55):
homage to this, that's me payinghomage. If you ever seen number two,
I don't think I did in theBunker on the Big three. Actually,
I think it probably is. Thethree on the elevated door is probably
the same font as Thunderbird three.I know in Apollo thirteen. I did
Apollo thirteen, and I know inVirtuosity, and there's another movie I did.
(50:15):
There's a big number two and it'sthe Thunderbird number two. Okay,
Yeah, It's just always those thingsthat, like you know, when we
did Star Trek, you never couldread them. But I know, like
Akudo, he used to do these, like you know, instructions like on
the nuclear nuclear whatever it was,the three points. The rules of the
(50:38):
rules are never eating a restaurant calledMoms, never play cards with a man
called dot with the department exactly becauseI think those are good things that lived
by. That's right. Because onthe on the Enterprise, Yeah, Mike
(51:00):
was doing this big graphic and heI said, oh, it'd be really
cool on the in the in thein the dog to just put a Porsche.
And he goes, we can't dothat. And I think we put
a Porsche and send it's rubber ducks. And it was like, that's fun.
And I think it's become people knowabout it. Now. Have you
(51:21):
seen the rubber ducks or the Porscheon the in the on the on the
deck of the end of because peoplelove that. This was you know,
well, Joseph, why don't wejust start another podcast where we watched the
episodes with you and then you doa commentary because I can tell you there
are three You did three commentaries forthe series, and they were all with
John Kazar and they're so entertaining.I was, I was listening to the
(51:43):
last one you did season six lastnight, and it's like to hear the
two you go back and forth.I love the backstory. I love that
you know the idea of well,this is the set from there, but
you didn't recognize it because we changedthings up. Fascinating John and I.
I John and I were partners ineverything. We used to get the script
(52:07):
and that was our moment of theepisode. We would go to our offices.
Sometimes I would read it in hisoffice, but most of the time
he would lock his door and Iwould lock my door and we would read
the episode because that's the only timewe got to enjoy the surprises or right
right whatever, and then we wouldwe would he would support me no end.
(52:30):
I remember when we did the openingof the episode of the season where
we had the nuclear bomb that goesoff right and see this is right.
So this is because my mouth usedto get me into trouble because I I
don't put I was the saying youdon't put it in gear before you know,
(52:53):
pressing the exhilarator. I remember,I remember, I'm not sure if
we read there with there I'm atthe conference table with all the production crew
and the writers, and we getyou know, so the helicopters crashed in
the middle of the street and there'sa pilot. The pilot has trapped underneath
(53:15):
the rotor blade. And I remembersaying out that, how the fuck does
that happen? How does the pilotfall out of the helicopter and not be
sliced into by this rotor blade?And of course the writers are you know,
they were like, they're just They'relike, well, one, how
dare you talk to us like that? And you know, who do you
(53:37):
think you are? And two you'llfix it because we know you'll fix it,
you know anyway, So so soI said to so I went away,
and I was like, well,we could do is because of lax,
because of the nine to eleven.They were knocking down all these houses
to make a big security center,so all these small houses they were demolishing.
(54:01):
So I said, what we coulddo is take a helicopter and have
it crashed into the top of thisbuilding. Have Jack round the corner and
seize the helicopter up there, thepilot still in it. Jack scales this
building, he pulls the head pullsthe pilot out of their helicopter and the
helicopter you know, falls to theground, big explosion, blah blah blah.
(54:23):
Well, it's a bit expensive forthe TV show, but it's exciting
for the first episode. So Ipushed and pushed and pushed it, and
uh, basically the upm said no, we're not. And I remember telling
John this. Michael's not going togo for it. He doesn't. He
says, I'm going to put Ihave to put the helicopter on the lawn
(54:45):
in front of the house. John'slike, it's just not exciting. So
anyway, John comes to the tothe to the scout with us, and
we're there at the house and I'vegot is the crew I've got. I
don't know how it is, butI know that John's in front of me,
(55:06):
and I'm like doing this, goingthat's the roof. I want to
put it on. And John's fuckinglistening, and it's like, so we're
here's going to put the helicopter andJohn, wouldn't it be more fun to
put the helicopter up on that roof? And Jack climbed this building and it
just falls down and because you know, then the producer, then not the
(55:27):
producer, the Michael Click then goesoff. Okay, obviously you've been talking
to Joseph. And it took us. I mean it was a lot of
way. It took us five days. But then the special effects guys they
were, you know, wires throughthe house and when it's caught and it
had to be safe. I rememberKeifer turning up and he like, you
want me to climb up there.I can do it because I placed the
(55:52):
satellite dish in the television aerial andwhatever. And he you show him once
and Jack and then ck. ThenKeith is like, oh yeah, all
right, and he goes up andhe pulls the pilot out and he goes
and four weeks before that episode aired, Fox would play that scene coming up
(56:14):
on Monday twenty four and and Icalculate, I don't know how many times
it played, but let's add upall those thirty seconds. Yeah, yeah,
that's an hour of television that theypaid, that would have paid for
exciting sequence. Absolutely absolutely well.I mean, I'm you held the line
(56:36):
and you said hitting the accelerated beforeyou shift gears. That's pretty much how
you described twenty four So in thespirit of twenty four. I would think
you held the line and it paidoff because, like I said, you
were successful in getting your the lookand saying this is what twenty four is.
And we appreciate that from an audiencelevel, in so many ways,
(56:58):
we appreciate that. Yeah, technicalbarrister,
It's perfect for Netflix because you canyou can spend the weekend watching it.
I mean they did some crazy thingson twenty four. Oh yeah season No,
I mean the sort of the showbehind it. We had a competition.
There was a competition. People cameand sat in the bunker. They
watched the whole series in one weekendin the bunker. They've won. They've
(00:59):
won a compety issues. So theycame and watched it. People would call
them, they said, no,it's a family gathering. People would go
to work, go home off ona Monday night, go home, change
shower, go back to work tobe with their coworkers, co workers to
watch the show. It was amazing. People, you know, families would
(01:21):
get together and I you know,and they'd say even the three year old
and was like, oh really.It was like, yeah, I know
it's a bit too young for them, but you know, the whole family.
