The shooting for One Night was split into two halves. The initial block of three saw Catherine Millar in charge of direction as well as providing the visual guide for the entire show. The second block of three is when Lisa Matthews took the helm.
For myself and Helena, this interview was a lot of firsts. Our first time conducting an interview together, our first Zoom interview and the first ever interview for Read The Room Magazine. Enter Lisa Matthews. Sitting in what looked like a home office with a wall of framed film posters and the sun casting a warm glow from the window behind her. As setting the scene goes for an interview with a director, it couldn’t have been more perfect.
As we were to discover while working on this special feature, the cast and team behind One Night are a passionate collective, generous in their time, and candid with their experiences. Lisa proved to be all of the above.
// Please be aware that, due to the themes represented in the TV series One Night such as sexual assault, PTSD and addiction, it was inevitable that some of those topics would be discussed in our interviews. //
Alfie Whitby: We're curious to know what made you pursue directing. How did it all begin for you?
Lisa Matthews: That's a big question! I always loved film, television, and photography. I always just loved storytelling, I think. I didn't know I was going to be a director; I just love that creative world of storytelling. I did a lot of photography at school and then I did a Bachelor of Arts at Sydney University.
I majored in film theory, so I was doing a lot of semiotics. Alongside that, I was doing Super 8 and making films. I just loved that. When I graduated, I heard that West Pack, which is an Australian bank, was looking for a producer/on-camera presenter and I just literally interviewed my mother who was a social worker with a little handy-cam. I got the job! So I thought, well, this is pretty cool. I was flying around the country in helicopters shooting everything - it was so much fun. I did writing, editing, on-camera presenting, directing - it was like a 10-minute video of different news items. I thought I was going to be an on air reporter! I was looking at doing that in Australia, but one of the networks collapsed, and I thought, "This isn't a good time". I also didn't really like being in front of the camera.
I went to the UK for three years and I worked in television researching. I worked for Icon Films, not the Icon films, another Icon Films in Bristol. I got the gig of doing the Royal Collection which was this six hour documentary on the Queen's painting collection. I did that and some other shows and then I came back to Australia for a friend's wedding and made a short film [called] Rosie's Secret which I wrote, produced, and directed. It got into the Sydney Film Festival, and that was my calling card as a director.
Straight after that I was offered to direct a documentary on the author of Mary Poppins, an Australian woman, Pamela Travers. Saving Mr. Banks, that was based on my documentary. The same company produced it. That just set me off. I've been directing ever since then, pretty much 25 years!
AW: You've done a lot of documentary filmmaking. Has that impacted your approach to directing narrative TV and feature length drama?
Lisa: I think it does, because with documentary, you have to find the story. You've interviewed people - you know what their thoughts are - but you always have to find the story and you have to create the story as well. I think that discipline really helps in being a better director for drama. I'm very good on story. I'm often in pre-production going, 'This doesn't work; why would the character do this?" I'm quite forensic about that and I think that's from a documentary background.
Because documentary [projects] never have the same budget, I'm not so precious. It just makes you very creative because you come from such a low-budget background. You do everything yourself. That’s why I love doing drama, because I have a whole team, whereas in documentary it's you and your poor producer: you research, you write, and then you get your great camera person and sound recordist. I remember traveling to seven countries in 10 days, sleeping in dives. I just thought, "I've got two kids, I'm over schlepping it."
Helena Emmanuel: Sounds like it was very much an indie filmmaking experience versus the larger system of scripted drama.
Lisa: Yeah! I mean, it was great. I did high-end stuff, but it's a long process. It's often a year out of your life or maybe two years. You develop it, then you get the finance, then you have to travel to meet everyone, whereas with drama now, you've got three months to [get it done], then I can take time off to be with my kids or write. It's nice.
HE: How long was the shoot for One Night?
Lisa: I did the second block. Catherine Millar was the setup director, so she did the first three episodes, and I did [episodes] four, five and six. We pretty much had two months pre-production, and it was a six-week shoot each block, so a 12-week shoot.
[In terms of shooting days,] some days we were shooting 10 and a half minutes a day which is quite a lot for this type of drama. It's not like a kids comedy or a sixth series or something; it was inventing its own language and it had quite emotional scenes as well which can require more time.
HE: How did you approach the subject matter and those emotional scenes on set? How did you work with Emily Ballou and Emma Paine to give the actors the space needed for those scenes while still staying within the schedule and resources you had?
