page_title: The Favourite
section_title: Filming
hierarchical_section_title: The Favourite / Production / Filming
caption_attribution_description: Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, England.
context_page_description: The Favourite is a 2018 period black comedy film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, and written by Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara. It is a co-production of studios based in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the United States. Set in early 18th century Great Britain, the film's plot examines the relationship between two cousins, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough and Abigail Masham, who are vying to be Court favourite of Queen Anne. Principal photography lasted from March to May 2017, taking place at Hatfield House in Hertfordshire and at Hampton Court Palace.
  The Favourite premiered on 30 August 2018 at the 75th Venice International Film Festival, where it won the Grand Jury Prize and the Volpi Cup for Best Actress for Colman. It was theatrically released in the United States on 23 November 2018 by Fox Searchlight Pictures, and in the United Kingdom and Ireland on 1 January 2019. The film became a box office success, grossing $95 million worldwide on a $15 million budget.
  The Favourite was praised for the performances of the three leads, and it received numerous awards and nominations, including ten Academy Award nominations, tying Roma for the most nominations of that year.
context_section_description: Filming was expected to begin in the spring of 2016 but was postponed for a year, during which time Lanthimos made The Killing of a Sacred Deer. Principal photography began in March 2017 at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire; there were 45 filming days and filming finished in May. Regarding his choice of location, Lanthimos said, "from the beginning, I had this image of these lonely characters in (a) huge space".
  Prior to principal photography, Lanthimos engaged the main actors in an unorthodox rehearsal process that lasted three weeks. The actors "delivered their lines while trying to tie themselves in knots, jumping from carpet tile to carpet tile, or writhing around on the floor", according to the New York Times. A Coleman said, "He had us do all sorts of things that keep you from thinking about what your lines mean". According to Weisz, one exercise involved the actors linking arms to create a "human pretzel". "Somebody's butt is in your face, your face is in their butt, and you're saying the lines for a really serious, dramatic scene while doing that", she said. According to Stone, Lanthimos wanted to see "how much we could sense each other without seeing each other". Lanthimos said he believed the rehearsals allowed the actors "to not take themselves too seriously, learn the text in a physical way by doing completely irrelevant things to what the scene is about, just be comfortable about making a fool of themselves".
  The most challenging aspect of filming for cinematographer Robbie Ryan was trying to capture fluid camera movement without the use of Steadicam:
  We explored a lot of ways of trying to have a fluid camera movement that wasn't a Steadicam move. He showed me a film early on called Angst ... He wanted to try and instil that in the way we shot The Favourite, but it was going to be really difficult to do that. Because of the costumes and just the physicality of it, it was not going to be possible. So we tried to come up with ways of being as fluid as we could with the camera. That was exciting because we came up with some interesting rigs—we explored different gimbal rigs and things like that.
  
  Lanthimos encouraged Ryan to use fisheye and wide-angle lenses for a majority of the shots, which Ryan believed contributed significantly to the story:
  The wide lens is twofold. By showing you the whole room and also isolating the character in a small space ... you get a feeling of no escape. I think one of the critiques of the film believed it was like a playground that turns into a battleground that turns into a prison. I think that's a very good explanation of what the film tries to get across with these characters. I think the wide lenses are pretty integral to that, as well.
caption: A majority of the film's principal photography took place at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire.
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