Production design of "Superman" by Beth Mickle. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Continuing the ongoing series of interviews with creative artists working on various aspects of movie and TV productions, it is my pleasure to welcome back Beth Mickle. In this interview, she talks about the changes in the industry since we spoke back in 2012, how she sees generative AI, what advice she’d give to her younger self, and the importance of physical and mental well-being. Between all these and more, Beth dives deep into her work on “Superman”.

This interview is the second part of a special initiative – a collaboration with the Production Designers Collective that was founded about 10 years ago. This collective brings together over 1,500 members from all around the world, sharing ideas, experiences and advice across the industry. We talk about how its goals and initiatives, and the upcoming second International Production Design Week scheduled in mid-October this year.

Beth at the LA Premiere Of “Superman”

Kirill: Welcome back, Beth. We first spoke back in 2012 about your work on “Drive”. What has been happening in your professional life since then?

Beth: “Drive” was an amazing opportunity to work with Nicolas Winding Refn and Ryan Gosling. A couple years after that I worked on Ryan’s directorial debut “Lost River”, as well as a few other smaller studio movies. Then, quite excitingly, I got swept into the James Gunn filmmaking arena in 2017, and I’ve worked almost exclusively with him for the last eight years. At the height of pre-vaccine Covid I did “Dear Evan Hansen” with Stephen Chbosky, and I’m working with my brother right now on a live action film for the Japanese franchise Gundam. It’s been a wonderful adventure for all of us.

Kirill: Outside of your work on “Deuce”, would you say that you are one of the rarer artists that stays in the feature world, and not crossing over too much, if you will, into episodic productions?

Beth: Not by choice, necessarily. It happened to be the projects that have come my way. There have definitely been many wonderful series that I really admire and would love to have been a part of if the stars had aligned. I’m hopeful that in the future I’ll be able to dive into world building in the TV side of things.

My brother is a writer / director, and he did the series “Sweet Tooth” with Netflix, which my husband designed. I always admired their work on that, and always thought that it would have been fun if I could have been free to be a part of that. I was on “Guardians of the Galaxy” at the time, so it didn’t happen.

Kirill: What bigger changes have you seen over the last decade or so since we spoke? Maybe some technical advances, or new materials or techniques that are directly applicable in your field?

Beth: There have definitely been advances when it comes to the visual effects [VFX]. Every year it feels that the VFX worlds get progressively more sophisticated with the finishes and the realism that they can achieve. Compared to 10 years ago, we are able to lean on them more and more as needed for resurfacing and for set extensions.

For physical builds, we did a lot of material testing on “Superman” to nail down how we were going to do the Fortress of Solitude. It’s a rare thing to have that much time and resources to be able to explore and experiment with so many materials. We definitely wouldn’t have had that luxury in the smaller filmmaking arena. It’s one of the joys of getting to work on some of these larger movies – you have time to develop techniques and fabrication to achieve what you want.

Beth on the Fortress of Solitude set of “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: When “Avatar” came out in 2019, there was a period of a few years where a lot of productions did 3D – and then it slowly faded away. Do you feel that the audiences prefer “flat” images?

Beth: I remember being really excited about the 3D world. I felt that it was going to have great reception and great longevity. I don’t understand why it’s not been used more frequently. My husband did a number of 3D films, and in our discussions we thought that this new technology was going to sweep the industry – but surprisingly for me, it hasn’t. I keep reading about some of the 4D experiences where they’re bringing in motion in the seats and all kinds of effects within the theaters. It’d be interesting to see what that might end up doing.

And that brings me back to your previous question about technology – I should mention the volume [virtual production stage]. It’s a great new tool that is being introduced. It still has a little ways to go with being fully accessible for all the movies that might want to use it. But I think when used correctly, it’s a fantastic resource. As people get a handle on that technology, it will start to become more and more ubiquitous on films.

Kirill: Continuing to the Production Designers Collective, what is it and what is it for you?

