Sarah Laker Creative Arts for Theatre and Film: Inspiration from 'The King's Speech'

While watching 'The King's Speech' (2010, Tom Hooper) over the weekend one of the sets inspired me with ideas looking towards how we will decay the wall behind the screen. Lionel Logue, speech theropist to George VI had a very unique office. Much of his work took place within this huge empty sparce room, with one baroque style sofa against a wall of torn and damaged paper/paint. The layers of destressed colour are a maze to the eye, almost as if an animal has agressivly attacked it or that over years and years of weather and wear the layers of the rooms past have been exposed. In our corner this same technique would be used but for a darker morbid affect. Death is destroying his house from this corner like an animal attack that is stripping Ivan's soul away layer by layer exposing his fears. The film also had many examples of palace interiors likening to the paintings of the Winter Palace in my early research. The pictures below show and example of production designer Eve Stewart's original drawings for the room, against the final set still.