‘Spencer’ Production Designer Goes Inside Princess Diana’s Head
Tomris Laffly An air of claustrophobia inhabits “Spencer,” Pablo Larraín’s psychological drama that follows a distressed Princess Diana (Kristen Stewart) as she spends the Christmas of 1991 at the Royal Family’s Sandringham estate. That confinement spawns a sensation equal parts austere and foreboding despite all the opulence that surrounds it, one that veteran Production Designer Guy Hendrix Dyas meticulously crafted to mirror the unhappy noble’s headspace at a time when her troubled marriage to Prince Charles was nearing its end.The Royals’ customary secrecy and privacy presented a research challenge for Dyas, a difficulty he overcame thanks to a reliable (and anonymous) royal advisor he worked with.