Framing the funny

Michael Cumming has worked with such legends of British comedy as Stewart Lee, Lenny Henry, David Walliams and Jo Brand, and is probably best known for the ground-breaking TV satire Brass Eye.

Wherever possible, he’s teamed up with celebrated cinematographer Peter Edwards, whose impressive comedy back catalogue includes Absolutely Fabulous, Armstrong & Miller and Outnumbered.

Above: Steven Toast (aka Matt Berry) with Michael Cumming on the Toast of Tinseltown set. Photograph (and main image) courtesy of Ben Meadows.

Can you explain how filming can underline the comedy inherent in the script/actors’ performances?

MC: I think you are always looking for ways that you can enhance the comedy by the way it's shot. Often, it’s not appropriate – a crazy shot would kill the moment – but on Toast of Tinseltown/London there are more opportunities than usual because we have created our own world, with our own rules and heightened reality. 

Above: Matt Berry in Toast of Tinseltown, Episode 5, Death Valley.

Can you talk more about the look of Tinseltown and how it helps the humour? 

MC: We wanted Toast’s Tinseltown to look different from London. Part of that was simply trying to make it look very sunny, but I also wanted it to have even more of a period look. Toast of London was always sort of timeless, we tried not to have many modern references. We pushed that further in Tinseltown. The costumes, design and art direction are all very 60s/70s. 

Above: Cumming and Edwards have drawn inspiration from 70s cop show Columbo.

I wanted to try and give a nod to Technicolor films. I re-watched all of Hitchcock’s classics during lockdown and I think that crept in a bit. It’s fairly impossible to get that look exactly now, and it probably wouldn’t have been right to go too far, but it was a starting point. Also, I watched about 50 hours of (classic 1970’s cop show) Columbo. You can learn a hell of a lot from Columbo. 

With Brass Eye, we had to make sure the way we shot everything was exactly like it would have been on current affairs and news shows from around the world. I learned the more accurate you can make it, the funnier it can be.

We were also keen to do as much stuff ‘in camera’ as possible. Avoiding modern CG. We used a lot of rear projection. Most obviously for the driving scenes, that were very much influenced by Hitchcock. 

Above: Cumming's storyboards for Toast of Tinseltown Episode 5, drawn by Mike Nicholson, aided the use of a virtual production stage.

All the stuff in Death Valley (Toast of Tinseltown, episode 5) was done on a Virtual Production Stage. We used it like a modern version of what Hitchcock would have had. Basically, a high-tech form of rear projection using a curved LED video wall, sides and ceiling. I loved the combination of an old Hollywood technique, combined with modern gear. The slightly heightened look of it all fit perfectly with the world of Toast.

I loved watching lots of old adverts from [the 1970s] and trying to distill them into a 30-second homage.

It was a massive learning curve for everyone because it’s very new technology. I ended up storyboarding most of that episode, just so everyone could get their heads around it. 

In the Pilgrim’s Choice ad, Fashion, there's a gaudy retro sheen, particularly in the cheese close-up. Why do you think gaily coloured cheese cubes on sticks are amusing?

MC: Those Pilgrim’s Choice spots were directly parodying 1980s commercials. I loved watching lots of old adverts from that period and trying to distill them into a 30-second homage. Trying to pin down exactly what filmmakers from the past did, and how to replicate it now, gives me a perverse pleasure.

When I was making Brass Eye, part of the job was making sure that the way we shot everything was exactly like it would have been done on current affairs and news shows from around the world. I learned that the more accurate you can make it, the funnier it can be. There are lots of never before seen examples of that in the Oxide Ghosts film.

With Brass Eye you never knew when one of the filmed items would be used to dupe a celebrity, so the accuracy of the way it was shot was paramount. 

It’s kind of easy to think of a dramatic way to, say, shoot a sequence where a cow is being fired from a large cannon. When you have to create footage that looks totally authentic it adds reality to the proceedings. That attention to detail makes it even funnier. 

On a commercial, everything has to be locked down more, but it’s not so different really. TV and film comedy has lots of sequences that have to work in 10 or 30 or 60 seconds. 

Making the ridiculous somehow seem believable – I seem to have done a lot of that over the years.

