Behind the glitz and glamour of Hollywood: Candid photographs reveal the secrets behind some of Tinsel Town's biggest movie sets
Behind the glitz and glamour of Hollywood: Candid photographs reveal the secrets behind some of Tinsel Town's biggest movie sets
A special effects specialist smoothes the "skin" of the vampire Pearl during the filming of Blade, 1998.
It's an industry known for its use of smoke and mirrors.
But these candid shots taken by photographer David Strick from Los Angeles, California, show just what takes place behind the scenes of some of Hollywood's biggest movie sets.
The images reveal the work necessary to create the illusions that entertain us on the big screen and even shed light on some of the unsung crew who work tirelessly to create the magic of cinema.
From the technician on the set of Blade smoothing down a gigantic obese vampire called Pearl or an elephant wrangler collecting a bag full of elephant dung - some of the work showcased is the less than glamorous side of an industry known for its glitz.
The photographer behind the images said his fascination with documenting the movie industry begun after his great-aunt, Gale Sondergaard, won the very first Best Supporting Actress Academy Award.
However, it still took him a while to feel comfortable on Hollywood film sets.
He told Slate: 'There were plenty of competent adults working the sets, and I would have felt like Bart Simpson trying to work alongside King Kong.'
'What I did manage to absorb was a sense that the work the grown-ups were doing was a high-stakes, deadly serious one, and to some extent a comically inexplicable version of let's dress up and pretend. I don't think that sense of confused awe ever left me.'
The novice photographer went on to become a highly successful editorial and commercial photographer.
This series of photographs came about after he was sent to do an assignment for The New York Times in 1975 and ended up seeing first-hand 'the decline of Hollywood.'
He gradually gained access to lots more movie and television sets and started doing regular behind-the-scenes columns about Hollywood for Premiere Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, and the Hollywood Reporter.
He said: 'Making photos on a set is like spending your day jaywalking back and forth across a busy street and trying not to be run over while doing your best not to be noticed.
'The best way to describe the parameters is that you have all the freedom in the world not to be a nuisance. Some actors love outside attention, some love it right up until they hate it, some just hate it.'
Strick has been fortunate to photograph a host of big name stars including Charlize Theron on the set of Mighty Joe Young, George Clooney in Oh Brother Where Art Thou and David Hasselhoff messing around in the sea in The SpongeBob SquarePants movie.
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