The LES Goes Back To Its Past, Courtesy Steven Soderberg

I saw this remarkable picture on Twitter yesterday, shared by the Bedford & Bowery Blog (there are a few more shots on their site as well). This is not a Hollywood set but the actual corner of Orchard and Broome Street, redressed with hay and dirt to look like New York City circa 1900. All this effort was done for a new miniseries that Steven Soderberg is directing about the Knickerbocker Hospital, entitled THE KNICKS. The show is about doctors and nurses at the hosptial and the then-revolutionary treatments they used in an era of disease and high mortality rates.

It's amazing they went to this all effort to recreate this old fashioned street but, in the end, it was probably cheaper than a) building this on a backlot and b) doing it as a CGI-genereated faux street scape. As the price of EFX has risen sharply, the new mantra in Hollywood these days is "don't fix it in post"--- whereas the old mantra used to be the opposite.  

Steven Soderberg Lets It Fly In NEW YORK Magazine

There's a long and discursive interview with one of my favorite contemporary directors Steven Soderbergh in this week's NEW YORK magazine. He talks about his well-publicized "retirement" from feature filmmaking and how the system of Hollywood features is broken....and, more specifically, how directors are treated so poorly. (Agreed!)  His next project, a Liberace biopic, is going to HBO starring Matt Damon, with Michael Douglas as the piano man. And they apparently really got into their big gay scenes too!

It's a very entertaining interview as the outspoken Soderberg goes on about many topics beyond filmmaking. Soderberg is a very modern Renaissance man and talks about his interest in painting and making collages with US magazine(!) as well as a new sidebar, importing a special kind of liquor from Bolivia. In assessing his eclectic film career, he says the one movie of his he wouldn't change is OUT OF SIGHT. I would have to agree with that as it's one sharp and sexy movie....with J. Lo's most decent performance to date. Worth adding to your Netflix if you missed it the first time around.