Described as engaging, well acted and snappily directed, BBC ONE’s TV drama ‘Hustle’ gained critical success and very respectable viewing figures right from its first episode, resulting in a second series being commissioned while the first was still running. Produced by Kudos Film and Television, the team also behind BBC ONE’s hit TV drama ‘Spooks’, ‘Hustle’ follows a group of expert con artists performing the long con, but despite being on the wrong side of the law the gang only scam the unscrupulous and greedy, following the unwritten rule of ‘You can’t con an honest man’. A driving factor behind ‘Hustle’ was to create a series that was entertaining and fun, its stories are smart enough to keep you guessing but at the same time raise a smile through the audacity of it all. The drama also looks smart, bringing the movie tradition of the con to TV with its slick and glossy style. |  | | | The Hustle Team | |
Shot in Super 16 on two 16mm SR3 Advanced cameras supplied by ARRI Media, it was DoP Jake Polonsky who had the task of continuing the style established in the first series. Polonsky, who after having previously worked with Kudos on the third run of ‘Spooks’, was invited to shoot the first two episodes of the second series of ‘Hustle’. ‘Kudos sent me the whole of the first series and when I started watching it I was very impressed. It was obvious they really cared about the look of the show. It’s very rich, with interestingly constructed shots. Part of my job as DoP is to carry on all the stylistic elements that create that look.’ One of the main considerations for Polonsky was the visual design of each scene. ‘The first thing the Director (Otto Bathurst) said to me was he really liked the idea of just really nicely designed wide shots, holding things in, which is a style I really like, it is much more cinematic. The structure of the show is that the characters live in a hotel suite and hang out a lot in a bar, which were both sets that Kudos had built on the fifth floor of a business complex. There are a large number of scenes that take place on these sets that ultimately help the viewer understand the story, the con that the characters are planning, and one challenge for me was how to keep them interesting. Ideally, you want as many moving shots as you can have and scenes that develop out of interesting blocking but at the same time it is also about trying to get what needs to be done within the time available.’ In order to try and accelerate the process of getting the coverage required two cameras were used. ‘If we were using two cameras I would get the main shot but also try and get a tight shot at the same time. So with a scene with all five of the characters talking together, just at times I would pick off a couple of them.’ But using two cameras didn’t always accelerate shooting. ‘When you shoot with two cameras its very important that both are aware of each other and slightly forgiving of each other’s requirements. The ‘A’ camera will always be slightly compromised by the ‘B’ camera and that whole process can end up taking more time. There are some scenes where using two cameras enabled us to get the coverage but perhaps didn’t end up saving time, on the day you try and get as much footage as you can so that there is enough to edit with because you don’t want loads and loads of scenes that are made up of one or two shots.’ A key style signature of the series is its freeze sequences, scenes where the action freezes but the characters can still be seen to interact with each other. ‘When I was working out how to continue what was a very successful style I decided that I really wanted the process of the action stopping to be visible to the viewer rather than it just suddenly stopping, so we ramped down the action from normal to 150 frames per second and then from there went into the freeze. You see everything go into extreme slow motion and stopping rather than just instantly stopping.’ When lighting ‘Hustle’ Polonsky chose to use Tungsten lighting, which he prefers over HMI. ‘I’m personally a big fan of Tungsten. A lot of my work is based around two lamps. I favour the ARRI T12, which I think is one of the most brilliant tungsten lights that there is, it’s a big light you can use to cover a big space but in my opinion it doesn’t have the brutality of an HMI, it has a nice soft feel to it. The other units that I use every day are Lowel Rifa lights, which are very lightweight tungsten softlights that you can pretty much put anywhere and they make things look good.’ Three weeks were spent filming on location, followed by two weeks on sets. It was the sets that presented the biggest lighting challenge. ‘I love working on location because its real, but its a challenge working on sets and stages creating that element of realism, you want people to instantly buy into what they are looking at. The onus falls on you as the Lighting Cameraman to actually make the sets come to life. One of things I wanted to do was to add an element of realism by avoiding ‘white out’ windows. There is a brilliant exterior of the balcony outside the hotel room, you see all the characters going in and out and I wanted to make it possible for the viewer to see somebody go outside from the hotel room set and then be outside so we had a backdrop made. With the bar we also tried to have some elements you can always see through the windows, they are kind of frosted so you can’t really see what’s actually there but you can see shapes, I wanted to give the impression there were some buildings across the road.’ 'The bar set is one of those places that has a lot of colour and contrasty lighting. We spent quite a lot of time looking at how contrasty we wanted to make it as it was all very deep colours but the initial feedback was that it looked too good. Kudos didn't want the bar to be a sexy place, but its nice to have the criticism that something looks too good, so we worked on taking that back a bit.' 'Hustle' is obviously an ambitious show, its look is as important as the scripts and casting. Polonsky reflects, 'Having worked with Kudos, one thing I really do think is how great it is to work with a company who are not only passionate about the programme, but also passionate about its look and passionate about film.' 'Hustle' was produced by Karen Wilson and executive produced by Jane Featherstone, Simon Crawford Collins and Gareth Neame.
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