By all accounts,Bigis a classic of 1980s cinema. A charming comedy that helped cementTom Hanks' status as a superstar. An irresistible premise full of iconic moments – the FAO Schwarz piano, the toy-filled apartment, Zoltar. An absolute win for directorPenny Marshall. But, by cinematographerBarry Sonnenfeld’s accounts – which he, conveniently, compiled in amemoir out today– it was an absolute nightmare to make.
You may now know Sonnenfeld best as the director of classics likeMen in Black,Get Shorty, andThe Addams Family. But he started as a director of photography, working with luminaries like theCoen Brothers,Rob Reiner, andDanny DeVito. And hot off the heels of shootingBlood SimpleandRaising Arizona, he was desperate to nab the gig shootingBigin his hometown of New York City. But his first interview went, well, pretty darn bad. Marshall described what she wanted for the visual language of the film (“When the kid is a kid, the camera should be low and naive. When he is transformed into an adult, the camera should be higher and more sophisticated”). And Sonnenfeld… disagreed. He asked, simply, “Would it be okay if I just make it look nice?” And was promptly shown the door.
A few weeks later, Sonnenfeld got a call from producerRobert Greenhut. Greenhut said, simply: “I was walking to work this morning, and I realized we start filming in ten weeks and we still don’t have a cinematographer so I said to myself, ‘Why not just hire that idiot Sonnenfeld?’” Sonnenfeld took the gig – so long as he could come have another interview to prove he wasn’t, well, an “idiot.” After the briefest of second interviews, Sonnenfeld got the job. And that’s when things went from “difficult” to “more difficult.”
“Penny and I liked each other as people, but she truly disliked me as her cinematographer,” says Sonnenfeld quite candidly. Apparently, Marshall detested making decisions, preferring to roll film on as many options as possible – which often got in the way of Sonnenfeld and Greenhut’s desires to pre-plan. In fact, Marshall couldn’t even decide on whether starElizabeth Perkinswas going to be a blonde or a redhead. So they shot the first night ofBigboth ways, switching out her wigs rapidly, moving as quickly as they possibly could. Certainly, a bit of a stressful way to film anything.
Sonnenfeld doesn’t only have bad things to say about Marshall – he admires her skill with comedy and performance, particularly marveling her choice of food for Hanks to eat (eating baby corn like corn on the cob? Priceless). But Marshall seemed not to return the favor. Sonnenfeld tells one story of her admitting to him she wanted him fired. “Pen, you should have any cameraman you want,” answered Sonnenfeld diplomatically. “If you don’t want me, you should get someone else. I’ll understand.” “No. They said I can’t fi‑a you,” responded Penny. “It’s okay. It’s just that you’re not very good.” Yikes!
Did Marshall ever pay a compliment to Sonnenfeld? Just one, after production had wrapped. When viewing the final color-corrected print of the film, Marshall said this to Sonnenfeld: “I never thought you were a good cameraman. But you picked a nice film stock.” Now that’s the textbook definition of “damned with faint praise.” At least Sonnenfeld got one nice thing out of the deal: apparently, Marshall went on to tell the Los Angeles Times that “she never thought Tom [Hanks] was a particularly good actor, so she made sure to surround him with good actors to make him seem better.” Doesn’t it always seem like the best films are the hardest to make?
If you want more tales of Hollywood neuroticism, check outSonnenfeld’s memoir here. For more onBig, check out our ranking of the10 best Tom Hanks performances.