Lisa: Having Emily on set was fabulous. She’s gorgeous. She's a lovely woman. I have a duty of care to Emily because we want to be true to her and her show. At the same time, I'm the director and I have a duty of care to make the story work cinematically as well. Having her on set was fantastic because she would do a line-run with me and the actors and then she'd [be there] behind the camera and the monitors.
We talked a lot about the scenes beforehand. One thing I do find just generally is that if something is a hard scene, I don't go 'ok, we're all quiet'. It's sort of [clicks fingers] "Ok, we're doing this scene now". You keep it quite light, because if everyone is suddenly quiet, it's so reverential, and I think it tips everyone the wrong way.
We had an intimacy coach as well, Chloë Dallimore, who I've worked with several times before. Even the shot at the end with Tess and Vicki where they have a kiss on the balcony was choreographed in consultation with the intimacy coordinator. She said, "Lisa, what do you want?" and I said, "I just want to see a familiarity and an intimacy, that these two are back on track." The actors would say "Ok, we'll go left [here], we'll go right [here]." So I think communicating is just the best thing.
I know in block one there was a counsellor on set if anyone wanted to talk to her. It was pretty traumatic for the guys because they had to be the aggressors. They're lovely young men, you know what I mean? It was quite confronting for them. We had the intimacy coordinator and we talked about what they were comfortable with.
I tried not to do too many takes. Emma and I clearly said, "Well, I want to have a mid-shot here and I want it wide here, and then we're going to come over the shoulder…" You don't just shoot the shit out of it and see what you come up with. You plan it.
AW: I think you can actually really feel that when you watch it, how much care has gone into every scene. It doesn't feel like there was a lot of waste and unnecessary stuff going on.
Lisa: I think because of the subject matter, everyone was very gentle around it. You can't help but pour yourself into a project. I think the best projects are when you put part of yourself in there. There's all sorts of things you can tap into in your own experience that you can bring. That's what makes better directors and why certain people suit certain shows. I think you're right and I'm glad you said that, because I do think there's a lot of care in the show that comes across. I'm glad it does!
HE: Memory and how it's interpreted, how everyone recalls things, is a big theme in the show. Questions of is the memory correct, whose memory is more correct... We noticed that mirrors were recurring frequently throughout the series. Based on how you've spoken about your work on the show, it seems like every shot was very deliberate.
Were mirrors specifically incorporated to echo that theme of memory and reflection? If not, can you just talk a little bit about how you used the camera and the technical aspect of filmmaking to help tell the story?
Lisa: At the beginning we requested from the production designer, Victoria (Williams), that we wanted mirrors. A lot of mirrors. And often seeing through glass as well, just to have that whole idea of reflection and refraction. For the flashbacks we used this bevel glass which you put in front of the lens. That gives it that refracted look.
We wanted that to look distorted because it is like, "Whose memory is it?" I love that scene in the car with Yael and Nicole when she says, "Just because you wrote a book about it doesn't mean your memory is better than my memory." Everyone has got errors about what happened in the past.
We also tried to, as much as we could, integrate the flashbacks into the present narrative quite seamlessly. You see young Simone running up the stairs before adult Simone walks up the same stairs. Trying to keep them close or almost within the same room or cutting from one character in the past to the person in the future. We did that as much as we could and we thought a lot about that in terms of the blocking. Often it's just lazy filmmaking when they just flashback to the past but there's no segue, there's no theme that links the two. We also specifically made the past even more vibrant in colour in the grade because it's so alive, it’s so visceral. Often flashbacks are sepia or they're very desaturated, so we did the reverse.
One of the flashback scenes I love is when Yael and Nicole, in episode six, are sitting at the pool. They look across and their younger selves jump into the water. Having that in camera as opposed to just cutting away to the past because the past is so ever-present in the present narrative [was important]. Making it more like a character.
Also, the character of that looming precipice is kind of like the past. The precipice of the cliff face is just towering over all the characters. We had Tess looking out the window, and there's just this huge escarpment. The past was ever-present. Very separate worlds, the land and the sea. Diametrically opposed.
Just to further that, I used a lot more Steadicam in block two, because for block one, it's setting up the narrative and the interplay between the three women, the whole evolution of the book and the repercussions. Block two starts to take off with what is happening. I wanted it to be more in the character - following them and trying to be what they're finding, getting more immediacy.