There was a gathering. We're sopleased to have Joseph Hodges joining us
today and talking about twenty four andthe twenty years of twenty four. How
did you get connected to the show? Just my agent, I mean I
(01:42):
interviewed for the pilot and Joel actuallygave me the job. Well, he
called my agent and said, look, I really want Joseph to do it,
and I'm not sure, and Ireally can't remember. I'm not sure
if he said I really want himto do it, but because i'd also
into viewed with some somebody at thestudio and I didn't and Joel called my
(02:06):
agent and said, I really wantedJoseph to do it, but the studio
won't go for it because he doesn'thave as much experience as this other person.
So, and my agent did representthe other person, so I guess
that's why he knew. This otherperson got the pilot, and so they
shot the pilot and then from whatI was told, that that person didn't
(02:31):
want to do the series because hewanted to just do movies. He was
quite happy to do pilots, buthe didn't want to do the series.
And so Joel called my agent andsaid, would I do the series?
The same guy at Fox made meinterview with him again, so I remember
going in and I'm sure I didn'tget the job at that point, and
(02:52):
I remember walking out of his officeand as I was leaving his office,
I turned around and I said,you know, he had this painting behind
him. Really liked it. Itwas very It was a bit it was
obscure, but I could tell withthe colors and its shapes and things,
and it was very Spanish, youknow. To me it looked like tiles
Spanish houses. And I said,oh, by the way, I like
(03:12):
your your Spanish villa's painting. Andhe was like, what you can see
that? And I was like,yeah, I like it. And I'm
left and I think, I don'tknow if that convinced him that perhaps,
like you know, I hadn't theeye great detailed. So so so then
I started. So I started ontwenty four and I remember, as you
say, I watched the pilot,okay, and I fast forwarded the VHS
(03:37):
tape because I wanted to know whatI knew. There was no other but
I fast forwarded it till the endof the tape finish, and so I
watched it and I asked Joel.So I went back to Joel and I
said, listen, you they shotit all on on locations. See you's
location. I want to make ita bit more high tech. There was
brickwork and the ceiling it was allwood. It was They shot it into
(04:00):
Fox Sports a Fox Sports set wherethey not the set, but where the
Fox Sports people were in journalists orI don't know. So Joel said,
sure, you can. You canmake it more high tech. And we
also shot. We did the thewhole to three minutes of the opening in
(04:25):
the Kuala Lumpur streets. I builtthat in the parking lot when the guy
goes into this hut and makes thetelephone call and then the other guy that
gets the phone call that there's goingto be assassination. That was all added.
That wasn't part of the original pilotNoel and Joe, so I think
(04:46):
we were. I had been therefor three days and Stephen Hopkins, the
director of the pilot, who wasthen going to do every two episodes,
every other two episodes, he cameto my office. I think, I
don't know if I ran into him. I think he came to my office
and he said, so little Birdstold me that Joel's a little not upset,
but he's a little worried that hehasn't seen you for three days.
(05:10):
And I was like, you shouldgo and talk to him. So I
said, okay, I mean Idid talk to him, and I'm making
a high ten and it's just threeday, I've got to do drawings and
blah blah blah. So anyway,so I went to Joel's office and I
remember what I wanted to say wasJoel, I hear, you know,
he might be a little worried.I want to tell you. You know,
the way I work is, Igive a you know, I'll do
(05:30):
the whole design and then I'll presentit to you rather than piecemeal. And
all I got out was Joel,the way I work is, He goes,
no, let me stop you there, let me tell you how I
work. And he proceeded to tellme how it was a hands on producer
and blah blah blah, and heneeded to see everything. I said,
yeah, no problem, Absolutely noproblem. So I finished the design,
(05:54):
showed it to him through, andthen from then on I would present everything
to him. We would walk thesets and he would, you know,
just walk through the sets with meand perhaps make a little I remember walking
through some kids' bedroom once and hemade some changes. But then and I
can't remember. I thought it wasfive episodes in, but now I'm thinking
(06:16):
about it. What it must havebeen season two when Keifer, I mean
Jack is in a police station,he's arrested and he's in a in a
cell. Right, yes, sothat's season two, okay, So so
that must have been the whole waythrough the first season. Joel hands On
(06:39):
producer, he needed to see everything, and I showed him everything that episode.
I went to him, I said, so the police station, what
are you thinking? He goes,oh, you know, ye have police
station and the NYPD bleue that kindof look, and I said, Joel,
I'm trying to give you a coollooking show. I'm trying to do
I'm I told him, in mymind, I was always doing James Bond
(07:01):
that it was. It was real, but there was a there was a
style style to it. At thetime on television you could only watch West
Wing and Er and it was allbased in the real world. I really
even when Palmer had an American flagin a painting behind him, I had
(07:25):
done that painting. It was veryobscure. I know in the first season
when Palmer is doing his speech,the massive American flag there. But that's
what they produced. But I triedto I tried my best to just make
a World of twenty four. Soanyway, Joe that so I said to
Joe, look I'm trying to giveyou a cool looking shut and I'm trying
(07:46):
to create a look. And soI said, there's this police station in
North Hollywood that I don't know whatthe interior looks like, but the exterior
glass block and it's quite kind ofsleep So I want to do, you
know, the scene in the Matrixwhere Keano's mouth getting zipped up, just
light green. I want to dothe whole police station like that. Okay,
(08:11):
give it a go. Wow.So I designed this police station and
as you can see, it wasall it was very much like no other
police station you'd seen except in ohit wasn't really a police station in the
Matrix, it was just this room. So it's that green anyway. So
I'm walking Joel through the set,and Joel finishes walking through the set and
(08:31):
at that point he just turns tome and goes, Okay, you're my
production designer. We don't need totalk about sets anymore. I leave that
out to you. I trust you. Yeah. So that must have been
a year, you know, thebeginning of season two and from then on
for the next well, I dideight seasons. So so for the next
one hundred and seventy episodes or minusthe first season. I never talked to
(08:56):
Joel about sets, and directors wouldarrive and they would say, Oh,
I shot this location last week andI really want to go back there,
and I'd look at pictures and Isaid, no, I'm afraid that that's
not twenty four they would want toshoot. There's no craftsmen houses, there's
none of that. Directors would bewould be shocked that I had, But
no, that was it was.I know that the when they were doing
(09:20):
pilot season, Bruce more Garlis,the guy who was sort of the go
between between the studio and our production, he came to me and he said,
oh, it's pilot season again.There's a lot of upset production designers
out there. And I was like, why because they don't believe that they
all asked for the same money tobuild the sets as you do, or
(09:43):
as they want the same money astwenty four gefts, and they don't believe
me when I tell them they've alreadygot more. Wow. Because I had
to warehouses, we had this hugespace that I could leave sets up.