How does filming TV or film comedy compare with creating funny commercials? Given the brevity of ads, where every frame must count, do you have to be more disciplined in shooting?

MC: On a commercial, everything has to be locked down more but it’s not so different really. TV and film comedy has lots of sequences that have to work in 10 or 30 or 60 seconds. The only difference is that in TV you probably have an hour to shoot them, not a day!

Michael, you like to use improv a lot, how can that work out in ads, where you have to storyboard and pre-plan shots? 

MC: Unless the whole point of a show is that it’s improvised, it’s rare that you get much time for that sort of thing on TV or commercials. I did do a whole TV series that was improvised (Going Forward) with Jo Brand and Omid Djalili and that was exciting and nerve racking in equal measures, but it's fairly unusual. 

Pete and I do a lot of music stuff and having a DP who can count bars and feel where the music is going is extremely useful… and rare!  

However, the commercials I did for Cravendale were in the style of a fast-paced documentary, that gathered its footage from lots of different sources. So I suggested that we might get a more realistic performance from the actors if we loosened things up a bit. We built in some rehearsal time with the cast before the shoot and let them play around with it a bit. 

Above: Jo Brand (R) and Omid Djalili (L) in the improvised BBC sitcom series Going Forward.

In those Cravendale sessions, and sometimes when shooting, once we had all the scripted stuff, I would ask them questions off camera and they would think on their feet. Kathryn Hanke, who played the Moonicow obsessed eye-witness, came up with the line, “at first, I thought it was a stone and then it moved. Stones don’t move do they?” It made us all laugh, so we kept it in the final cut. If it’s funny, keep it – always a good rule. 

You said in our last interview for shots Michael, that you were “surprised how TV and advertising have become quite similar, much more of the committee element has come into TV in recent years.” Do you still think that?

Actually, I need to revise that now because on Toast Of Tinseltown the BBC was absolutely brilliant. They let us make it with very little interference at all. It felt like the committee element had gone away. The general consensus on the series seems to be that, in spite of it being more unusual than ever, more people have engaged with it. So, there might be something to take away from that.

Above: Father Ted writer Arthur Mathews, who co-wrote Toast with Matt Berry, is also a drummer.

Can you tell me more about you both being drummers and the importance of… timing? 

PE: We discovered early on that we have a similar taste in music and then found out we both play drums.

When a sequence comes together it has a natural rhythm and if it can be shot to include that, it enhances the comedy. In Toast of Tinseltown, Episode 1, the fight in the bar between Steven Toast and Ray Purchase was shot so that it could have rhythm to it when edited. The rhythm of that cut makes it more ridiculous and less violent.

MC: I just read Mel Brookes’ autobiography, All About Me. He was a drummer and reckons that having rhythm definitely helps with comedy. If it’s good enough for Mel, I’ll go with that – The Producers is one of my favourite comedy films of all time. Peter Sellers – the star  of my other favourite comedy film of all time, Dr Strangelove, also played the drums. 

I’m very keen on the slow zoom. I use it a LOT in Toast. It’s a very retro move to pull, but it’s a quick and simple way to point something up. But I think you use everything in your arsenal.

Arthur Mathews, who co-writes Toast (and Father Ted) was also a drummer. Fred Armisen who plays Russ Nightlife in Tinseltown – another fine drummer. I rest my case. 

Pete and I do a lot of music stuff and having a DP who can count bars and feel where the music is going is extremely useful… and rare!

It needs to be noted that Pete is a proper drummer, who still does gigs. It’s very useful to have a DP that can not only recommend the right lens, but also help you out when you need to know the best 22” ride cymbal to buy. 

Above: Gene Wilder and Zero Mostel in Mel Brooks' 1967 comedy, The Producers.

Does the fact that you have so much in common culturally and personally aid your collaboration?

PE: Very much so!

MC: I like having someone around who knows more than me about filmmaking. I’ve done a lot but Pete has been in the business even longer than me! He’s not only amazing with lighting but he’s a brilliant camera operator as well. When he’s not doing comedy he will keep his hand in by shooting a three-hour Shakespeare play, beamed live to hundreds of cinemas around the country. There’s no margin for error there, you just have to get it right. 

It’s very rare to have to re-take a shot because Mr Edwards has messed up.

Above: A contra/dolly zoom on a horrified Matt Berry in Tinseltown. 

