Exclusive: Emmy Award winner Michael Wylie (Pushing Daisies, Disney+) is the production designer for
Exclusive: Emmy Award winner Michael Wylie (Pushing Daisies, Disney+) is the production designer for Netflix’s live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender seriesWe have another brand-new reveal of a crew member in a creative position today, this time one of the less well-known jobs in cinema, but an absolutely huge one. This info was confirmed by me personally. Like anything, Netflix has not announced this officially yet, but my understanding of the production process makes me pretty certain that this is finalized (more on that later).Michael Wylie will be the production designer for Avatar: The Last Airbender. The production designer (often overlapping with the position of art director) is in charge of overseeing the creation of the look and feel of the whole world of a movie or show. They’re responsible for all the sets, settings, props, and everything in between– basically all the visuals that aren’t costumes, hair, and makeup. On a production of this scale, the production designer doesn’t literally do everything like nail the chairs together themselves, they oversee a large team and crew who together bring the production designer and their team’s vision to life.Michael Wylie has a pretty impressive resume, starting with Pushing Daisies, a cult classic series from the late 00s particularly known and lauded for its unique production design and overall stylishness, for which he won an Emmy Award (the TV equivalent of the Oscars). He has also worked on a string of big ticket items since then, including Marvel’s Agent Carter, Paramount+ and Jordan Peele’s The Twilight Zone revival, and Disney+’s The Mysterious Benedict Society.His resume covers an eclectic range of periods and sensibilities. None of it is particularly superficially similar to Avatar, but that’s not the point; it’s all about quality and knowing how to do the specific job of production design itself well. (In general, this applies to most aspects of making a movie or show. For example, this is why they keep the characters/show a secret during casting; they want to find people who fit the characters and are good at acting, period. But I digress…)Production (filming) is set to start this November, and at that point the show will have officially been in pre-production for over three years. Based on those aspects of the timeline we know so far, it’s likely that production design on the series is already well underway, planning and crafting the world of the Four Nations from Sokka’s boomerang all the way to the Fire Nation throne room.The show is going to film in Vancouver, partly on location and partly on indoor sound stages with virtual production. It’s unlikely that we see anything from the latter, as security will be air tight and leaks from inside are quite unlikely. However, there will likely be some large sets built outdoors, and it is common for set photos of those to be snapped by the public.Another exciting thing about that timeline is that we’re getting more and more crew reveals right now! Cast reveals will also follow, most likely announced just before filming starts in November (along with Netflix officially announcing all these crew positions).Stay tuned! -- source link
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