I didn't have, like I saythat parking lot was. The crew would
be sometimes upset because they couldn't partthere. They had to park on the
(10:07):
street because I built the construction sitethere the Colquala Lumpur streets. Then when
the girls are being chased through somethe the warehouse, it was kind of
two warehouses and a corridor that ledto all the offices up the front,
but then above there was this otherfloor. So I knocked these whole walls
(10:31):
out and I could hang backings.When we did a I can't even remember,
was it the first season where wedid the bomb shelter and there was
a spiral staircase that went down thatcould have been the second seas right,
Kevin Dillen, Yeah, yeah,I mean I would. I'd be able
(10:52):
to. I had a lot ofspace and I could leave stuff up.
People called when we did the OntarioAirport and as up in the ceiling of
the airport, like we've been tothat location, there is no ceiling space
up there. I was. Ino, I built it on stage because
it was I had a set thatI had then repurposed and put something else
(11:13):
in. I know, we couldyou could change it up for whatever you
wanted it to be. That BlackEven movie and he's in a sewer and
they had called us because they wantedto know what sewers we shot in,
because they Health and Safety wouldn't letthem shoot in any sewers. I know
we didn't cheat them in the sewers. We only shot. I built it
(11:33):
on stage here and again because Iwas in control of it. Here you
placed the camera. It was onlytwenty feet long and a t junction.
But because I had placed you know, it was art directed. You placed
the camera here, and that's yourshot. He discussed it with the director.
That's all he needs is Jack orwhoever was coming into that. So
(11:56):
the show looked much more expensive.Like when Jack is on the oil rig.
We went to an oil rig andwe did shoot there briefly, but
because it's so dangerous, I builtin a tank in Downy, like the
legs that came down into the seaand the shot of them going in the
(12:20):
dinghy towards the oil refinery. Theoil rig oil platform is on stage in
a parking lot. I did thebit where there's a helicopter coming in and
there's a big explosion and all ofthat. That's in the parking lot.
Again. Wow, but it justYeah, they obviously gave us extra money
(12:43):
for certain things. I remember whenwe scouted the David Palmer's at the White
House. At some point the endof the season something or other. He
talks to Jack on the phone andJack is out between some palettes. Anyway,
we had checked out the West Wingset. We drove out there,
(13:05):
we'd check it out. It wasgoing to cost us to rent it,
rent the set, and when youtake a crew on location, let's say
it's sixty grand a day. Lookby the time you pay, you know,
all the fees, the rentals,having people catered out there rather than
on the stage. So let's say, so, I you know, we
(13:28):
scouted this and it was going tocost us sixty And I said to John
Cassar was directing the episode, andI said, for thirty grand, I
can build this by next Wednesday onstage. Obviously not all of this,
but we don't need all of thisbut corridor. John, you just need
a long wall with windows and willput columns in the foreground. And John's
like, yeah, sure that worksfor me. So of course we all
(13:50):
go back and Michael clicked, Ithink there was the upm at that point,
and I do the drawings and Isaid, so I've got thirty grand,
right, he goes, no,I know, you've only got twenty
five. And I was like,well, but I said I could do
it for thirty. Well, yougot twenty five negotiation, So we did,
and for years I just said,when something costs twenty five grand,
(14:13):
it costs twenty five grand. Andeventually I was so beaten down. I
was like, okay, so Isaid, to my cause I'll play the
game that everybody plays. This isgoing to cost forty grand. Oh,
well, you've only got thirty.And I remember doing that once and Michael
said you've only got thirty. Iwas like okay, and I walked out.
He says, that's all right.I was like, yeah, it
was only going to cost thirty anyway, but you made me play this game.
(14:37):
Yeah, exactly exactly it was.It was when I said it was
going to cost that much, itwould cost that much, and then so
the other the only other thing Isticks because then the CTU changed at the
end of season three to season four. Right, yeah, and again only
because Joel had that faith in me. So I went to So I heard
(15:03):
we were moving, right, theywere knocking down our studio. There's apartments
there now this warehouse and so we'removing up to Chatsworth and I'd seen this
building on Scouts before and it wasthis amazing glass block front and it had
these two massive feet concrete feet thatoriginally I'm sure when they built it because
(15:28):
there were no trees there, thefeet were reflected in the glass and it
was just to me, it wasjust so beautiful. Now behind beyond that,
beyond that facade is just a warehouse. It literally is trucks parked at
angles down the side. But soanyway, so I loved that. So
(15:50):
Joel, so I heard we weregoing to build. Joel said, yeah,
we're moving stage and so I wentto see him and he said,
well, just rebuild ct you andI may. We've been living in it
for three years. Can I designa new CTU? And he was like,
oh well. And I didn't takea holiday that year. Usually you
(16:11):
get a month off, and Istayed at home and I remember doing build
the built the model in the computerand I had it pinned up in my
house on the windows. Joel said, I said, look that draw it.
The design has been done. Comeand see them, because bring them
to the office. I said,no, look, come to my house.