HE: It's very, very good. There's so much in it. Like you were saying, the second half really kind of revs up, it's when everything comes to a head. How did you approach and chart the emotional journeys of everyone through those three episodes? Especially for Tess, as even in Episode Six alone, it starts on a bit of a high with her dancing with Lily; it seems like it's the first time that we really see her connected to her body and her youth in a way that's not through trauma. And towards the end, it's her listening to the recording, but then ending with that kiss and swimming. She has a lot of ups and downs even within that episode.
Lisa: For every scene I always like to know what came before, who they last saw as a character, where they are emotionally. I just go through the scenes and say, "Well last time we saw you, Tess, you'd done this, you were there - bring it down a bit". They're just such good actresses, those three. They all just come so prepared. They do their homework. Some actresses they'll say, "What was I doing? What happened [before this]?" Those three knew everything. They were so well prepared. I'm just like a little rudder, saying, "A little bit here, a little bit there". It's not reinventing the wheel. It’s helping just navigate a little bit sometimes.
Every night I watched the rushes and looked at the scenes for the next day and I'd just make notes like, "Make sure Simone is angry, she's not gentle". Sometimes I'd put key words next to scenes just to remind myself because you get really tired, you've got a million things going on, you can sometimes forget the intention that you want or a little subtly. I just write key notes in the script.
AW: Can you tell us about your collaboration with Emma Paine and what it was like working together?
Lisa: Funnily enough, I hadn't worked with Emma before. She's just a sweetheart and so talented. We met for a coffee before pre-production, just to talk, get to know each other. We talked about how we saw the show and our block. We just wanted to be more in with the characters, we both really wanted more Steadicam. Then we were obviously continuing the style of the show with that shift tilt, that overhead shot where they're very close, the soft focus. We wanted to use that too for getting into the past as well: often you'll see a character, then there's that shift tilt and they see their younger selves. We talked about the kind of seamlessness to get in between the two worlds. As much as possible, we tried to chart that so if it was thematic, it would be a visual connection.
Also saying that, we talked about not wanting it to be so clever that it's self-conscious. Sometimes things can be really too, "Aren't I so clever, I've done this movement with the camera," but it takes you out of the storytelling. That was another consideration. You can probably tell by the makeup and the hair that we wanted to have a very believable world. The actresses weren't wearing much makeup, they didn't have four thousand costume changes and their hair was messy because you're down the South Coast, it's blowing all the time anyway. We wanted a real sense of reality, a visceral world that you could relate to. We wanted a rawness about the show. You're on a journey with these characters and you're in with them as opposed to watching, sitting back.
We did shot lists, we went through every scene together and said, "We're going to do a top shot here, maybe do this here, how are we going to do the dream sequences, and what about this?". Emma, she's really fastidious so she'd go away and she'd get all these little images from other movies, shots we liked. We had our own little book about block two. She did an amazing job and we worked really well together. She'll go far, she's very simpatico to work with, on the same wavelength. We would finish each other's sentences. We never got to a scene and went, "Oh fuck, how are we doing this?" We both knew how we would do it. We'd sit together at lunch and we'd go, "I'm a bit worried about this scene because we've only got an hour and a half, we need to do that, I think we should shoot the wide shot first…" We were always talking.
So much is going on, being prepared is just the best thing. And sometimes it might all fall apart so you go, "Ok, we don't have enough time, we're just going to do a oner, that'll be ok." Always having a plan really helps.
HE: I think you can tell that you always had a plan everywhere in the show, that everyone was prepared and knew what they were doing because the choices all feel very deliberate, but not in a way that takes you out of it, in a way that adds to the narrative.
Lisa: It was such a joy. The writing was so original, and I thought the themes of the show were so important that you want to honour them.
HE: Did you have either a favourite scene to film or one that you were most anxious about?
Lisa: We shot one of the hardest scenes on the first day because of the weather. I think the first block had it worse than we did - they had wind, then it was pouring with rain and three cars got washed away. It was really hard going. The first day we had that really long scene on the beach when Simone and Hat come to see Tess and say, "We need to have a chat," and they go down in front of the house. It was a pretty hard scene to shoot first-up for everybody, but we had to because of weather. It was sunny that day, and we could've done it maybe three days later, but if it rained we were stuffed. That was quite a tricky scene to shoot.
My favourite scene is the end scene of episode six. I love that end of the sequence. I just think it was such a beautiful scene to show Tess had found a way to live with her pain and to bear her soul, kind of move on, be vulnerable. It was tricky shooting it. I said right along that we have to shoot this scene in Sydney. We have to make it a beautiful shot, we have to have the Harbour Bridge, everything. There was no time in the schedule to shoot the scene, so it had to be shot with a stringer crew the day after we wrapped. I really had to fight for that. It also took about eight hours to do the tats for Tess.
