By Mr. Will Wong
After winning first runner-up for TIFF ’23 People’s Choice Award, acclaimed Filmmaker Alexander Payne‘s THE HOLDOVERS soon will see a release November 10, 2023. The Film is set is set at a New England prep school where an Instructor (Paul Giamatti) is forced to stay on campus during the Holidays to care for a small number of students with nowhere else to go. He forms a bond with one in particular (Dominic Sessa) and the school’s Head Cook (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), who just lost her son at war.
We were thrilled to be invited to a virtual press conference with some of the key figures behind THE HOLDOVERS, including Payne. Joining us were:
Production Designer: Ryan Warren Smith
Costume Designer: Wendy Chuck
Composer: Mark Orton
Editor: Kevin Tent
Writer: David Hemingson
Director: Alexander Payne
David Hemingson is asked about the inspiration behind THE HOLDOVERS which came from his mind and also one specific moment which stands out most to him.
Hemingson: “Yeah, I mean, you know, it’s kind of like I lived most of that movie and certainly the interpersonal dynamics and, you know, separate apart from the relationship between Paul and Angus, which I think is sort of one of my life experiences with my uncle.”.
“But that kind of King Rat trading at the top of the movie, that starts with the swimsuit and it’s like how much for this weed, that kind of thing. That kind of dealing in contraband naughtiness is something that definitely resonates for me because you know, it’s part of the thrill of being young where you’re sort of trying to find yourself trying to be adult and that kind of swapping and trading and sort of undercover light misbehavior, let’s call it light misbehavior, reminds me of high school, I think the most.”.
Director Alexander Payne is asked which parts of THE HOLDOVERS in particular take him back to a time when he was in school. He insists that the Film is a period film, but is meant to be a contemporary film pretending it’s 1971.
Payne: “Not necessarily just school, but that period, maybe three things. First is yes, like Mark Orton, Latin class. I was four years in Latin class at an all boys Jesuit school in Omaha. I’m still tight with my friends from Latin class, and there are some in jokes woven into those scenes that only they will get. Second, I was nine, turning 10 in 1970 to ’71, so I was young, but I had an older brother. I had two older brothers, one of whom was that exact same year. He graduated Omaha Central High class of ’71, which I didn’t quite realize until later in the program. I go, ‘I’m making a film about that class.'”‘ And when you’re a much younger sibling, you live a lot vicariously through your older, you know, siblings wanting to emulate them and adopt their taste and so forth. So I have vivid memories of that year. And then third, the thing, again, taking it out of school is the movies of that period, because even at that age 9 and 10, I was movie crazy.”.
“And for example, Little Big Man, Arthur Penn’s Little Big Man is featured in the film. It’s appropriate to the time and the scene in which it’s presented. But I saw it like four times in the theater when I was nine years old. So it’s not just the school thing, but a lot of contextual things bring us all back, I think.”.
Ryan Warren is asked about the inspiration behind the Film’s unique Production Design.
Warren: “Yeah, I mean, that was a unique challenge because we had to shoot in, you know, five different schools and intertwine them together. But what we got to do and focus on, like Alexander pointed out, was to make it a little bit invisible. We wanted it to feel natural and never take you out of the scene and always let the story be the star. And so for us, we always just led with our feeling on that. And so we let feeling and instinct lead the way, and me and Alexander like to spend a lot of time in each of the real environments with the real people that live there and soak a lot of that in and then intertwine that into the work that we do there.”.
Costume Designer Wendy Chuck talks about some challenges of recreating looks of the ’70s.
Chuck: “There’s so many people in this movie, there’s so many clothes, half of which don’t appear on the screen. But the volumes were just, I would look at my assistant, I’d say, we’ve got to find more clothes. I’d go down to where the background was being fit and say, we don’t have enough clothes. I’m sick of seeing this thing. We can’t put that on anybody. It doesn’t fit. And also bodies are now very different too. So since 1970s, we now have the advent of fast food. People’s bodies have changed, and especially in Boston, so we don’t have like, tiny, tiny people anymore. So that in itself is something, so we were dealing with the volume. But I want to second, Ryan and I don’t put people’s clothes on, although I have put on Jack Nicholson’s pajamas and broken them down personally. But in this one, I want to reference an Easter egg that nobody knows. Lydia Crane wears a heart-shaped necklace that Reese Witherspoon wore the exact same one in Election.”.
Composer Mark Orton tells us about some of the inspiriations behind the Film’s memorable Score.
Orton: “Yeah, I think, well, in terms of overall blending, I think my first job was really to make sure that nothing I was doing would betray the 1971 feel of it, or 1970 feel of it. That for me ended up in some places that I don’t get to explore much in scoring. You know, I’m more doing sort of orchestral stuff or Americana leaning stuff. But about a third of the score is really coming from a band place, like a band that you know, would be playing in that time period, which for me is super fun. I guess, I have the instruments from that era. They’re the ones that musicians like me collect old guitars from early seventies, late sixties, amplifiers too. And I really got to stretch out and do that stuff and to kind of blend in with this fantastic, you know, source score that’s in there. Things like the Almond Brothers, or Cat Stevens, or Bad Finger. So, that was super fun for me. And then, on the other hand, I was also, of course, referencing some Christmas. I upped my collection from two to something like 25 different sleigh bells, and they do find their way in here and there.”.
Focus Features and Universal Pictures Canada will release
THE HOLDOVERS In Toronto on November 3, 2023
& In Theatres Nationwide on November 10, 2023.
For advertising opportunites please contact mrwill@mrwillwong.com