Set Decorator Carla Curry SDSA and Production Designers Cary White and Lisa Ward share with their friend David Hack SDSA anecdotes and insights about the massive undertaking they once again took on for another friend, Writer/Creator/Producer Taylor Sheridan. [Previous stints included the series YELLOWSTONE, from which they eventually stepped away to help him create the prequel 1883, and now this next generation of what becomes the Dutton dynasty.] Click on the video below for the fascinating conversation!
The second and final season of the series1923 began in deep snow, with the harsh winter bringing a menacing cougar and wolves to the Dutton’s door, literally, and in the form of human adversaries much worse than the four-legged predators. Thus, at the end of S1, Spencer Dutton was summoned back from across the world to help his family. While at her family’s estate in England, his newly pregnant wife, Alexandra, former Countess of Sussex, decided she must join her new family, no matter the travails of the journey.
That's only the beginning of the season's storyline...
As the team points out, “We have characters crossing the Atlantic ocean in multiple sea vessels, and then trying to make their way to Montana from very different parts of the country, which gave us the opportunity to see the whole country...and we wanted to be true to each place.”
That includes Alex's experience of Ellis Island and the dangers for a lone woman arriving, then a long train trip only partway to her destination...and so much more on just her personal journey...Spencer, too has his own perilous path, all heavilly researched and made accurate to time and place.
Here is a quick glimpse of that push for accuracy:
Sussex, England, 1923. Bedroom of Alexandra of Sussex, former Countess of Sussex who gave up her title for love of a Dutton. Courtesy of Paramount+
Train from New York to Chicago, 1923. The team did deep research on the train cars of the period, even finding photos from the early 1920s...with a commitment to bring us into what Alex would have experienced. Images courtesy of Paramount+.
Train from New York to Chicago, 1923. More sets that are not only completely absorbing in accuracy of detail, but it also feels as if a cook or postal worker has just stepped away for a moment! Images courtesy of Paramount+.
Set Decorator Carla Curry SDSA would like to acknowledge the SDSA Business members who often "take these journeys" with her.
For 1923, especially: Warner Brothers Drapery |Warner Brothers Property |AMCO - American Screen and Window Covering | Universal Property | Omega Cinema Props | Premiere Props | Hollywood Vines | RC Vintage | LCW | ISS...
And Lennie Marvin’s Prop Heaven, “They are the first prop house I rented from as a new set decorator – Lennie was so kind and helpful, and they still are!”