HE: It took eight hours to get her tatted up?
Lisa: Yeah! Poor Sheldon, the make-up artist.
We were shooting at this beach and Jodie says, "I can swim, but I can't dive so I'll just belly flop in the water". You're not belly flopping in the water! [laughs] That is not an eloquent way at the end of our show! I said, "I don't need you to dive in like an Olympic swimmer, but can you just walk in?" We talked about this for a while.
So, Jodie's on the beach and she's saying, "[Are there] sharks? [Are there] sharks?". "There's no sharks, it's fine, I swim here," the makeup artist was assuring her. We had to work out the shots [beforehand] because we only had one take of her going under water because her hair would be all wet. We did all the shots, then that last one when she goes into the water, she's walking in, the camera is back here, out wide, the sun's streaming down, there’s the sunset... She puts her foot in the water and goes, "THERE'S A FOOKIN' EEL!" There was an eel in the water! She runs up the beach, and I'm like, "Oh my god. I've never seen an eel in the water in my life." So we got the safety supervisor who’s making sure the eel had moved away and finally we got the final shot of her just going in under the water. That was my favourite scene. I think it's beautiful.
I'll tell you one which we did not enjoy shooting was that tunnel underneath the pub. It was so hot and smelly. It was just not a nice place, and we had a whole day in there. It was so great and was so perfect for the show, but it was really hot.
AW: Sounds like there were quite a few tricky scenes!
Lisa: Probably the hardest scene to shoot was the day at the carnival when Hat's at the stall at the beach. That was quite a big day. We had 60 or 70 extras, and it was threatening to rain every five minutes.
We did the driving shot of Lily and Simone in the car on a low loader. They wanted to do that in a studio, and I was very adamant that we weren't going to shoot that in a studio. It would look so fake. Unless you have a huge budget, it always looks fake. It just does. Our whole show is set in the natural world, everyone's looking very fresh and raw. We fought for that and we shot that on the last day too.
We really wanted the soundscape to be natural. There's cane toads, there's crickets, there's a lot of natural sounds and wind. We wanted it to be very evocative in that world. The South Coast is like that. In Catherine's block, they had cicadas which we often get that were deafening. Locusts and cicadas, they're just so noisy. They had to ADR a lot of the first block because the cicadas were so noisy. Luckily they'd shut up when we'd started shooting [laughs]. We really wanted the soundscape of waves crashing and cicadas to reflect the inner turmoil of the characters as well. Sometimes you'll hear Simone's driving and then there's really loud cicadas, the car stops and so does the cicadas. We wanted to play with the soundscape that way to make the sound, the natural world very visceral.
And Amanda Brown, she did an amazing job with the score. I love the music.
HE: I think it's used so sparingly but it's used so well.
Lisa: We didn't want to signpost everything with music. Often shows signpost everything - cry now, laugh now, it's scary, someones going to jump out of the cupboard. It was just, use the soundscape with minimal music. A lot of [Amanda’s] music, some of it you don't know if it's music or the soundscape, which was good.
I know it's sort of a dark subject matter, but there's also this ethereal quality, like with the girls walking through the lilies. It was such a joy to work on. What I really felt so passionate about is that idea of whose story is it to tell? The layering of memory and refraction of memory, what do we remember? The thing that is really interesting is that even if something didn't happen, if you think something happened and you carry that, how that can change your perception. I sort of have a theory in life that shit happens to everybody but it's how you deal with that shit that makes a difference. Some people will be a victim, some people will be angry, some people will get therapy, some people never stop talking about it. It's almost like what's more important is how you deal with what happens to you.
You look at how these three have dealt with it or not dealt with it, whether it's Tess going to another country and suppressing it and how the body doesn't lie, her whole kind of bulimia and her being out of control…. All of it's so interesting in how the three have processed it in different ways, but also haven't processed it. Ironically, if Simone hadn't written her book, none of them would've gotten to that place of, I wouldn't say peace, but a place of where they're much more at ease and in control of their own narrative.
Words: Alfie Whitby
Interview: Helena Emmanuel (HE) and Alfie Whitby (AW) (with questions submitted by the RTR team)
You can watch One Night on Paramount+ UK & Ireland and Paramount+ Australia now.
Read The Room is a volunteer run magazine! Enjoyed reading our articles and content? Please consider supporting us on ko-fi to help us cover the cost of running the website!
----------