Beth: I am thrilled that the Production Designers Collective has come into existence. Inbal Weinberg is one of my dearest friends in the film world. She and I worked together when we were first starting out in the indies in New York twenty years ago. I remember she said to me how she strongly believed a community could be created of all the production designers out there, so that we could share resources and advice, and build a supportive community for each other. And I’m sitting there and thinking what a beautiful idea that would be, but what a Herculean effort it would be to actually bring that together.

So now here we are, ten years after she actually started this collective with Kalina Ivanov, and they’ve connected hundreds and hundreds of production designers around the world. You have all of these people that I have always admired from afar, and whose work I had always respected from afar, and whom I always wished I could be in connection with – and now we can talk about crew, about ideas, about approaches to work. You can ask what it’s like to work in the middle of Ireland or the middle of New Zealand.

I never had easy direct access to these wonderful designers, and with the Production Designers Collective, it’s so easy to get in touch with one another. It’s taken down these imaginary walls that may have been there before. There’s only one of us production designers on a movie, and that means that we’re quite isolated from other production designers in the industry – unless you really make an effort for outreach. You’re not always sure if designers across the world are all going to want to be in communication in that same way.

That is what this Collective has done – open all those doors, open all those lines of communication. Now we can be stronger as a community because we’re all connected.

Render of the exterior of the Fortress of Solitude for “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: With the International Production Design Week initiative, who do you want to reach with it?

Beth: Audiences in general is definitely a goal, but also more specifically people in our industry. We believe that outside of a film set, a lot of people aren’t fully aware of the contributions that production designers and their art departments bring to these films. They’re not fully aware of the extent of the world building and the efforts that we offer that go into creating what these films are. With the International Production Design Week the goal is to get more awareness out there of what our jobs entail and what we bring to these films – so that our work can be regarded and fully understood.

A lot of times people will reference the look of the film and would give credit to a cinematographer – not understanding the partnership that goes in with the production designer to get those visuals to come to life. So we’re hoping to put more awareness out there as to what it is that we do.

Kirill: Would you call it misconceptions about what production design involves?

Beth: I think it’s more a lack of awareness. I’m asked constantly, even by people in the industry, what do you actually do as a production designer. People often see it as only set design – designing that office space or that bedroom. Meanwhile, it’s this much bigger role that takes into account the entire tone of the film. It’s the color palettes that are used across the entire arc of a film. It’s the discussions about lighting and discussions about mood. It’s our job to bring all of that to the forefront.

A lot of times people could misunderstand it, or limit it to you sitting at a table and drawing floor plans for sets. But it’s a much bigger world building than that. I think it’s mostly a lack of awareness.

The production designer role has evolved over the decades. It didn’t exist in the early days of film. There was an art director, and people understood that that role is somebody who brought scenery together. Then, as production designer became an actual role – in surprisingly more recent times – I don’t think people fully understood the distinction between art direction and production design, and what that production designer role meant.

It’s so great with the Production Designers Collective to have this opportunity to be more vocal about it, and to help explain to audiences and to people on the periphery of the industry what our role actually entails, and how big of a scope our role really encompasses. It’s fascinating. We talk about it a lot, but it’s minimized – not by anybody’s intention, but ultimately minimized.

Fabrication of the crystals for the Fortress of Solitude on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: It’s interesting that only in 2012 the Academy renamed the category from best art direction to best production design, acknowledging that it’s not just the physical builds – that it is the art of creating the worlds for these stories.

Beth: And it touches all visual aspects of a film. It’s so wonderful that they did rename it with production design and then partnered it with the set decorator, but then the art directors ended up getting the short end of the stick. I believe they should be a part of it there with us. It should be production design, along with art directors and set decorators, who get nominated for Oscars. So we haven’t gotten it quite right yet, but we’ll get there [laughs].

Kirill: Getting closer to “Superman” and building these worlds, how do you take the probably very few words on the page and build these imagined worlds?

