How Saoirse Ronan’s new whodunnit recreates London’s theatreland

‘See How They Run is set eight years after World War II, when London is often depicted as downtrodden and bombed out. But we were amazed at how much vibrancy was coming out of London’s theatres at this time, which were being rebuilt and acting as a colourful epicentre for this new age of British culture.

The look of the film is inspired by the foyer of The Dominion Theatre. It has this stunning dark red colour, which feels luxurious but also deadly. Having the freedom to run around the theatre’s beautiful ironwork staircases created a real electricity on set.’

‘We wanted a backstage environment with old ropes and flying rigs, but not many of those exist anymore, so we recreated one inside of The Old Vic. It also doubled for the film’s auditorium and stage sequences.

If you’ve ever seen “The Mousetrap” on stage you’ll know that it has an incredibly brown set for the countryside mansion where the murder occurs. It was imperative that we jazzed it up a little, so we took a lot of inspiration from William Morris’s Red House. I used to work in theatre, so it felt like I was going back to my roots.’

‘The scene inside the theatre’s bar, where there’s a fight over a gigantic cake, was filmed in the bar at the top of London’s Freemason’s Hall. It has stunning stained-glass windows and there’s this eerie atmosphere that runs through the place, but the naturally cold air was perfect for a murder-mystery.

I loved that we had to keep slot-testing the cake to ensure it had the right consistency. Members of the production crew would run up and splatter the cake to check that it looked just right. Covid was going on, but here we were methodically destroying cakes.’

‘This pub on The Strand was a gift of a location! It’s so historic and you can still smell the cigar smoke from the Victorian era. The biggest issue was that the pub had modern pumps that couldn’t be removed, so we got some pieces of old beer pumps and stuck them on. We pulled out the cash register and decorated the set with all the most popular alcoholic beverages from the 1950s.’

‘Normally, you’d only be able to shoot between midnight and 5am, but because The Savoy wasn’t open, we had unprecedented access. We filmed in the hotel’s Princess Suite. 

The hotel era-less: it has these rich black and gold colours, and the reception and entrance feel so timeless. The back of the hotel is great too, with all those New York-style grandiose buildings and intricate alleyways. The streets were empty [during filming], which added something special to the feel of the scenes.

I’d love to come back for a sequel, but I doubt we could make a film like this again. Lockdown created the perfect storm to allow us into the heart of these empty locations. It was sheer luck, really.’

‘See How They Run’ is in UK cinemas Sep 9. Read our review here.