WITH WENDY OZOLS-BARNES
***image1***
SFR: Did you always aspire to be a movie set decorator?
WOB:
Lord, no. I actually started out doing craft service [catering and crew assistance] for commercials, but I hated craft service. It's a thankless, horrendous job dealing with a lot of cranky people that basically treat you like you're an idiot. People who do craft service deserve a medal.
So how did you start decorating movie sets?
I was working at the [Los Angeles] County Museum and I wanted to do something else but I didn't exactly know what. A friend suggested working [on movies] in the art department and so I started out as a production assistant.
How long were you in LA?
I did about 17 years in Los Angeles before we moved back here about five years ago. Ironically, that was before we knew about the [New Mexico film] incentive program. We fully expected we would have to travel to LA for work, but it turned out we made the right decision at the right time. I'm thrilled to be back in New Mexico. There is a strong sense of community and I think that comes through with the crews who work here-none of us would be anything without the crew-and there's a level of cooperation and camaraderie here that you just don't see in Los Angeles.
What was your "big break"?
I've worked on some really big projects, but the one that was the most fun, most exciting, most rewarding was
The Missing
. Not to totally plug New Mexico or anything, but you know you've arrived when you've worked with Ron Howard.
How much interaction do you have with the directors and cast?
A large part of what I do is interpreting a lot of other people's ideas. You have the writer, you have the director and then you have the actors that are bringing their idiosyncrasies and character to the set. I generally let them tell me what they want and then I fill in the blanks.
What are some of the strangest requests you've gotten as far as set decorations go?
They're all weird [laughs]. No, the requests aren't necessarily strange so much as there are a lot of logistical problems that can be challenging. You never know what they might throw at you. It's a strange circus that happens, but when everything falls into place it's an amazing moment, and I think that reflects in what you end up seeing on the screen.
I'd imagine you have to do a fair amount of visualization when you're decorating a set.
There are a lot of things that you have to consider beside the actual [props]. You have to put some history to these scenes and these characters. You can't just say, 'This is a teenage girl's room.' Well, is she goth? Is she a cheerleader? Is she into Cyndi Lauper or Madonna? You can't just throw a bunch of stuffed animals on a set and call it done.
You were the set decorator for Seraphim Falls [which opened Jan. 26]. Was it a challenge to recreate post-Civil War scenes in New Mexico?
It was a very simple show in terms of set dressing. But sometimes it's harder to not put things in because the impulse is to fill every room and every set with a lot of stuff. Fortunately for me, I've lived in a number of very remote areas of New Mexico, so it was easy for me to draw from my own life experience. Plus, I love westerns.
Have you lost the ability to get starstruck when, say, Pierce Brosnan walks by?
Oh, no. A lot of those actors still give me the heebies. It's just electric when they walk into the room. But you typically don't go up and talk to the actors unless they talk to you. That would be totally unprofessional. Although it can be hard sometimes to restrain the impulse.
I noticed that Guy Barnes is listed as the art director for Seraphim Falls. Is that a coincidence?
No, that's my husband. We try to work together when we can. We've spent too many years working on different shows and not having a life. Not that you have a life anyway [laughs], but at least now with our schedules he can throw the laundry in the washing machine and I can pull it out of the dryer.
What film are you working on now?
Right now we're doing the
Sunshine Cleaning Company
in Albuquerque, which is from the same producers who did
Little Miss Sunshine
.
What's the premise?
You'll love this. Basically there are two girls who work for a sort of Molly Maid company and they're trying to make money by cleaning up crime scenes. That's it in a nutshell.
I'd imagine that could be a challenge as far as set decoration goes.
We're doing research on crime scenes and it is a little nauseating. We're researching something that's pretty heinous, but you still have to be very sensitive to the fact that you're trying to pattern after something that happened to a real person. It's a little creepy, but that's part of what we do.
