To fully realize the stylistic vision of the script, the DOWN WITH LOVE sets, costumes, cinematography, choreography, music, make-up and hairstyles had to maintain a cohesive tone throughout the filming.
"What's distinctive about the script is that it keeps an emotional reality along with its stylized look and performances," says Peyton Reed. "The script is almost like a musical without the music. There's a distinct rhythm to the dialogue, and I felt there should also be a visual rhythm for the way the movie plays outs."
Not only does DOWN WITH LOVE take place in 1962, it was written and designed specifically to look like it was made in 1962. Split screens, enormous sets, stock footage and sixties-style music all evoke the period. "Audiences will feel as if they're watching a movie made in the sixties," says Reed.
The script abides by the rules and mores of 1962. "We don't show or say anything in DOWN WITH LOVE that wouldn't have worked in an early-sixties romantic comedy," says Ahlett.. "There's no sex or nudity, but there is sexy dialogue and lots of crazy jazz."
In the early sixties, New York City had a vibrancy and optimism under which the arts thrived. It was no wonder the Doris Day - Rock Hudson movies were set in New York, albeit an idealized version, where everyone had a fabulously furnished apartment with a spectacular view, the weather was perfect, and one could always hail an immaculate yellow cab. On the Hollywood sound stages and back lots of the period, anything was possible.
DOWN WITH LOVE also plays on our current fascination with early-sixties designs. "What's interesting is how much we embrace the early sixties today," comments Cohen. "You would kill to have those early-sixties-style apartments and those clothes. You want that music on your stereo. There's a synergy that's allowing us to make a movie that's simultaneously a period piece and also completely modern and contemporary, because everyone is so in love with that aesthetic right now."
Liked the Day-Hudson collaborations "Pillow Talk" and "Lover Come Back," DOWN WITH LOVE was filmed entirely on four stages at Hollywood Center Studios, with a few days of exterior work done on the Universal Studios back lot.
"We have painted backdrops, not translights, so we're not hiding the fact that our setting is ot real," says director of photography Jeff Croneweth. "The sixties films were classically beautiful and color saturated, but were shot fairly simple, and I wanted to pay tribute to that style. I added a little more contemporary camera framing and movement, and I used the anamorphic (widescreen) aspect ratio to force interesting compositions."
Production designer Andrew Laws, yet another admirer of early-sixties movies, relished the challenge of designing DOWN WITH LOVE's 55 sets.
"Working on DOWN WITH LOVE allowed me to take my favorite pieces of mid-century modern architecture and my favorite architect-heroes, like Miss Van der Rohe, Eero Saarinen, Richard Neutra and Alvar Aalto, and create a slightly more whimsical world with pieces and samplings of the period," says Laws. "At the same time, we played with the architecture, and weren't bound by conventions of how somebody moves through space, or by logic."
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