Maestro cinematographer Matty Libatique, ASC

We have the multi-talented Kays Al-Atrakchi as our special guest
host this week! Shortly after working together on A Star Is Born,
director and actor Bradley Cooper told cinematographer Matty
Libatique that he'd like their next project to be about conductor
Leonard Bernstein. Cooper hadn't even begun writing the screenplay
for Maestro yet, but over the next six years, he and Matty
discussed how to evolve the story and shoot the biopic. They spent
a lot of time shooting tests in multiple formats. Matty and Cooper
decided to shoot on Kodak film, using both black and white and
color, and two different aspect ratios (1.33:1 and 1.85:1) for the
story. The film takes place over 50 years, and it was important to
test the aging makeup and prosthetics Cooper would wear as
Bernstein. Maestro was a complex story to tell, and Cooper wanted
to explore Bernstein's life in as many visually creative ways as
possible. Every shot was thought out, including all the montages
that deal with the passage of time. For several scenes, much of
what Cooper had described on the page was what ended up on screen.
“It's one of those rare cases where the the writing really matched
up with what we ended up doing, very early on. There were
subsequent drafts, but those moments that he had crafted ahead of
time never went away,” says Matty. In order to keep himself
organized, Matty created a spreadsheet that mapped out all the
shots and equipment for every beat and scene in the script, which
could also be altered if Cooper made changes. At the heart of
Maestro is the complicated relationship between Leonard Bernstein
and his wife Felicia Montealegre. Cooper frequently used the motif
of Montealegre waiting in the wings for Bernstein, as she put
everything in her life on hold to be with him. Their love grounds
the story, and Matty wanted it to look as naturalistic as possible.
“Instead of going for the glam, even though it might feel like an
old movie at the beginning of the film, I was trying to keep it
more candid... I think Bradley and I gravitate towards naturalism
because we don't want anything that smells false or pretentious.
It's just something to stay away from. Bradley has a real
sensitivity to it.” Cooper's approach as a director is extremely
artistic and sensitive to the emotions in the scene, and he doesn't
use a conventional shot list or get traditional coverage. If the
scene feels wrong after they've shot it, he and Matty will mull it
over and then come up with a better way to shoot it. “Bradley is so
editorially minded, he keeps in mind whether or not we're going to
end a scene in a wide or start in a wide or ended in tight or start
in a tight. So those are conscious decisions, but they aren't
necessarily made ahead of time. We respond to the space and we
respond to the light. And then we just react and it's organic, it's
his process.” Maestro is available on Netflix.
https://www.netflix.com/title/81171868 Matty Libatique is nominated
for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography. Find Matty Libatique:
Instagram @libatique Sponsored by Hot Rod Cameras
www.hotrodcameras.com The Cinematography Podcast website:
www.camnoir.com Facebook: @cinepod Instagram: @thecinepod Twitter:
@ShortEndz