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Shooting Lady Gaga revealing herself as a down-to-earth woman while staring at a rock star character Bradley Cooper was creating for herself just two of the challenges facing DP Matthew Liberte in the star-crossed lovers story "A Star Is Born." love story is screening at the EnergaCamerimage fest, competing for the hand cinematography prize. Libyan Confessions Cooper was so busy performing in his directorial debut that the DP was often left on his own to decide on composition and shots.
You started your career working for Ed Lachman, a master cinematographer and perennial mentor here at the fest. Were there lessons from him that you still use today in your shooting?
The way I meter. He has this modified exposure zone system that he does not quite leave the Ansel Adams zone system. It is very similar to the scale and total values so I meter very similarly to him – except he overexposes. I underexpose. The other thing is that he's so versatile, project to project. He's a major influence for me.
You've said that you did not shoot much cover this film because you wanted to give it a boost. Is not that risky?
I was reacting to what they were doing – it was always kind of a surprise. Like the wedding dress they found. It was actually the costume designer's wedding dress. It was that kind of grass roots mentality the movie had. It's a Warner Brothers movie – it was not a studio you had a normal movie.
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You shot concert at real performances, filming between live band shows. That takes some expert timing, clearly.
That was a source of anxiety. It was kind of relaxing to get into the narrative bits. We started at Coachella in between the two weekends. So we were able to get the production of their stages and their lighting. Then going on there we are staged, like at the Greek Theater during the scene for the song "Shallow," where she comes on stage for the first time. And then having the next level, where we were shooting between acts at real concerts.
So Cooper, who is in front of the camera all over the film as we see the self-destruction of his character, the Jackson Maine singer-songwriter, how do you make movies?
I can not say enough about how motivating he was. The process was very fluid. He was not too precious about things and he had none of the anxiety that some directors have about getting shots. It was the authenticity of the performance that he was focused on. He acted in this film and did a wonderful job. His directing prowess was impressive for a first-time director.
Did you feel under extra pressure as a co-director?
I never thought about it that way – I just wanted to support him. Between Lady Gaga – Stefani [Germanotta] – and Bradley, they were wearing so many hats. You know at night they were making music, tracks for the coming weeks.
He's directing and he's acting and evaluating his performance while he's acting with her. The least I could do was help paying attention to other things besides cinematography. And down the line, the camera operators did more than they usually do. We all had to pitch in collectively.
So his dozens of acting roles on a camera?
He's very persistent in terms of trying to get it better. And he has a great sense of the edit when shooting, which I think is the mark of a great director. Knowing how you're going to get a scene. How do you learn that? I think it's just because it's so much time consuming both with Clint Eastwood and David O. Russell.
In terms of deciding the look of the movie – and the color palate of Cooper's concerts – you've said that you prefer to decide on the tones of your scenes, rather than tweak them in post, correct?
I do not really love to reinvent the wheel in the post process. I'm very particular about the dailies. The dailies have to be pretty much what the intention is. So there's no confusion. And I find it hard to deviate from it. In rare cases I've worked with directors who wanted to change the look of the movie. What's the point of that? I think it starts to look false when you start to break it.
And what about directors who want to shoot in neutral tones so they can decide later on the color palate in post?
Well, it's the same feeling. You're just changing something for no reason other than to have editing choices. I like people who have an idea what they want to do.
Did you have more flexibility to shoot cover on "A Star Is Born" than on "Mother !," where are you in tight quarters, filming on 16mm for Darren Aronofsky?
Actually the budgets were about the same on both movies. They're mid-budget, the rare lot of $ 30 million movie. It seems like today it's over $ 100 million gold it's $ 10 million. So I've been lucky. It's a nice place to be. You have enough tools to do something special but you do not have the $ 100 million pressure.
Do you always operate the camera yourself as much as you did on "A Star Is Born"?
No, sometimes I step back, especially on multi-camera events so I can watch all the frames, so I can make sure that everybody's on the same page. The last thing I want to be different.
I kind of learned that working with Spike Lee. He'll be using multiple cameras in very interesting ways I'm sure everyone is in connection. But I love operating, especially handheld.
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