Marlowe
Part 12: Marlowe - Building from Pain and Perseverance
2020 | Director: Andrew Rose | Wrightsville Beach, NC
PRODUCTION DESIGNER
Memory: Building the sandcastle and joking with a close art department friend. Despite the pain, it was a fun build.
Within weeks of wrapping Where’s Rose, I was called on by an director friend I’d worked with in 2017. Marlowe was a small-scale but gratifying project filmed on the beaches of Wrightsville Beach, NC during the pandemic. This time, it wasn’t the logistics of the film that presented the most significant challenge but my physical health. I joined the project while experiencing an intense worsening of pain, a hurdle that required me to find new ways of managing my workload and preserving my energy. With Andrew as the director, I felt supported, yet the strain of the work took its toll.
The setting— a beautiful sunlit beach—became both a sanctuary and a test of resilience. Filming outdoors required meticulous planning, and sourcing beach-specific props through the coastal resale shops in the area added a whimsical yet essential layer to the design. Although the crew was small, the dynamic was harmonious and we managed to create a beautifully cohesive look despite the constraints. We didn’t need to find much, just the right pieces to add to the story.
The largest challenge, literally, was the crescent shaped sandcastle with built-in tunnels we constructed as a prop for the beach scenes. We enjoyed building it, but overall it was a huge piece broken into three parts that stretched 8 by 12 feet in total. This project taught me the importance of self-care in sustaining creativity, pushing me to recognize and respect my limits.
Marlowe wasn’t the largest or most complex project, but it symbolized my ability to adapt, even when we managed to get the truck tire stuck deep in the sand! The final product was a delicate, intimate short film that felt like a gift. Though I did a couple commercial projects after this, I consider Marlowe my most recent film. Between the pandemic and the chronic pain I was dealing with, it was time to shift my film goals.