(16:32):
He only lives around the corner.So they came and they approved,
but it had these huge concrete feetin there because people were always a bit
confused because we never really established theoutside right. No, not no,
we did. We did a carexplosion there, but you know we didn't
really catch those fee you can ifyou're quick about it. So I was
(16:53):
able to design this really really coolspace and again still had what we called
the magic try angle, which wasJack's office or whoever, and again that
space because twenty four was all butalways about shooting very wide angle, lens
up tired, very long, lensare far away, and television, the
(17:15):
law of television. The sets intelevision changed because they were all can't you
know the west wing? You know, you can tell, I can always
tell when they've just done the sameloop, right. Spielberg actually said to
I think John Spielberg once, andSpielberg said, the thing he liked about
twenty four was even though you don'tdo establishing shots, you always knew where
(17:38):
you were. Somebody asked me onceabout the boldness of the colors, and
it was like, because we don'tshoot wirds, you need to know exactly
where you are immediately. So eachlook had to be distinct. Yeah.
Yeah. And then also we usedto do things like we shot an airport
once or no, we shot whatwas supposed to be an airport once over
(18:00):
seven different locations. Because somebody askedme, was it a signature of mine
to paint lines on the you know, strikes on corridors and things, and
I was like, I like itbecause it blocks it, it breaks up
the space, but mainly because I'vegot seven different locations that all of different
(18:21):
architecture slightly that when you just seethis big blue line down it, you
go, oh, I'm still inthe airport or something. So that was
a trick I used a lot soas a point of reference for the audience
to say, oh, this iswhere we are now. Yeah, yeah,
you know, because of the realtime aspect, like we used to
(18:41):
shoot a shoot the location, andthen the following episode that they hadn't written
yet once we got that. Ithink there was an episode where Jack is
somebody's in a safe room and atthe end of that episode they're still in
the safe room or they are comingout. Anyway, I had to build
the corridor of that house plus awall that looked like they had just come
(19:03):
from the living room so we woulddo those things because it was only a
couple of hours to shoot that onescene. We didn't they didn't want to
go back to the back, tothe to the location just for that couple
of hours. What I mean,what what season was it where Audrey gets
kidnapped at the beginning her and herfather? Oh? Season four, yeah,
(19:26):
which which was the abduction, right, right? So the abduction because
I think the season before i'd donea little bit of second unit. Not
it's not second unit directing. Itwas literally inserts, right, perhaps because
of that telephone thing I was,or you know, they gave some of
(19:47):
their stuff. I remember doing somesome inserts. But then Audrey gets kidnapped
in that first episode of that season. So John was John Cassar was directing
that episode and we couldn't squeeze inthree hours of filming, and John Gazar
said, well the whole thing withAudrey getting kidnaped, the terrorists coming down
(20:07):
the street, and let Joseph directit. And everyone went, are you
sure, Yeah, yeah, yeah, he'll be fine, he'll be fine.
So because I you know, storyboarddied, this whole sequence, great
going down because I had three hoursand John that I remember breakfast, showing
him the storyboards, and John's like, you got thirty set ups here,
(20:27):
I need three shots. I needthis shot, the truck pulling up,
lad this and that, this andthat. Just make sure you get those
three shots and you can do whateveryou want. Was like, all right,
So in my usual way, Ikind of made sure. I knew
I was going to get what Johnwanted. But I did what I wanted
(20:47):
to do. I walked my waydown the street. I did all these
shots, got everything that I hadstoryboard and what John wanted. John turns
up after three hours he go,so did you get my three shots?
And I'm like yeah, and ifyou see you didn't have time to do
yours. I said, no,I got everything. I did it all.
(21:07):
I had it planned. We didthis, this and this, and
when you do second unit, peoplemove up, like the focus puller is
now the camera operator and the gafferis a DP and everyone's moved up.
So everybody's really enthusiastic. You know, they want to shoot as much as
they can because it goes on theirreel. Right, so everyone like works
(21:27):
like a charm. So so Job'slike, well, the crew are still
on their way, so let's doit a couple more. So, I
think we do a little. There'sa shot of somebody leaping over the bushes
or something in the front yard.And and from then on John used to
(21:48):
give me or I used to getto direct second unit. I'd be downtown
La three o'clock in the morning witha small cruise car chases and oh yeah,
I mean that was the first timeyou had done that was the Heller
abduction scene. Yeah, that wasmy first that first scene with the with
the terrorists, the truck screeching toa halt, the guys jumping out,
(22:11):
walking down the street, hitting theguys in suits ran backing up, and
the door opening. I'm not sureif I had a double or John did
that bit. It's a long timeago. M hm. Well, I
mean everybody that's listening this should goto your portfolio site, because I watched
that on your portfolio site yesterday,the abduction scene, and that you directed
(22:34):
that, and that led obviously tomore directing, which is which is pretty
ama is it? Because we gotbecause we did the prequels, That's when
I got to do most directing isthe well, no, they so I
didn't know at the time, becauseso every year you re negotiate your deal
and part of the following year orsomething. Because they didn't want to pay
(22:55):
me any more money as the productiondesigner. My agent got thirty days to
directing guaranteed, which were only meantfifteen because the DGA rules are you get
one day of directing and you getpaid one day of prep. I would
much prefer to have got the thirtydays of directing for the same money.
But anyway, it doesn't matter.I found out really since or later on,
(23:18):
that that doesn't apply if you're actuallyworking on the show. I could
have directed thirty days, got it. But one of the producers, I
don't know how many years he was. I think he was only there,
perhaps two years. I remember whenI got that deal. He called me
to his office and I walked inand he says, close the door,
(23:41):
and I closed the door. Hegoes, what the fuck do you think
you're doing? Taking food off myplate? And I was like, what
you get him directing? Because hewas directing some of the stuff, And
I was like, I don't know. It was the beginning. There was
it. You can see if youwatch the show. You don't have to
watch it carefully, but you cansee I peeked at the President's Retreat.
