page_title: Luke Cage (season 1)
section_title: Filming
hierarchical_section_title: Luke Cage (season 1) / Production / Filming
caption_attribution_description: Español: Cartel del Malcolm X Boulevard en Harlem (Nueva York) English: Malcolm X Boulevard street sign in Harlem (New York)
context_page_description: The first season of the American web television series Luke Cage, which is based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, follows a former convict with superhuman strength and unbreakable skin who fights crime in Harlem, New York. It is set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, sharing continuity with the films and other television series of the franchise. The season was produced by Marvel Television in association with ABC Studios, with Cheo Hodari Coker serving as showrunner.
  Mike Colter stars as Cage, reprising his role from the series Jessica Jones. He is joined by principal cast members Mahershala Ali, Simone Missick, Theo Rossi, Erik LaRay Harvey, Rosario Dawson, and Alfre Woodard. Luke Cage entered development in late 2013, and Colter was cast, to appear in Jessica Jones and star in Luke Cage, in December 2014. Production took place in New York City from September 2015 to March 2016, with the season exploring race and politics while looking to replicate the atmosphere and culture of Harlem.
context_section_description: Marvel announced in February 2014 that the series would be filmed in New York City, with Quesada stating in April that the show would be filming on location in addition to sound stage work. In July 2015, Loeb stated that Luke Cage was prepping to begin filming, and by September 2015, production had begun under the working title Tiara. Filming concluded in March 2016.
  Filming took place in Harlem, including Lenox Avenue and areas where American Gangster was shot, the Mount Olivet Baptist Church, St. Nicholas Park, Jackie Robinson Park, Riverside Park, and the Riverside Drive viaduct; in Washington Heights, including at the United Palace; Cortlandt Alley in Chinatown; in areas of Queens for when Cage escapes Seagate Prison and puts on the classic Power Man costume; the Roosevelt Island steam plant and Queens Detention Facility for interiors of Seagate; the Music Hall of Williamsburg for the exterior of Harlem's Paradise; the former Fulton Correctional Facility in The Bronx for the Crispus Attucks Complex; and the Long Island City portion of Newtown Creek. It was important to Coker for the series to film in Harlem, "the only place in the city where you see those wide boulevards. We really wanted to capture the color, the rhythm of the streets". For example, the production had the opportunity to film at a barbershop in Greenwich Village, which would have been much easier for the production, but Coker said "the opportunity to film it in Harlem was irresistible. I didn't want us to talk about Harlem and then not film" there. Soundstage filming took place at Broadway Stages in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. For the church that Cage and Temple visit in Savannah, Georgia, an abandoned church in The Bronx was found that was being sold, and the production was able to "graffiti up and sort of ruin" it. They also had to spend two days carting snow from the site before filming, after a recent blizzard.
  Manuel Billeter served as director of photography for the series, after doing the same for Jessica Jones. He worked with director Paul McGuigan to establish the look of the show in the first two episodes, with Coker hiring McGuigan based on his direction of the Sherlock episode "A Scandal in Belgravia". Coker was delighted to learn how little CGI McGuigan used to craft the visuals of that episode, and wanted the same approach for Luke Cage, "just old school camera stuff. He brought a very analogue perspective, analogue feel to the show." McGuigan, Coker explained, directed "every scene [as] long takes, from multiple takes over and over again. We would run an entire eight-page scene almost like a play, so when it comes together it's seamless." McGuigan was inspired by the works of photographers Gordon Parks, Tony Ray-Jones, and Jack Garofalo. Billeter looked to differentiate the look of Luke Cage from Jessica Jones, using modified gels on lights, and saturating and warming colors in color correction to give Harlem a more glowing look. Coker noted that the series' has a color scheme of yellow, brown, amber, and gold, in contrast to the violet tint Billeter gave Jessica Jones to reflect that series' villain, the Purple Man. The series was shot on Netflix's standard 4K cameras, with Billeter pairing them with Panavision Primo lenses that were "custom treated with a reflective coating in between the glass elements in the interior of the lens, causing more flares and bringing down the contrast in addition to very slightly de-focusing them" in order to "add something magic, less controlled and more cinematic". Billeter filmed Colter with a lot of low angles to make him look "even more heroic", and kept the camera close to him with Harlem in the background so that Cage "is always the dominant force in his shots, but he also remains a part of the terrain. The shots aren't of him alone; they’re of him in his home."
  Cage's fight style in the series was called "smack-fu" by Coker, referring to the way he tried not to punch anybody since that would probably kill them with his super strength. To film the effect of bullets bouncing off of Cage, remote controll
caption: Filming took place on location in Harlem, which was important for showrunner Cheo Hodari Coker to accurately depict the neighborhood.