BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE FUNERAL
Death at a Funeral was shot on Sony Studios' Stage 23 after seven days of exteriors filmed on location in South Pasadena. Over the years, Stage 23 has served as the shooting venue for a series of films for Screen Gems. It was originally built as a Spanish-style apartment building for Quarantine, became a traditional home in The Stepfather, a modern home in Obsessed, a nightclub in Takers and, following Death at a Funeral, it became an apartment building for The Roommate and a burlesque club for Burlesque.
For this film, production designer Jon Gary Steele recreated the elegant interior of a Craftsman-style house, where most of the frenzied comings-and-goings take place. "We scouted dozens of locations and ended up going in the direction of a shingled home in Pasadena," Steele says. "We shot the exteriors on location and then we created the interior we needed on the soundstage. The director wanted hints about Edward's secret life scattered throughout the house, so we placed sculpture, paintings and photographs everywhere that point to it, if you know what you're looking for."
He describes the interior of the house in the British film as "much lighter, but Neil, the director of photography and I all liked the idea of making walls very dark and rich with lots of wood and great wallpapers."
"There's a wonderful collision between the conservative tones of the Craftsman house and the uncorked insanity that's going on beneath this roof," says Horberg.
LaBute and director of photography Rogier Stoffers wanted the setting of Death at a Funeral to have the realistic look more often associated with drama. "Often with comedies they use what I think of as 'comedy lights,'" says LaBute. "They just throw things up and if you can see it, that's great. I wanted to have something that maintained a dramatic film quality. That's why I brought in Rogier to gave things a painterly quality."
"Everybody initially asked why isn't it light and bright?" says Stoffers, who worked with LaBute on his previous film, Lakeview Terrace. "We thought that if we created this fancy, classic, almost solemn environment and then slowly told a story that starts to unravel, getting crazier and crazier, it would create a nice juxtaposition between two worlds. When the coffin falls open and these people sitting in this beautiful dark environment in their black suits begin to go completely out of their minds, it really works!"
Costume designer Maya Lieberman used clothing both to set the scene and to impart crucial information about each of the characters. A story taking place over the course of only one day, as it does in Death at a Funeral, provides a costume designer with specific challenges. "You might assume that it's very easy to do a movie with each actor wearing only one costume throughout," she says. "It's actually more difficult. When you have only one shot to tell the story and develop the character through the clothes, there's a lot more importance on that one look. And since we were dealing with a funeral, we were confined to a certain palette of colors, which accentuates the challenge in differentiating the characters."
For Cynthia, the grieving widow, Lieberman balanced the character's natural flamboyance with her concern for propriety in the face of her husband's death. "Loretta Devine has such a great big personality and I wanted that to show in her clothes," says the designer. "The best part of her costume is a teeny, tiny feather funeral hat which at a certain point starts to do the wiggle. It brings just a little touch of comedy in the clothes, especially when Oscar's high and he's staring at it. We definitely didn't want the comedy to come from the clothes in this movie, but there's a little bit right there."
For Martin Lawrence's character, Lieberman selected an expensive suit with a bit of edge. "Ryan wants everyone to feel his vibe when he walks into a room," she says. "He definitely has the flashier look of the two brothers. We wanted to keep it dark to contrast with Chris in the white shirt. So he has a black, French-cuffed shirt. His Versace suit, black with a grayish stripe, gives him a little attitude."
For his characterization, Morgan was given some great assistance from Lieberman. "There's something a little off about Norman," notes Lieberman, "and I thought there should be something a little askew about him at all times. So while he's wearing a really nice suit, we cut the sleeves and pants a little short so there's an awkward look."
Columbus Short's character is younger and more irreverent than most of the family, which gave Lieberman the opportunity to deviate from the funereal palette. "With everyone else so solemnly dressed, it's fun to have a character we could give a crazy, inappropriate look for a funeral. He wears pants with the suspenders that hang down and Pumas. But first, we have him answer the door in these crazy boxers."
Stoffers and his team shot the film on high-definition video. "We had a cast full of great comedians and improvisers," says Stoffers, "Working in this format allowed us to try things in different ways and not be hampered by the fact that there's only so much film in the camera."
"We never had to break in the middle of something and change film," says the director. "I was always ready for the actors and they were like race horses. They could go for 10 or 15 minutes at a time. And then they would just be finished. Chris would look over and say, 'that was everything I had in my head, and I came up with new stuff for you. But now I'm done.' With that kind of actor, it was great to have the freedom to keep shooting."
Stoffers was impressed by the director's relaxed attitude on set. "Neil doesn't seem to be bothered by stress, which allows him to always stay open to possibilities," he says. "It's hard enough to make a movie and it's great if you can do it in a way that you can have fun."
With so many naturally funny people in the cast, the filmmakers took full advantage of their improvisation skills. "As long as we adhered to the form and the structure of each scene, there was a lot of room for people to bring their personalities," says Horberg. "That's what we hoped and prayed would happen. It's like two plus two equals five. When you've got guys as funny as these guys, you put them together and let the sparks fly."
LaBute says one of his primary responsibilities was to create an environment in which the actors felt safe to be silly. "They could do the things that the script required them to do to make people laugh. It worked out so well that people wanted to see what other people were doing. We sometimes found ourselves writing people into scenes, because they were already there and they wanted to see what happened. Chris was there when he didn't need to be there, lending his presence to the whole thing.
"If somebody came up with a good line or a look or a pratfall, we jumped on it," says LaBute, "We tried to make it part of the fabric of the whole piece. I had to get the material that was already there, but you never know where else a good joke's going to come from. It's the bold performers who know the material and then can go somewhere else. For me, it was all about seizing those opportunities."

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