(24:06):
Yes, yes, Joel, youknow there was me just doing water because
again the sixties themed one, yeah, that was that was supposed to be
Camp David was Camp David, andI think I'd seen Camp David on the
West Wing. And again I waslike, Joel, it's old cottages in
(24:27):
the woods. It's just nothing spectacular. Can I design? He has horses,
his family has horses. It's thePresident's retreat. I built this pool
outside, which not a pooled,but just some water that you never do
on stage because of leaks, soI could reflect the light in. It
had this ceiling so you wouldn't shootoff it. People would call to ask
(24:48):
where the location was because they wantedto shoot it, and it was on
stage. And that's when I thinkI peaked. And I love that set
so much that off happened that yearand then I just you could see by
the time I left at season eight, did we do division? That's just
a gray box, right right,I kind of given up. It was
(25:11):
like I was so beat and that'swhy I left. It was like I
can't carry on right, And youcan say I was thinking about it the
other day you could see it inthat set. I just I wasn't even
going to try and persuade anybody thatthe FBI or wherever it was should be
a cool space. It was like, okay, I'm just designing an office.
You held the torch as long asyou could. Yeah, yeah,
(25:34):
yeah. No. One of thethings that stood out that really prepared us
to talk to you today, HowardGordon used the phrase twenty four was always
five minutes ahead of everything else,and nothing describes that as much as the
set design of twenty four was that, like you said, this is the
standard that I wanted to be andI don't want it to look like everybody
(25:55):
else. And we knew that rightfrom the beginning that this was knowledge,
this cinematic. This wasn't just anormal, regular old TV show. This
had a sheene to it. Andwhen you reference James Bond, I totally
got it. They totally understood itwas meant to be five minutes ahead.
I've got tears in my eyes andstumps because I tried so hard. Yeah,
you succeeded, You succeeded. Iappreciate that because I always argued that
(26:22):
we I'm not the writers are thereto entertain. The actors are there to
entertain, and I'm there to entertainas well. Where to entertain like a
Bond movie. Yeah, I had. Yeah, I mean it was eight
long years. They were the firstfive or six years with Fight. The
(26:44):
last two. Well, I leftbecause I asked to direct some episodes and
if I didn't get to direct,i'd believe, and they said no,
and I left because again I justcouldn't wrap my head around it because I
think I know what's when? Didwe have the writer's strike during seasons seven?
(27:04):
Between? Yeah, seasons No,it was before before before Redemption,
just before because Redemption kind of camein as the interim, right, yeah,
after season six, right because Igot I had done a shoot for
a friend for Black the video game, and then I did this shoot.
(27:26):
Well, I was prepping this shootfor Need for Speed Undercover and listen,
yeah that one, oh yeah,oh yes, and thank you for thank
you for that. By the way, I love racing games. I just
did the the live action stuff inthe middle, right, yeah, And
(27:49):
the week before or two weeks beforewe were going to shoot here, the
writers strike ended. We went backto work on twenty four. But I've
been working on that prepping it fora month at least, and I think
I called the UPM to tell himthat I wouldn't make the production meeting the
(28:10):
following week because I was directing thisthis video game. And he came to
my office and he closed the doorand says, say, you have to
make a decision. You either dotwenty four or this video game. And
I was like, well, i'vebeen I can't fun a video game.
They've been they expecting me to.So I think it was like a Tuesday
(28:34):
or a Wednesday. I said,look, I'll work till the end of
the week till you find somebody else, but I have to go and do
this video game. And he didn'teven walk out and let me sort of
think about it. He kind ofstood there and went, oh, well
that changes things all right, Wellwe'll have to work around it. And
I was like, again, Iwas sort of so deflated that they would
(28:56):
even try and pull that on me, because you know, twenty four was
everything to me. I died forthat show. I worked so hard and
I loved everything. I'm pissed peopleoff because I pushed. I didn't realize
that everything you do doesn't have tobe the best it can be all the
time. I guess that's your standard. Though. That's a standard I know,
(29:19):
and I try even today, youknow, not to be like that.
My daughter helps having a family.Having a daughter and having to have
a job. I guess to feedthem makes a bit of a difference.
But I didn't then and or mybaby was twenty four. Yeah, and
I get so upset when I watchan episode and there was an orange ladder
(29:42):
in the background or a piece ofplywood on the floor, and you know,
John can't cook. I used towalk on set. I didn't go
to set towards the end because Iwould just get upset John because I would
say, oh, here comes witheagle eye Hodges. I literally walk past
the monitor and go, is thatthat's not the shot? Right? Yeah?
(30:03):
Why? You know, Jay andand Guy the two cameras, it's
like, why, what's wrong?I was like, you can't see that
orange ladder and they looked through thelegs. I was like, yeah,
okay, I guess we should cansomeone move that orange ladder? And that's
just my eye. But that's whatyou were hired to be. You were
hired to be the eye of twentyfour. But they did me there was
(30:26):
this there's this scene with the president'swife in the garden. She's meeting somebody.
And I had designed this concrete slaband a big concrete post, only
this concrete slab so that Rodney couldput a light on it, so he
had a light in the middle ofthis black space, so he had some
(30:48):
a reason to have a light outthere. And I remember watching the episode
and the camera comes around and inthe background on this lawn is an orange
ladder and I'm like, nobody seeyou know, no one does that.
But again, that's that was justmy that's my baggage that I needed it
to be perfect and I and peopledidn't like me for that because I just
(31:12):
would push porsch porsch and I didn'tdidn't, I didn't care if i'd John
Casar would have a meeting with theproducers every year too. He tell me,
John, I got that. Igot that meeting again. Oh,
to save my job, He goes, he had to save your job.
He go every year and he'd convincethem that no Joseph does all this and
(31:36):
he saves us this because he heyou know what he does. And then
I think the last time he went, he goes, I've got that meeting
again. I was like, okay, and he went to the meeting.
He came back with his huge smilein his face. He goes, I
don't know what's happened. They musthave heard that you're threatening to leave,
because they saying, what can wedo to keep Joseph here? That's the
right answer, That's the right answer. That was it. But yeah,
(31:59):
I laughed and I loved all thepeople. I mean, I was like
I say, I was. Youcan see I guess you've been online.
There is that there is an interviewwith me in the President's Retreat Beard.
