Making of ‘Foundation��: Roundtable panel with 6 creative Emmy contenders
When the talented craftspeople behind the Apple TV+ drama series “Foundation” started work on the show’s second season, their mission statement was clear – and not for the faint of heart.
“We were tasked with trying to figure out how to make Season 2 bigger and better and more fantastical than Season 1, and Season 1 was a hard opening act to follow,” visual effects supervisor Chris MacLean tells Gold Derby in during our Making of “Foundation” video roundtable. “But I think everybody on this panel will agree that we turned it up to 11 and did our best to try to make it as good as possible.” Watch the exclusive interview above.
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Loosely based on the Isaac Asimov stories and created for television by David S. Goyer (“The Dark Knight”) and Josh Friedman (“Avatar: The Way of Water”), “Foundation” is a universe- and centuries-spanning science-fiction story that “chronicles a band of exiles on their monumental journey to save humanity and rebuild civilization amid the fall of the Galactic Empire.” But unlike many shows within the genre, “Foundation” separates itself from the pack not just with its labyrinthine story and acclaimed performances from stars like Jared Harris and Lee Pace, but the show’s commitment to filming on location with real sets as opposed to a reliance on green screens.
“David Goyer and I usually meet a year in advance to start the season,” production designer Rory Cheyne says. “In Season 2, we were in Ireland, we are in the Canary Islands – I think we were on at least four or five islands of the seven. And then we finished our time back in the Czech Republic. With that sort of library of locations, we let the show breathe and extend out and find those new worlds. We were able to knock it out of the park again.”
The key to the show’s success, adds cinematographer Owen McPolin, is collaboration. McPolin and fellow cinematographer Cathal Watters shot eight of the second season’s 10 episodes and frequently communicated about the sets and environments in which they were built.
“But Goyer never said to us once, ‘You have to do it this way,’” McPolin adds. “He encouraged our self-expression and said, ‘Go on and do your best, enjoy it, and then bring it back to me and show me what’s cool.’ I think all of us here would agree that’s what we tried to do.”
Hair and makeup department head Nadine Prigge agrees. “I really tried to work with all the different planets and work with the elements that we put into the planets. And we did: we went from the avant-garde and over-the-top to truly dystopian. On every level, I tried to work within those parameters, to give the representation of the people, to identify the people to the planets. We had a blast and David was always very encouraging me, he really did push us creatively, which was wonderful. It was a great experience. I love the show.”
“Foundation” Season 1 landed Emmy nominations for its opening titles and MacLean’s visual effects work, and while the show’s Season 2 haul is still undetermined, it’s clear the production team – including supervising sound editor Joe Bracciale – feels they upped their game significantly on the new episodes. Now the challenge becomes doing that all over again: “Foundation” was renewed for Season 3 by Apple and the show is currently in production.
“The bar that we set on Season 1 and then raised on Season 2, we’re trying to raise it again on Season 3,” MacLean says. “We’re trying to manifest the same kind of magic that we found in Season 1 and Season 2… we just don’t want people to think about [the crafts] when they’re watching the show. We want them to think about how this is a cool show. We don’t want them to go, ‘Oh, well that shot was bullsh–.’ We constantly strive to make sure that we’re not those people where somebody on Reddit goes, ‘Oh, look at what they do. That’s nonsense.’ We’re trying to up the bar every season of the show.”
All episodes of “Foundation” are streaming now on Apple TV+.
