Robert Boyle

Many production designers have their own specific style or particular process for designing a set. For Robert Boyle, a production designer, who worked with Alfred Hitchcock on North by Northwest, Saboteur, The Birds and Marnie, his process begins with the script. He analyses how the characters interact and where they position themselves in the frame. Plotting how characters move in a space is very important as you can use the space around the people to make a particular point.

Fig1.1 Cary Grant in North by Northwest

An example was the famous crop duster scene in North by Northwest. The idea for the scene was very simple - agoraphobia. The landscape is completely flat and Cary Grant is in a situation where there is no place to hide. Here the space does not suggest loneliness but vulnerability due to the landscape. The scene was done on location in San Joaquin Valley, with little physical change done to the location. Location scouting is another role for the production designer when designing the set locations. "I always start with the economies of the characters. Very often they are not indicted in the script. The first thing I ask is how much do these people make and what can they afford. Then I want to know what who their friends are. I want to know about their educational background is: did they go to college……You have to know all this before you can sit down with a pencil land start to draw." 3

The importance of Boyle's work is that the mise-en-scene becomes an extension of the character, the personality and the predicament.