It’s fitting that for a crazy whirlwind of a film about Liberace, Zsa Zsa Gabor’s Bel-Air home would be one of the set locations. Production designer Howard Cummings fell in love with her house, given its similar decorative aesthetic to Liberace’s, and used it as a basis for re-creating his Las Vegas home.
The only problem? The pool had a stunning view of the ocean, which you can’t see in Nevada.
“I had to erect this wall and put up all the greenery in order to obscure the incredible view the house actually had,” says Cummings. “That’s when we started to find every Greek-themed garden statue in the greater LA area. I did collections of [Michelangelo’s] Davids. Because that’s something he’d do. One is not enough. More is better.”
This philosophy sums up the challenge the producers faced in designing the sets and costumes for Steven Soderbergh’s shimmering new Liberace movie, “Behind the Candelabra,” which premieres Sunday at 9 p.m. on HBO. Twenty-five years after the world-famous pianist’s death, the biopic follows the star (played by Michael Douglas in a wig and rhinestones) and his relationship with boy-toy Scott Thorson (Matt Damon).
Costume designer Ellen Mirojnick made 60 looks for the actors in just eight weeks.
“I didn’t copy anything. I used [his outfits] as a springboard,” she says.
DUELING LIBERACES: ‘SINCERELY YOURS’ (1955) vs. ‘BEHIND THE CANDELABRA’
Mirojnick breathes new life into several of Liberace’s most famous looks, such as the elaborately embroidered and appliqued clam-shell-collared King Neptune outfit he first wore at the 1984 World’s Fair in New Orleans.
Luckily, Mirojnick has been fitting Douglas for films since 1987’s “Fatal Attraction” — it helped her meet the tight deadline to pull together a platter of sequins, embroidery and fur to fit Douglas precisely.
“When you see these transformations happen [to the actors] with the help of a costume,” says Mirojnick, “it’s magic.”
The costumes also get a thumbs-up from the people who might know Liberace’s clothes better than anyone else: costumers Connie Furr Soloman and Jan Jewett, who wrote “Liberace Extravaganza,” the essential Liberace costume bible.
“She had a really tough job, and she did a great job with it,” says Furr Soloman.
It was production designer Cummings’ job to create the Liberace glamour beyond his outfits — 36 sets worth in five weeks.
“Fortunately, Liberace was such a big self-promoter, he liked to talk in front of the camera and show off his houses,” says Cummings. “So going into it, I had a really good picture.”
In many cases, Cummings was able to track down Liberace’s actual furnishings — some purchased by LA prop houses from his estate sale. The Liberace Foundation also loaned the filmmakers his pianos, cars and, of course, candelabras.
With more than 100 candelabras and chandeliers in the film, Cummings laughs, “We got angry letters saying, ‘You’ve tied up every chandelier in LA!’ ‘Lincoln’ was in production there, and they were doing the White House in the 1800s and they needed chandeliers — and [we] had snagged them all.”
As Liberace always said, borrowing a line from Mae West, “Too much of a good thing . . . is wonderful!”
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Click through the gallery for the behind-the-scenes stories of the “Behind the Candelabra” sets and costumes.