Beth: It starts with a conversation with James and the other creative department heads to figure out what the world is that we will want to build. We’ve all worked together for a number of years now, so we have a nice shorthand built in. We have a good grasp of what James’s aesthetic is – which is generally colorful and not shying from being experimental. We want to do something that feels original. And if there’s an opportunity to do something that has a little nod to nostalgia, that always works well with that mix.

After we have those conversations, we all go off and do our individual research. So Judianna Makovsky our wonderful costume designer and I will go off and do our own research, looking into the comic books, looking into the lore, watching the films that came before us, and starting to tease out how we want our world to be its own, while possibly paying respects to other versions that came before us.

“Guardians of the Galaxy” was fantastic for me. I had such wonderful groundwork laid by Charles Wood from the first installment where he developed such beautiful visual language for that film. We were able to pick up the ball and keep running with it there.

On “Superman” we were going to start with our brand new vision that we wanted to put out in the world. We started with figuring out our key points of the visuals. We wanted to be colorful, with a lot of use of primary and secondary colors. We wanted to use big bold geometric shapes in architecture or in patterns. And then we wanted to bring in a sense of nostalgia and a sense of timelessness. Those were the three key visual points for what we wanted the whole world to look like. From there it was applying all of those keystones across all of the sets that were going to be in.

It was an exciting process. We had several months to develop what the visuals were going to be for the film. By the time we got into building the sets, we already had a handle on what the film was going to be.

Beth inspecting a fabricated crystal for the Fortress of Solitude on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: Compared to the previous phase of the DC Universe, this movie feels lighter, more energetic, and a bit more inviting – sort of a fun environment.

Beth: Yes and that was purposeful. We definitely did want it to feel brighter, and definitely did want it to feel more hopeful. I love that you use the word inviting. We wanted it to be a world that people wanted to spend time in. That way when we do go to Lex’s underworld, it feels more nightmarish. You’re more hesitant to be in there for too long. You’re excited to get back out to the bright sunny world above.

Kirill: You have two iconic places where Superman spends most of his time – the Daily Planet and the Fortress of Solitude. How do you take these established environments and put your spin on them?

Beth: For the Fortress of Solitude we definitely wanted to pay homage to the original Richard Donner films with Christopher Reeve. It was that beautiful ice fortress that we all remember from the ’70s. I loved that place when I was little, and I was excited and honored that we had the chance to get to do a reimagining of that.

I wanted to come up with something that felt sculptural, something that had a silhouette, something that leaves an impression. So I started with something that was asymmetrical, and that feels that it was exploding upwards – much like Superman almost exploding upward into the sky. What can we do with these crystals to have it feel like it’s reaching and bursting upward? That was the first nugget of inspiration that I had when I first started considering this.

We looked at crystals, and we ultimately ended up looking at the way waves hit stone surfaces and burst off of them. Then you think – what if it froze in midair? Would it give us that sense of propulsion? Once we figured out that for the exterior and nailed down that exterior shape, we brought that feeling inside. We had that same propulsive, explosive feeling inside of these crystals that burst up and outward. Referencing nature and geology was the hallmark of what his world was going to be.

Finished set for the Fortress of Solitude on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

The other thing that James wanted for the Fortress of Solitude was from the Silver Age that had a great, somewhat mid-century feel to them. It felt a bit like a man cave with these little compartments and areas that were all part of the comic book lore that we wanted to integrate – the supercomputer area, the lab area for the robots, the charging stations for the robots, etc. All the technology has a slight mid-century feel to it, even a little art deco – as a way of keeping it from feeling too futuristic and intangible. Once we got all those elements together, that helped us land where the Fortress of Solitude ended up.

Going to the Daily Planet, it is art deco in the comic books, and originally it was planned to be an art deco build. But ultimately, we weren’t going to have the resources to build it to the size that we needed. I felt that it would feel like a much busier newsroom if it was two levels, and it was becoming too expensive to do as an actual stage build. We didn’t have the stage space to be able to build it to the size we thought we needed, so we ended up looking for locations.