Can you share with us some secrets of shooting for comic effect? Pushes, pulls, camera bumps, perspective shots and all. Maybe share some examples from your work, or others?

MC: I’m very keen on the slow zoom. I use it a LOT in Toast. It’s a very retro move to pull, but it’s a quick and simple way to point something up. When Toast is hatching a plan or under pressure, or if we are hearing his internal monologue. But I think you use everything in your arsenal. 

I always think it’s funny, when you meet people to talk about a show, they ask, “stylistically, how are you thinking of shooting this series”. I think that you choose how you shoot something scene by scene. Whatever works best for that moment.  

We ended up using that camera move for Ray Purchase a few times. It became like a catchphrase.

At the start of Episode 3 of Tinseltown, just before the opening credits – when Toast realises Clem Fandango & Danny are in LA – we used the contra or dolly zoom. This was made famous by Spielberg in Jaws, but was probably done better by Hitchcock in Vertigo. 

By tracking towards the subject whilst zooming out, you create an unsettling effect as the perspective distorts. By using it on Toast’s horrified face, you get all the shorthand from film’s history, plus a very funny moment.

Above: Harry Peacock as Ray Purchase in Toast of London's "well, well, well" scene. 

PE: The [trick] that comes to mind is in Toast of London, Series 1, Episode 2, in the rehearsal room Ray Purchase says "Well well well". We used three small zooms into his face to time with each ‘well’. We’d already tracked/zoomed into Toast as he sees Ray. This shot seems to be very popular on social media!

MC: We ended up using that camera move for Ray Purchase a few times. It became like a catchphrase.

Above: Is it the spats or the space? Toast of Tinseltown, Episode 4.

There is something intrinsically funny about this shot (above), can you explain the thinking behind it? 

MC: Well, Toast’s outfit is pretty hilarious for a start, but the room leant itself to a very symmetrical style of shooting for that scene. We deliberately filmed the wide shots square on. The comedy, for me, comes when Toast is told that he might be arrested for MURDER. As the dramatic brass stab on Matt’s brilliant soundtrack punches through, we cut to that symmetrical, very wide shot of him looking lost and shocked. It’s held just a bit too long ¬– for comedic effect.

PE: I think this is all about the combination of costume, space, situation & location. And we had to include his shoes!  

MC: You rarely get a chance to frame a shot that includes spats these days.

Above: Shazad Latif as Clem Fandango in Toast of Tinseltown.

And in Toast of Tinseltown, Episode 5, Clem Fandango appears as a head in a bin. Why are disembodied heads funny? 

PE: This works as a reveal, we don’t hear from Clem till he’s revealed … in the ice bath.. only Toast thinks it odd…. It’s also another nod to the running gag about the heat in Tinseltown.

MC: It probably doesn’t matter how you frame a shot of Clem Fandango in a “traaaash can”, It’s always going to be funny.

Pete and I have form with disembodied heads. Here is Downton Abbey’s Hugh Bonneville encountering one in [UK sitcom] Sandylands, that we shot for real – no CG – on the beach at Weston-Super-Mare. Darren Strange, whose head it was, was buried in a freezing beach for half a day.  

Above: Hugh Bonneville and Darren Strange's head in Sandylands.

How can you use POV to enhance the comedy?

MC: I sometimes like using the camera to be the point of view of an inanimate object that couldn’t have a point of view. There is a kind of slapstick-ish bit in Episode 1 of Toast of Tinseltown. Toast throws a bread knife that bounces off various surfaces before almost stabbing him in the face. As the knife approaches Toast we are travelling with it.

Above: Peter Edwards drew inspiration from Citizen Kane DP, Gregg Toland. 

MC: And…If more proof is needed of Pete Edwards' brilliance, look at how he perfectly replicates the legendary Gregg Toland’s cinematography in one of my favourite films, Citizen Kane. The lighting is perfect for the Wells’ Wine House showdown between Toast and Ray Purchase in Episode 6 of Tinseltown. 

I’ve always wanted to ‘do an Orson’ and Lewis MacLeod – who, incidentally, played Stanley Kubrick  in Toast of London, and is my go-to V/O guy for commercials – turned in an exceptional performance as Orson [in the shadows, below].