SDSA, the Set Decorator Society of America‘s SETDECOR has a new feature about the Production Design and Set Decoration on John Lee Hancock‘s serial killer thriller The Little Things, starring Denzel Washington, Rami Malek and Jared Leto, which is now playing in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.
The fascinating feature includes an interview with Set Decorator Susan Benjamin, SDSA, and Production Designer Michael Corenblith, Hancock’s long-time go-to artisans, talking about the process of creating some of the locations, which were meant to replicate 1990 Los Angeles. It also includes some incredible pictures, including the one above, which is the apartment of one of the serial killer’s victims. Benjamin is also the Set Decorator on the television series, Why Women Kill, which is currently filming its second season.
From Susan:
How do you “decorate” the apartment of a dead girl, or a suspected serial killer?
These were the questions that weighed on me as I read the script of THE LITTLE THINGS, the latest film by Writer/Director John Lee Hancock. Clearly, there was an audience to watch the star-studded cast of Denzel Washington, Rami Malek, and Jared Leto, but how would we get anybody to care about solving the mystery of a dead girl whom we meet after her demise? It was important to show the tragic loss of her life instead of letting her slide by as a numbing statistic.
To do this, my buyers Jennifer McClaren, Emma Verdugo, and I worked hard to create a portrait of a young girl hoping to make it in the music industry in Los Angeles. The script was written in 1990, and we were filming it for that time period. We had a lot of fun assembling posters, flyers and tickets for concerts for bands of the time period.
You can read the full article here and learn more about the SDSA at SetDecorators.org.