We ended up coming up with a train station in Macon that had this gorgeous classic architecture. It was more turn of the century and not art deco per se, so we had to let that go. But we ended up bringing in a lot of art deco touches. There are six key murals that you see throughout the space, and if you’re looking closely, they’re all done very much in an art deco period style.

In an effort to bring the timelessness into the space, we dressed everything with slight vintage pieces. All of the desk lamps are vintage gooseneck work lamps. All of the chairs are all ’70s chairs that we’ve reupholstered in our pumpkin color. There’s metal tanker desks. There’s landline phones. Things like that help it feel a little bit suspended in time. And then of course, it’s modernized with all the screens that you see around the space. We wanted that space to feel classic and timeless, but also still contemporary with all the news footage that was happening around them all the time.

Final still of the Daily Planet on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: How much went into the Pocket Universe? What was the description on the page, and how did it translate to the screen?

Beth: James said that it was a world that was built out of arithmetic, so there were a lot of fun conversations about what does that mean. I think he put it out there as a way to get all of our minds going in a direction of this world having some kind of a mathematical structure to it. It was a way to push us to dissect that phrase and come up with our own interpretation of it.

We ended up interpreting that as being a simple shape – the cube that is compounding, replicating itself, and growing in these clusters to build architecture. We thought everything should be geometric, with right angles everywhere. A lot of our passes took the right angle and repeated it outward, so that you get these cool sweeping shapes in all directions. That world was confined to that geometry interpretation. There is nothing organic in it, or any other materials.

Then we found this mineral called bismuth. It grows in strict geometric ways, and it has this gorgeous blue and pink iridescent finish to it. That’s what you see on all the surfaces that go in all directions. It all felt like it was made out of that one material.

On the set of the Hall of Justice on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: Would you say that the Hall of Justice is the direct opposite of it, being light and open and going back to the Art Deco style?

Beth: Yes, it is a perfect diametric opposite to the Pocket Universe. It’s also the absolute hallmark of what Metropolis is, which is that big beautiful Art Deco architecture steeped in history. It’s a big expansive space, with big bright colors and big bold shapes. It was such a thrill to shoot there. It was just as jaw-dropping in person as it is on screen.

The original Hall of Justice comes from the comic books and the “Super Friends” series, and it felt so meaningful to be able to go back there and actually film within the walls of it.

Final still of the Hall of Justice on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: Is there such a thing as your favorite set, or are they all your babies?

Beth: They are all near and dear to me for a lot of different reasons. The Fortress of Solitude is definitely the most exciting challenge and the biggest honor to tackle. But we also put a lot of thought into the Daily Planet, and into the apartments of Lois and Clark. The Pocket Universe was quite exciting to come up with something that felt original that we hadn’t seen before – which is tough to do these days. So many roads have been explored with all the movies since the advent of CGI. And the Hall of Justice was our last day of principal photography with our full crew, so it was a beautiful and memorable day.

Kirill: Was there any color that you didn’t want to use or is it all in there?

Beth: We tried to avoid using the tertiary colors – pinks, purples and aquas – anywhere but in the Pocket Universe. In Metropolis you largely see the primaries – yellows, blues and reds, and the secondaries – greens and oranges. That’s the distinction we wanted to keep. If you see pink, purple, or aqua in Metropolis, we either couldn’t control it, or it’s in there for a specific reason.

On the set of the Fortress of Solitude on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: How do you see generative AI at the moment? Do you see it as a tool, do you see it as a threat, or something else?

Beth: I definitely see it as a tool. There are great applications for generated images to crack open ideas. You can use it to put things out there, to unturn stones that your mind may not have unturned on its own.

I believe that the voices of artists and filmmakers are going to be needed to keep the AI slop – for the lack of a better term – separate from storytelling and world building. Storytelling and world building are original and singular, and they follow the direction of a voice that is trying to tell that story. That’s where filmmakers, writers and artists will always have a place in these creative industries. This is why AI is just a tool to help them with those processes.

Kirill: It is a little bit exciting, and also a little bit frightening.