I'm overway, I'm not happy,and I can't remember. Some stuff was
happening in the background, and Iguess that I think it was. The
(32:23):
retreat was so beautiful to me andcalled me to the set on the first
day of the shoot and sort ofeverybody was there and he wanted to congratulate
me for just such an amazing space. But I don't know if I don't
know if something happened and I wasjust you can see I was really depressed
(32:45):
and everyone could see. I mean, I wouldn't say, I wouldn't speak
to people, and it was hot, so like twenty four. To me,
it was the best and best oftimes and the worst of times.
I don't I mean, I knowthat when we did because Redemption was the
first four episodes of season something orother than the studio didn't like and so
(33:07):
instead of writing the TV movie,they just brought out these four first four
episodes or first two episodes of whateverseason it was. And I did go
to South Africa to shoot, andI prepped it all, and see there
was one of those things. Iprepped it all. And then we had
hired an art director there to do, you know, to complete my vision
(33:30):
or you know whatever we had designedand built there. And then I remember
that, you know, the TVmovie came out and they put his name
on the credit of the joint creditproduction designer, and I was like,
he was my art director, andhere's those things that I I mean,
I'm sure he did a good job, but he he just was doing my
(33:50):
bidding, if you say it exactly. But anyway, the best of times
in the worst of times. Youmight if we go back to the presidential
retreat, because I love that said, do you remember what what made you
choose that motif? That look?Yeah, well, it was just thunderbirds.
(34:13):
I mean everything everything has that thunderbirdnineteen sixties just pinpointed it. Wow,
and you've got when Keifer was whenin the presidential because I saved it
and it went into different sets.The first bunker, the desk is a
copy of Jeff Tracey's desk, redleather top and the aluminium strip. Yes,
(34:39):
it's just a copy. It's noteven influenced. I copy the bunker
that I did later on, veryyellow with the big holes in the water.
Those are copies that in the sunkenseating area that's where Captain Scarlett and
the angels. That's the angels.It's bloreed my mind that it's not I
(35:05):
mean originally, I mean those thosepanels that have the ellipses and the circles,
that literally is a copy from thethunderbolt, from the Captain's scarlet fair
the big beams with holes in them. No, and you know it hasn't
that flavor and so the yeah,if if you were doing you know Jeff
(35:27):
Tracy's uh it was it was,Yes, it's the it's a combination of
everything you know to do the LikeI said, it has that flavor that
sixties flavor. You know. Thedesk was my idea was to have this
hue instead of a big square desk. I wanted to cut like a big
redwood. So if you never sawa close up of it, the painters
(35:49):
did an amazing job, as ifyou'd cut a piece of redwood and you
could see. I wanted. Ididn't. I ran out of time,
but I actually before we varnished it, wanted to put kind of dates and
things. This is where the CivilWar happened. This is what this happened.
It would have been amazing peace.But the silhouette is the spitfire wings.
(36:10):
They're just like I think there's somebehind the scenes stuff once that I
would just I was so into Formulaone that I would just pick the colors
from a for like the NHS arethe Renault colors, the turquoise, yellow
and white and blue. I thinkI was having fun. I always had
(36:34):
fun, and I wanted the audiencethat had fun. I was just yeah,
I remember we did this one.We did this one set that I
copyed I saw out of a bootiquehotel room. It was just bright yellow
walls and gray plaster and all ofthis. It was an amazing set.
(36:54):
It was actually where Keifer and Jackand Audrey are in this hotel room the
beginning of a season. Yes,I get called to the set because Rodney
had sort of said he hated theyellow. Literally, myself and the painters
were painting the walls gray while helit the set. Because he hadn't lit
(37:16):
the set, he hadn't prepped itso he couldn't be seen to be taking
two hours to light the set,so he said that the yellow wouldn't work.
And it was such a shame becausethe whole set is only lit by
a sliver of light coming through thecurtains, that it's just a black space
(37:39):
because we painted it gray. Butif you'd had the yellow, it would
have just been again another one ofthose like wow. I mean people would
sometimes I shot, I drew stuff, or we built stuff fluorescent greens,
and I don't know. I wasexperimenting. I was in my playground.
(37:59):
I knew, I kind of knewwhat I was doing, but I was
always I was always. It waslike I had an interview with me when
I finished the new CTU and theguy asked me, you know, what
do you you know, how doyou feel about this? And it was
like well, when I was akid, I used to design stuff and
build it on my desk, houses, or you know whatever it was.
(38:22):
Now I just do the same thing, but I have sixty guys that build
it, and people like Joel allowedme to do that. I mean,
Joel was just such a joy toHe would have let you. I mean
you'd walk into his office if youhad an idea. You get halfway through
(38:42):
the sentence and you go no,and then you carry on talking about it,
and you go I said no.At the same time, you'd get
halfway through he goes, yeah,sure, and you carry on explaining us.
Didn't I say yes, okay,And he was like that. It
was like yes, no and yeahno. I mean he was he was
(39:05):
a great fat Like I said,it was that second season. I thought
it was. I've been telling peoplefor years it was like the fifth episode.
It must have been the fifth episodeor the first episode of the second
season, So he must have.I showed him everything in the first season,
and then after that he didn't needto be bothered with me. And
(39:28):
again, like I say, itsaves you money because if you design something
that you know, you know.I've interviewed for jobs and you've done a
design and they love it, andyou start Monday morning and they go,
so we want this, Well,I don't understand that's Victorian and that's going
to cost a fortune with all thatdetail. Again, that architecture that I
(39:52):
that I use, that sort ofsixty stuff. It's very like the laminated
beans. Yes, they take lottake a while to pain, but it's
a very simple form. There's nota lot of waste of money. When
I worked with Neli Rhodis, heshowed me when we did Virtuosity, he
(40:13):
showed me a window. He goesyou see this window, there's no sill.
He goes up like this. Sowhen I was designing the bit,
where ah, what's the actor DenzelDenzel? Yes, when Denzel walked in,
he walked into a room, hetakes his clothes off. He then
(40:34):
walks into another room and he getsscanned. Yes, I was like,
why does it have to be aroom, Let's just make it a cattle
trough. Okay. And then thedoors. If you make a hinge big
enough, you don't need a door. And those doors are just a big
hinge. The doors to the bunker, I'm not sure if they ever closed.
