THE CAST IRON STARS OF THE MUSEUM
/Printing Presses in the Movies
View from the cameraman’s monitor for a commercial shot in Museum gallery.
Our presses just can’t stay out of the limelight! 2020 has been one of our busiest years for rentals to Hollywood.
The year began with a rental to Starz’ critically-acclaimed television program American Gods, a fantasy drama adapted from Neil Gaiman’s novel of the same name. They were interested in a Gutenberg-esque press, but the challenge was that the production was way up in Ontario, Canada. Mark directed them toward our smaller, portable reproduction Gutenberg press from the Jeff Craemer Collection. Our Gutenberg made it back across the Canadian border only two days before the nationwide Covid-19 shutdown. Later that year the press made its appearance in season 3, episode 10 of the show.
The “Good Girls” counterfeiting money in Season 3.
On February 16th, those watching the Season 3 premiere of NBC’s Good Girls would have seen a multitude of set decoration and props purchased from the Museum’s surplus sale last summer. In Season 3, the show’s three protagonists, played by Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks, Parks and Recreation’s Retta, and Parenthood’s Mae Whitman, get involved in a laundering and money counterfeiting scheme, all of which required the set decorator to assemble a realistic looking printing shop, complete with a Heidelberg Windmill Press. We missed out on renting the Windmill since they simply purchased one from a local printer. But we made up for that loss by selling them a paper cutter and folder, cabinets, lots of cuts and type, tools and imposing tables. Mark’s favorite items in this sale were two boxes of old, dead ink cans and a red rag canister filled with soiled, inky rags. Only Mark can sell useless cans of dried ink and used shop rags; he knows the look set decorators are after!
Over the years, we’ve had numerous film shoots at the Printing Museum but never quite so unique as our August commercial shoot. The commercial was for an antidepressant medication that helps someone re-engage in activities such as going to museums. The main actress and her two actual kids played a family on screen; we had them printing on several presses which the kids really enjoyed. But apparently they enjoyed the experience a little too much. The director kept coming over and talking to the mother, who was naturally beaming with a smile, watching her kids enjoy their experience. She looked a little “too happy,” and they had to keep reshooting the scene; the drug works but not that well, I overheard the director tell her! The set decorator also put together a faux living room in an empty corner of the Museum for the next scene; but upon closer inspection, the director wanted it to look more homely. Thus began a mad scramble to find homey looking things at the Museum. The good Dr. Franklin came to the rescue with an assortment of candles and trinkets from his theatre set. Museum Manager Sara found a set of wine glasses, something her home certainly has, but was told that the wine glasses were not appropriate considering you weren’t supposed to drink while on this anti-depressant. Sara did however have at her desk an adorable portrait of her favorite furry docent Moxie, Trustee Doug Haines’s dog that comes regularly to the Printing Museum. Doug had put the portrait in a wooden frame he fashioned out of printer’s furniture— the perfect piece-de-resistance making the set look authentic and lived in.
Volunteer Mike Slawinski and Mark on set, fully masked, for “Queenpins”
When the filming of a scene needs to take place on a set and not at the Printing Museum, it requires lots of logistics. Mark coordinated rigging our 3-ton 1955 Heidelberg Cylinder Press out of the museum and over our new vinyl floors to a film set at the Cal Poly Pomona campus. The press and other printing equipment will be featured in an upcoming comedy film titled Queenpins; it is based on the true story of a suburban housewife who counterfeited coupons and ended up scamming millions of dollars from big food companies. The film stars Kristen Bell, also known to millions of children as Princess Anna from Frozen. Mark and Museum volunteer Mike Slawinski were on set as technical advisors showing the actors how to operate the press and paper cutter. The movie is currently still filming and should be released sometime in 2021.
And finally, Mark was contacted by a set decorator for HBO who is working on dramatic series called The Gilded Age by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellows. It is set in New York in the 1880’s. The newspaper printing scene will feature our hand-cranked Prouty “Grasshopper” Press from the Country Newspaper Exhibit in the Museum’s main gallery. In fact, they are literally renting the entire exhibit and having it transported to Tarrytown, NY, for filming in April, 2021. Of course Mark managed to also negotiate an all-expense paid trip to New York to be the technical advisor during filming.
