“The Acolyte” cameraman Chris Teague explains why the new “Star Wars” series did not use “Mandalorian” technology

Lucasfilm turns the galactic clock back 100 years‘s The Acolyte presents an era of war of stars universe like fans have never seen on screen before.

Developed by Russian doll The new Disney+ series is set against the backdrop of the High Republic, a time when the Jedi Order was at the height of its power and there was relative peace throughout the galaxy. This idea of ​​a return to a simpler, more old-fashioned time within the long-running franchise was evident not only in the story, but also in the way that story was told.

***WARNING! The following contains certain spoilers for episodes 1-4 of The Acolyte!***

If you talk to me via Zoom, The Acolyte‘s chief cinematographer, Emmy Award winner Chris Teague, confirms that the show did not use the volumetric LED technology developed in its predecessor. The MandalorianThe goal, he explains, was to recreate the “handmade aesthetic” of the original trilogy, which famously broke new ground in effects work under the banner of Industrial Light & Magic. So the creative team limited itself to a practical toolkit and used CGI only as a last resort.

“We really went more with real sets,” Teague continues. “We used a lot of hand-painted backgrounds, which were incredible. A lot of practical effects – real snow, fog, clouds, wind, everything. We tried to capture as much as we could on camera and then ask our super-talented visual effects department to help us out when we couldn’t fill in the gaps.”

As for the plot, The Acolyte is a crime thriller in which a lone assassin kills the Jedi members one by one. As we quickly learn, the murderer is a young woman named Mae (Amanda Stenberg), who still has a serious score to settle with the Force-using peacekeepers of the galaxy. Mae’s twin sister, the former Padawan pioneer and space mechanic Osha (also played by Stenberg), initially takes the blame, but after she is exonerated, she teams up with her old teacher, Master Sol (Lee Jung-jae), to pursue Mae across several planets and stop the killing spree.

“You travel from place to place pretty quickly. I wanted each place to have its own color palette so the audience would immediately know they were somewhere new and special,” notes Teague. “I sort of mapped out the places we wanted to spend time in and created little color swatches for each place so you could see the color story of the episode at a glance.”

He continues, “I always refer to it as a sandbox that we played in. I come from a position where I spent most of my life lighting hotel rooms, bars and apartments in New York City in these very small spaces. To have the creative freedom to work with color in a way that is perhaps not quite as grounded as what you’ve done before was very refreshing from a creative perspective.”

Like many people working in Hollywood today, Teague’s creative spirit was shaped by war of stars from a young age, “around five or six,” he says. “When you rewatch these movies and you haven’t seen them in years, you think, ‘I know exactly what’s going to happen next.’ Because that sticks. When you see it at that age and love it so much, it really sticks with you. I just feel like war of stars was this franchise, this world that has accompanied me throughout my life.”

One of the aspects he was keen to recapture from previous films was the inhabited atmosphere of the galaxy far, far away. “It’s this science/fantasy world that is not pristine. The picture has rough edges, it’s rough, it’s dirty, it has texture.”

The real trick was to find a way to give a new twist to what had already happened, especially since The Acolyte takes viewers to a number of well-known locations such as Coruscant (busy center of the Galactic Senate and the Jedi Order). “Coruscant is this iconic place in war of stars and we wanted to find a balance between something that felt bright, sunny and pristine, but still felt in our world,” says Teague. “It wasn’t a magical quality of the sun, but it was this beautiful, natural sun that was just in the perfect place, or wherever we wanted it to be.”

Although the DP had never worked on anything of this epic scale before, he had the benefit of a brief collaboration with Headland following their collaboration on Netflix’s Russian doll“The fact that we had this shared history and understanding of filmmaking made the transition into this world so much easier,” he says.

Before a single camera started rolling, Headland invited her cinematographer for a long walk through Brooklyn’s Prospect Park to discuss her vision for the show. In particular, Teague recalls, she wanted to channel her love of the wuxia genre while exploring unseen corners of the war of stars Mythos. From there, it was just a matter of “refining” all the ideas into a practical “document” (or, if you prefer, a sacred Jedi text) that was eventually shared with the rest of the crew.

“(It was) a kind of guide to how we were going to do the show and what was important about the show,” Teague reveals. “At the core was this idea of ​​recognizing that we were a war of stars show, and it’s this epic scope and this big world, but at the core there are really important human dynamics that we absolutely have to consider in the storytelling.”

The influence of wuxia cinema is evident in the first scene of the series, in which Mae faces off against Jedi Master Indara (Carrie-Anne Moss, former “Matrix” actress) in a remote cantina. Teague describes the action sequence as “really representative” of the entire series. “It’s a combination of all these different, incredible departments working together. The production design is top-notch, the fight choreography is incredible. My inspiration for this room was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. I always thought of this as a western scene. I felt like we really nailed this kind of deep amber, almost sepia, moody, dusty space for this incredible fight scene to take place in.”

Another of his favorite sets was Ueda, the Endor-like forest planet in Episode 4, which was built in a British warehouse. “It’s this incredible empty space the size of a football field,” says Teague. “It’s kind of daunting when you think about all the work that goes into turning it into this forest, and how huge the space is. But then as I walked around and thought about how many scenes we had to shoot there – and how we had to portray this journey from point A to point B, which was going to be very long and arduous and involve all these very specific events – the space suddenly felt very small. It felt like we had to use every trick we could to maximize the visual impact of the set we were building.”

As with almost any big budget production, the process of bringing together The Acolyte to life proved to be incredibly challenging and rewarding. Teague had his share of tough days, of course, but he never took his position for granted. There were many moments of having to chicken out “almost every day,” he concludes. “Those days when you’re working really hard and trying to get things done. I’m marching across the set and then I just look (over) and see this classic war of stars creature next to me – one I hadn’t really seen yet. I film its first moment and I just shake and wonder if I’m dreaming when I see these things.”

Episodes 1-4 of The Acolyte are now streaming on Disney+.