(40:55):
They're the same design that I didon Virtuosity, massive massive hinges.
So you don't waste money on doinglittle things that people won't see. Right,
So again all the money ends upon screen. You don't waste anything.
(41:17):
And then again because I didn't haveto, it wasn't designed by committee.
I remember working on Star Trek.Well, first of all, we
did two episodes at once. Soby the time I got a script,
by the time we shot for thecurrent episode for sixteen days and then started
those two episodes, perhaps I'd havetwenty five days before a set needed to
(41:43):
be built maximum. Now, ona regular television show, you get a
script, you have to have thesets ready in seven twelve days max.
But because I had so much moretime. And then because when you do
a design, then it goes tothe producers. The producers could have their
well, they can approve it,and if they don't. If they don't
(42:04):
prove approve it, you then haveto redraw it presented again. Then now
we're building at the weekend, peopleare on time and a half, so
your set then has to be redrawnand made smaller. So these TV sets
get smaller and smaller and smaller.WHA was on twenty four. I was
like, okay, I know whatI'm doing. This is the set.
I share the director and he goes, okay, i'd need a door here
(42:29):
or you know, we change thelayout, but the look it's mine.
And so the sets could stay onebecause they perhaps reused of other sets.
I mean the President's retreat in thefirst episode. No, in a second
season, he's in a bunker,right, he's in a He's in a
(42:49):
retreat. Palmer is in a retreat, right, yes, yes, yes.
That set is refurbished the year afterfor Division Armas In. It's the
same corridor, it's all, butit's all completely different, high tech,
the Thunderbird, Jeff Tracey's desk,it's still it's still in that set.
(43:10):
I put a black top on itthat time, and the leather. The
ceiling lights have those three strips,the squares, three strips of aluminium.
I remember that. The lights inthe walls that I drill. When you
got a war light, I wouldalways draw holes in them so that behind
an actor's head you didn't just havethe light going up and down. You
(43:30):
had these like high spots of lightbehind them. That's the same set.
It's like the eras family. That'swhat their name was. The Era.
The Era's family home was repurposed forthe bunker, not Palmer. What's the
other president we had, the presidentthat we had at the retreat, logan
(43:58):
Logan, Yes, yes, hewas in a bunker. Yes, yeah.
Now if you watch that again,when the elevator is upstairs and he
comes out of the elevators and downthe steps, well that's the first floor
of the bedrooms for the Eras family. The steps are the same. That
corridor was the hallway to the kitchen, and the room to the left was
(44:21):
their living room and something else.But but yeah, I wouldn't strike anything.
But I could leave things up forperhaps months, and then you know,
just come back to them. Andyou know, if you work on
a lot and you've got one stage, you have to strike a set It
cost you to strike it, foldit, have construction, bring it out,
(44:42):
set it up, and you've onlyset it up. You've spent thousands
and you haven't done anything with ityet. Wow. So again, I
never you know, you never getthat freedom. How did you sorry,
I was gonna say, how didyou So you mentioned Joe sir, now
was the one who hired you tobe on twenty four. So did you
(45:04):
happen to know Joel before twenty fouror no, my agent just I had
signed. I'm my agent. Igot Nilo that I mentioned before, Nilo
Rhodis he he I met him onVirtuosity. He was going to do a
(45:28):
John Hughes movie and he'd production designedsomething for John Hughes, but he didn't
want to design this movie. Andhe told John Hughes that to hire me,
he would come along. It wasa film MO we were going to
do in New York. To hirehim, I would come along, and
then after John was comfortable with me, Neilo would leave. So I guess
(45:52):
all these agents heard that this moviewas going to New York. I was
going to be the production designer,and so I got calls from all these
agents about hiring an art director inNew York. And so I think I
got a call from three or fouragents, and John was John called.
(46:15):
He was with Montana artists, andhe's wanted me to hire any one of
his art and one of his anyway, one of his art directors. On
the Monday night, I literally hadthe ticket to New York in my hand.
That Disney canceled the movie. SoThe following day, I call all
(46:36):
these agents, including John, andsaid the movie has been because every time
I spoke to these agents, theywould say, who's your agent, and
I'd say, I don't have anagent. Oh well we must meet and
talk and blah blah blah. Allof that. I called every single agent,
and every single agent wasn't interested innow hiring me, oh talking to
(46:58):
me as a production because I onlyhad one credit at that time, a
small kids movie called the Legend ofPirates Point or something the Treasure of Pirates
Point. And John at Montagna Artistswas the only person that went, no,
I still want to meet. SoI met him and he got me.
(47:22):
I think he got me. Idon't think i'd done the Legend of
Pirates Point or Treasure of Pirates Point. Then I don't think I had any
credit. Okay, so John gotme that and I literally did this movie.
I don't know how much, becauseI know that I'd built a galleon
and all of that. My budgetwas twenty grand and I handed three grand
(47:42):
back. Wow, that sounds likeyour track record, right, And then
I like people like you then andthen John got me my meeting with Joel
and yeah, I remember I didn'tdo any designs because there was nothing to
really, I don't think there wasa script. I remember doing this poster
(48:06):
that job hated. I understand why, but he still saw something in me
that, like I said, hecalled my agent he said, look,
I think he coordinate. I didn'tget the job, he said, I
really wanted Joseph, but they've gonewith somebody else. And then, thank
god the other person didn't want todo the the series because he came back
(48:28):
and did series. Did they donine or eight? Did I do seven
or eight? I don't know.The last season in La Carlos came back
and took over because I get Iguess he didn't do the movies and things
they wanted to do. Then wentback to television. He took over,
(48:49):
but again he was there was stunningto watch or I heard. So we
had the old CTU and even thoughCTU wouldn't it wasn't going to be I
don't know. I remember people tellingme, I can't believe after watching eight
years of me reusing sets, right, he just struck everything and started again,
(49:12):
and it was like, what awaste? Sure, yeah, yeah,
The keyword is repurposed. You canrepurpose everything, and for our group,
our twenty four universe group online.I guaranteed after this discussion, they're
gonna go back and they're gonna lookat all the sets that you reckon that
you said, well, if younotice this, all the Easter eggs that
are in there, you'll see theblacktop over the desk. You'll see that,
(49:34):
which is amazing. Our group willdo that kind of stuff. They'll
do that kind of research and pullthat up. So no, we appreciate
those again, stories of repurposing andsaving money. Because always there's my whole
every episode. I could watch itwith you guys and go, oh,
you see that there in the background. Yeah, that's that is me paying
(49:55):
homage to this, that's me payinghomage. If you ever seen number two,
I don't think I did in theBunker on the Big three. Actually,
I think it probably is. Thethree on the elevated door is probably
the same font as Thunderbird three.I know in Apollo thirteen. I did
Apollo thirteen, and I know inVirtuosity, and there's another movie I did.
