The main character in this story, is having a bit of a crisis in nearly all aspects of his life. Series Creator Jonathan Trooper, once again, called on me with a challenge: To find out what that crisis might look like in a title sequence.
In the early stages of developing the creative concept for this main title, I wanted to lean into this idea of self destruction. A life coming apart at the seams. The undoing of all the superficial and materialistic items the ultra rich will surround themselves with.
The initial brief was very open creatively, so I pitched three wildly different concepts in hopes that one would strike a chord with Tropper and his team. One of these ideas was very ambitious, would require a lot of approvals and coordination, and involve multiple teams of people to pull it off. Naturally, that concept was also the most exciting to everyone involved, so we were off to the races.
What makes this title sequence stand apart is that we were able realize our creative concept through a 2 day Live-Action Production, full VFX and CG workflows, and access to an A-List actor like Jon Hamm, who graciously agreed to join in on the fun. Rarely do main title sequences get afforded this kind of complex treatment. This speaks volumes about Jonathan Tropper, Chris Arruda and the Execs at Apple for believing and trusting in us to pull it off.
For me, working on this title sequence was a truly rewarding experience. Not only did I get to direct a live-action shoot with Jon Hamm, but I got to combine that with my love of VFX and animation. From the beginning, I knew this was going to be a very ambitions and difficult process to execute this sequence at the high level it needed to be done at. Working with a true dream team on this sequence, from the initial storyboards, to the cinematography, and the world class VFX artists led by Ivan Guerrero, everyone gave it their absolute best. In the end, I’m very proud of the final result and what my team was able to accomplish.
Your Friends & Neighbors is now the third main title sequence that I have created with Showrunner Jonathan Tropper and Producer Chris Arruda. Season 2 of SEE on Apple TV+ was the previous and before that was WARRIOR, for which we received an Emmy Nomination for the Main Title Sequence in 2019.