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LAWRENCE JONES
“The clapper loader can’t give you any bullshit because I’ve put my own film in, and I’ve also been focus puller and operator... that gives you respect from the crew.”
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especially the F400 and we were shooting My Beautiful Son in 35mm and thought I would have a look at it. And I must say I was blown away by it.
“I was pleased at the tonality of it and the resonance. It’s particularly good on skin tones and the resonance of night shots in fluorescent lighting.”
Since My Beautiful Son and the six-parter Linda Green (currently air- ing on BBC1 Tuesday nights), Jones has worked on a couple of episodes of the new series of the ever popular Playing The Field for the BBC.
“They were switching from film to digi-beta for the first time and they wanted an experienced DP to give it a film look. They always say that’s what they want as if there is a button you can press and it’s done. I am happy to grasp new technology and move forward but you don’t have the options to play with, the full range of lenses or being able to alter the shutter speeds.”
Last summer, he also worked on Heart Of The Valley, a six-part drama series directed by David Innes Edwards and featuring James Bolam and Michael French as father and son doctors in a rural practice in the 1950s. “They want- ed a beautiful sun-drenched look which was quite a challenge.”
Jones prides himself on achiev- ing a naturalistic look which he puts down to his background in stills and documentaries.
Stills photography was where his career started after art college as a
photographer’s assistant in a commer- cial studio working on fashion shoots and advertising.
“After a while I decided I wanted to get into moving pictures,” he contin- ues, “and because I was born and bred in Manchester, Granada was the place.”
He took the first job that came up in 1973, working as a studio video operative for four years and waiting for the chance to join a film crew.
“As soon as a vacancy for a cam- era assistant came up I grabbed it, but I had to start at the bottom of the lad- der, changing clapper loaders and charging batteries. I was proud to do it.
“All the company’s programmes were shot by the department - on film. It was a mini-Ealing Studios. You would get six months on drama working for the top DPs, I spent four months in India as camera operator on Jewel In The Crown, and then it was your turn to do four months as assistant on World In Action, learn-
ing to think on your feet and shoot from the hip.
“It was all top quality stuff whether drama, current affairs or school series. I felt like a sponge, I was learning so much and eventually my chance came when I was promoted to cinematographer.
“There was still the choice of work. I worked on the Disappearing World series, the kind of documen- tary series they don’t do now. We went to Mongolia and lived with tribes in a tent for six weeks with an anthropologist to shoot a film about their life.”
Although he won several awards for documentaries, his first love was drama, largely because it gave him the best chance to use the lighting techniques he had picked up as a stills photographer.
He worked on a variety of Granada productions, including The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, the
award-winning children’s series, Josie Smith, In Suspicious Circumstances, September Song, Medics, Reckless and Gold.
“As time progressed the nature of independent television changed. It became less staff-based and after I had shot Reckless, the Robson Green series written by Paul Abbott, the director David Richards said, ‘it’s about time you stepped outside and spread your wings.’
“I think I had become slightly institutionalised, but I took his advice and never regretted it. I have now found myself back with directors I had worked with years ago at Granada.”
Among them is David Carson, whom he had known from the Sherlock Holmes series, who recruited Jones for The Tenth Kingdom, a 10- hour drama for Hallmark, and In His Life - The John Lennon Story for NBC.
Jones still feels the benefit of those early years. “The clapper loader cannot give you any bullshit because I have put my own in and I’ve also been focus puller and operator.
“That gives you respect from the crew and you also know there are ways of getting round what may seem a crisis. I have lit shots with car headlights when the generator has failed. If you’ve only worked in one area, you only think of solving a problem one way.” ■ IAN SOUTAR
My Beautiful Son
was originated on Fujicolor
Photos top: My Beautiful Son; above: Julie Walters and Paul Reiser in The Tenth Kingdom; Lawrence Jones and crew on location in Austria; the BBC 1 six-part Linda Green
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