(50:15):
There's a big number two and it'sthe Thunderbird number two. Okay,
Yeah, It's just always those thingsthat, like you know, when we
did Star Trek, you never couldread them. But I know, like
Akudo, he used to do these, like you know, instructions like on
the nuclear nuclear whatever it was,the three points. The rules of the
(50:38):
rules are never eating a restaurant calledMoms, never play cards with a man
called dot with the department exactly becauseI think those are good things that lived
by. That's right. Because onthe on the Enterprise, Yeah, Mike
(51:00):
was doing this big graphic and heI said, oh, it'd be really
cool on the in the in thein the dog to just put a Porsche.
And he goes, we can't dothat. And I think we put
a Porsche and send it's rubber ducks. And it was like, that's fun.
And I think it's become people knowabout it. Now. Have you
(51:21):
seen the rubber ducks or the Porscheon the in the on the on the
deck of the end of because peoplelove that. This was you know,
well, Joseph, why don't wejust start another podcast where we watched the
episodes with you and then you doa commentary because I can tell you there
are three You did three commentaries forthe series, and they were all with
John Kazar and they're so entertaining.I was, I was listening to the
(51:43):
last one you did season six lastnight, and it's like to hear the
two you go back and forth.I love the backstory. I love that
you know the idea of well,this is the set from there, but
you didn't recognize it because we changedthings up. Fascinating John and I.
I John and I were partners ineverything. We used to get the script
(52:07):
and that was our moment of theepisode. We would go to our offices.
Sometimes I would read it in hisoffice, but most of the time
he would lock his door and Iwould lock my door and we would read
the episode because that's the only timewe got to enjoy the surprises or right
right whatever, and then we wouldwe would he would support me no end.
(52:30):
I remember when we did the openingof the episode of the season where
we had the nuclear bomb that goesoff right and see this is right.
So this is because my mouth usedto get me into trouble because I I
don't put I was the saying youdon't put it in gear before you know,
(52:53):
pressing the exhilarator. I remember,I remember, I'm not sure if
we read there with there I'm atthe conference table with all the production crew
and the writers, and we getyou know, so the helicopters crashed in
the middle of the street and there'sa pilot. The pilot has trapped underneath
(53:15):
the rotor blade. And I remembersaying out that, how the fuck does
that happen? How does the pilotfall out of the helicopter and not be
sliced into by this rotor blade?And of course the writers are you know,
they were like, they're just They'relike, well, one, how
dare you talk to us like that? And you know, who do you
(53:37):
think you are? And two you'llfix it because we know you'll fix it,
you know anyway, So so soI said to so I went away,
and I was like, well,we could do is because of lax,
because of the nine to eleven.They were knocking down all these houses
to make a big security center,so all these small houses they were demolishing.
(54:01):
So I said, what we coulddo is take a helicopter and have
it crashed into the top of thisbuilding. Have Jack round the corner and
seize the helicopter up there, thepilot still in it. Jack scales this
building, he pulls the head pullsthe pilot out of their helicopter and the
helicopter you know, falls to theground, big explosion, blah blah blah.
(54:23):
Well, it's a bit expensive forthe TV show, but it's exciting
for the first episode. So Ipushed and pushed and pushed it, and
uh, basically the upm said no, we're not. And I remember telling
John this. Michael's not going togo for it. He doesn't. He
says, I'm going to put Ihave to put the helicopter on the lawn
(54:45):
in front of the house. John'slike, it's just not exciting. So
anyway, John comes to the tothe to the scout with us, and
we're there at the house and I'vegot is the crew I've got. I
don't know how it is, butI know that John's in front of me,
(55:06):
and I'm like doing this, goingthat's the roof. I want to
put it on. And John's fuckinglistening, and it's like, so we're
here's going to put the helicopter andJohn, wouldn't it be more fun to
put the helicopter up on that roof? And Jack climbed this building and it
just falls down and because you know, then the producer, then not the
(55:27):
producer, the Michael Click then goesoff. Okay, obviously you've been talking
to Joseph. And it took us. I mean it was a lot of
way. It took us five days. But then the special effects guys they
were, you know, wires throughthe house and when it's caught and it
had to be safe. I rememberKeifer turning up and he like, you
want me to climb up there.I can do it because I placed the
(55:52):
satellite dish in the television aerial andwhatever. And he you show him once
and Jack and then ck. ThenKeith is like, oh yeah, all
right, and he goes up andhe pulls the pilot out and he goes
and four weeks before that episode aired, Fox would play that scene coming up
(56:14):
on Monday twenty four and and Icalculate, I don't know how many times
it played, but let's add upall those thirty seconds. Yeah, yeah,
that's an hour of television that theypaid, that would have paid for
exciting sequence. Absolutely absolutely well.I mean, I'm you held the line
(56:36):
and you said hitting the accelerated beforeyou shift gears. That's pretty much how
you described twenty four So in thespirit of twenty four. I would think
you held the line and it paidoff because, like I said, you
were successful in getting your the lookand saying this is what twenty four is.
And we appreciate that from an audiencelevel, in so many ways,
(56:58):
we appreciate that. Yeah, technicalbarrister,
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