Production designer Beth Mickle first gained international recognition for Half Nelson and Drive, the latter earning her an ADG Award nomination. She continued to collaborate with directors Nicolas Winding Refn and Ryan Gosling on Only God Forgives and Lost River, and her other credits include Focus, The Family Fang, Collateral Beauty, Motherless Brooklyn and the HBO series The Deuce. In 2018, she entered the superhero genre with James Gunn on The Suicide Squad and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, receiving a second ADG Award nomination and an Emmy nomination for the accompanying_ Guardians Christmas Special. Mickle most recently designed Superman_, the first film in Gunn’s rebooted DC Universe.
For the fifth episode of Apotheosis, Beth Mickle and host Alex Whittenberg chat about the winding path of becoming a production designer, tracing Mickle’s journey from scrappy student films and childhood dioramas to shaping some of contemporary cinema’s most iconic worlds.
Mickle reflects on learning to see with curiosity and wonder, recounts formative collaborations with her brother and unpacks how limitations often spark the most inventive design solutions.
The conversation moves fluidly between philosophy and practice as Mickle discusses crafting character through space in Drive—from the stark restraint of Driver’s apartment to the warmth and color of Irene’s home—before expanding into the scale and ambition of reimagining the Fortress of Solitude for Superman and building vast, tactile environments for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
Along the way, Mickle and Whittenberg explore leadership, collaboration, equity in the industry and why physical, thoughtfully designed spaces still matter profoundly to the future of film.
Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) and Superman (David Corenswet) embrace in Superman.
”The world is a better place when everybody has a seat at the table.”
Inside The Bowie in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
The Fortress of Solitude was reimagined by Mickle and her team for Superman.
”We’re really lucky to be in a profession that really tunes us into our surroundings.”
Irene's Apartment in Drive.
