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Danny Boyle’s latest film “Ink” traces the rise of Rupert Murdoch on London’s Fleet Street and the takeover of The Sun newspaper.
The film premieres at the London Film Festival and will open in select theaters Dec. 11
before landing on Netflix on Jan. 8 in the U.S. and Latin America.
“Ink” is based on the Tony-nominated play of the same name by James Graham, who adapted his own work for the screen. Guy Pearce plays a brash, 30-something Rupert Murdoch, with Jack O’Connell as editor Larry Lamb, the working-class newspaper journalist who helped him remake The Sun into a populist juggernaut.
Set in 1969 London, Boyle enlisted his go-to production designers, Gareth Pugh and Carson McColl, to bring his vision to life. Boyle’s brief was simple. “He said he wanted to reset the expectations of a period film,” McColl explains. “We took that to mean that he wanted to recreate 1969, but in a way that felt immediate and grabby.” They looked back at how The Sun was one of the original places to find clickbait-style headlines.
Fleet Street
The Fleet Street of today looks vastly different from the Fleet Street of 1969. “A lot of Fleet Street doesn’t exist anymore,” Pugh says.
The Sun’s 1969 headquarters was originally located on Bouverie Street, with the print press set in the basement of the offices. In its place now stand modern buildings. “We ran into challenges when trying to recreate the newsroom,” Pugh says.
They ultimately found a space in Bromley, U.K., which they could transform for filming. “It had been vacated by the local council, and the mix of different architectural styles made it ideal for housing the various set-pieces, particularly the newsroom,” he explains.
The Newsroom
The newsroom was a huge undertaking for Pugh, and McColl describes it as the “nerve center” of the film.
Boyle referred to the space as a spaceship. Pugh notes, “It’s where we spent most of our time in the script.”
McColl adds, “For the space to feel real, the layout was key. In a newsroom, especially of that era, there was a daily system of way-finding — from the morning until the copy deadline at night — that would escalate into a frenzy of activity and human traffic.” He explains they worked with consultants who had experience on Fleet Street in 1969 to map out the newsroom and choreograph its flow with the cast. “It was amazing to see how it resembled an ecosystem,” McColl says.
The set had to balance breadth and scale despite the film’s low budget, which forced the team to be both creative and resourceful. “Danny gives us a lot of latitude when we’re designing sets,” McColl says.
The pair had recently given up smoking, but they wanted to add an extra layer of authenticity. McColl says, “We smoked like two packets of cigarettes, so that it smelled like cigarette smoke.”
In addition to that, they found old rotary phones, typewriters and other set-pieces that immersed the cast and the film in that era.
Linotype Machines
One challenge was finding the Linotype machines which The Sun relied on for its typesetting. McColl says, “They’re priceless. There are very, very few left in the world.”
The film’s set decorator Ben Barrington Groves came to the rescue. McColl says, “He found someone who had an obsession with hot metal printing and he convinced them to come on this journey with us.” The team ultimately secured three fully functional Linotype machines.
Larry’s Office
Larry Lamb’s office was designed to reflect the arc of his story. McColl explains, “The newsroom was supposed to look tired — functional, but reflective of a struggling newspaper. Amid the chaos, Larry needed his own space and as the movie progresses, he should feel increasingly isolated. We wanted the audience to see him through the gridded glass windows, alone in the final scenes where he’s on the phone with Hugh Cudlip, the newsroom deserted. It was a visual way of showing that while he got everything he wanted, he’s found himself alone.”
The team also worked closely with set decorator, Alice Davies, whose contributions proved invaluable. “When I walked into Larry’s office one day, her rough layout was nearly perfect,” McColl recalls. “It was a testament to how closely attuned we were to one another.”
So much was their eye and attention for detail that they found a way to make Larry’s phone work. “You could pick it up and you’d get the sales numbers,” McColl says.
The Tube
In one sequence, Rupert Murdoch is riding the tube. As with everything else, London Underground had since been modernized. So, the train sequence presented its own challenges. “There’s only one train of the right era, located near Watford,” Pugh explains. “It’s part of a museum, so the idea of bringing a film crew in initially made the curators nervous.”
When it couldn’t be used how they wanted, they got creative. Pugh says, “We used high-powered wind machines and flying newspapers to create the frenetic environment, all while being careful with the artifacts.”
The scene was brought to life by lighting designer Steve Mackie, who used fast-moving bar lights. “He was able to rush light down the entire length of the train and make it look like it was going at a million miles an hour,” Pugh says.
McColl adds, “There was something very punk and DIY. During prep, we experimented with different setups — running cameras down corridors and building fake tube windows to achieve the right look. Danny brought a 360-degree camera into ‘Ink,’ and used it for certain sequences, including the pivotal kidnapping of Muriel Mackay. It felt brave and risky, but it paid off.”