Beth: It can be frightening if you decide to only see it as an existential threat. We can look at a lot of previous things that were seen as existential threats, and they turned out not to be so. We’re in a period of seeing where this develops. Using it ethically, using it wisely, using it for idea generation is a great application of it at the moment.

On the set of the Fortress of Solitude on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: Which productions do you consider to be the golden standard of the field of production design?

Beth: “Anna Karenina” by Joe Wright is right up there. It’s one of the most beautiful and thoughtful films ever made, and it’s one of my absolute favorites. The entire story is set on a stage, as they didn’t have the resources to do a full big sweeping period piece. It’s such a beautiful way of telling that story.

The world building in “Mad Max: Fury Road” was the absolute best. I love every choice that they made there. And my heart sticks with some of the older ones – “The NeverEnding Story”, “Labyrinth” and “The Dark Crystal” – they were formative films for me when I was growing up. I’ve always loved their handmade tactile quality, and a lot of those visuals still hold up in a lot of ways.

Kirill: If you could go back in time to give a piece of advice to your younger self, perhaps about what you thought was important, but turned out to not be as important, what would it be?

Beth: Don’t be afraid to ask questions. When you’re starting out, you have this sense that in order for people to have confidence in you, you need to show that you know a lot of things you might not know. In my early days when I was starting out in the indie world, I definitely was misled by that belief – as all of us are. It’s absolutely OK to not know everything. It’s absolutely OK to ask questions and to want to learn more. People actually respect it when you show that you’re not aware of something, you’re not an expert on something, and you want to be educated. I think it goes not just in our industry, but in all industries. People admire the courage that it takes to ask the questions.

I would also say don’t be afraid to speak up. It might be that you feel in your heart that the way something is being done isn’t right, or the way that people are being treated isn’t fair, or an approach that’s being taken isn’t the right one. Value your voice no matter where you are in your career, how high up the ladder or how far down the ladder you are. Do not be afraid to use your voice. I would have appreciated hearing this when I was first coming up.

The final still of the Daily Planet set on “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Kirill: Despite long days on sets and long stretches away from your family and friends, what keeps you going in this industry?

Beth: I’ve been extremely lucky to work with a lot of the same team now for almost a decade. We’ve all become a wonderful support system to one another. We’ve all seen each other through a lot, including Covid. We’ve all supported each other through a lot, through loss of family members, through changes in the industry, through difficult shows. It’s a remarkable team that I’ve been lucky enough to work with repeatedly, and it’s been an absolute lifeline for me. We’ve all become dear friends, we all spend a lot of time together even outside the office. We all do things on weekends. Now, whenever I’m going away on a show, I’m actually getting to go spend time with all these people I care about, whom I enjoy and who I really see as a family. That has been irreplaceable.

Outside of that I have a supportive family. I’m lucky that we’re all in the industry – my husband, my brother, my sister-in-law. We all keep in good touch even when we’re apart. My brother and I talk almost every day. That’s a big lifeline.

One last thing that people hear me say a lot is looking after my well-being. I’m quite cognizant of the importance of protecting my downtime, and of having time to recharge. I get out for walks almost every single day. It sets the pace, clears my head, helps me take in things and appreciate things around me before going into the fray of work. I’ve been doing that for about ten years, and it’s been hugely important to set a healthy, happy base for each new day that I’m out there, wherever I might be in the world.

It’s physical health, as well as mental and emotional health. It is one of the things that I’m vocal about in Production Designers Collective – well-being in the workplace and life-work balance. We’ve been working on an initiative for the life-work balance and mental health at the collective, and I’m excited for that initiative to come together. We’re going to be offering some great things to the members.

The art department of “Superman”. Courtesy of Warner Bros.

And here I’d like to thank Beth Mickle for taking the time to talk with me about the art and craft of production design. I also want to thank Javier Irazuzta and Stephanie Pfingsten for making this interview happen. “Superman” is streaming on Apple, YouTube and Amazon. To stay up-to-date on the latest news from the International Production Design Week, click here. Finally, if you want to know more about how films and TV shows are made, click here for additional in-depth interviews in this series.