‘The Changeling’ Production Designer Breaks Down His Favorite Easter Eggs and How He Built the Elk Hotel
07.10.2023 - 19:53
/ variety.com
Jazz Tangcay Artisans Editor SPOILER ALERT: This contains spoilers from “The Changeling”, now streaming on AppleTV+ “The Changeling’s” latest episode steps back in time to New York — in 1982, to be precise. For production designer Lester Cohen, he needed to find a place where he could build his red-light area and seedy hotel. The episode begins with Lillian (Adina Porter) walking through the red-light district in New York where peep shows cost 25 cents.
She is still trying to get hold of Apollo (LaKeith Stanfield), leaving him messages. It has been three weeks since he went missing. She enters the Elk Hotel, a seedy joint.
Narrator Victor LaValle, who also penned the book of the same name, describes it as “the shittiest hotel in the world.” As it turns out, the hotel is 100 years old. The lobby decor is just as seedy — red and rancid. An old TV with the news is on when she walks in and the anchor announces that Mozart’s lost symphony has been found in the Bavaria State Library.
Lillian is back in 1982. Cohen describes the episode as “Lilian’s fever dream,” as she confronts her past self and comes to terms with everything that has happened and all she has done – the deal she made many years prior. Through flashback, it is revealed that Lilian, a new immigrant to America, murdered a white male cop and made a deal with a higher power to let her walk away free.
When reading the scripts, this was the episode Cohen was most excited to work on. His approach was to make this episode reflect what was going on in her head. Says Lester, “The red of the lobby reflects the rage she’s in when she gets there.” He continues, “The crazy blue-green hallway is indicative of her state of mind, and so we decided to push that.” While the
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