The Arizona Daily Star published this interesting feature on Prop Master Lee Lazarow today. I found the comments on theft to be very interesting.
Master of props trying to bring film work here
By Phil Villarreal
[email protected]
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 11.22.2007
Lee Lazarow is a master. A master of props.
The 52-year-old Rincon High School graduate has worked for nearly 30 years as a Hollywood property master — the man in charge of props on movie and TV-show sets.
He has worked on 62 films and TV shows since 1980, including 2005’s “Hard Candy” and “Mozart and the Whale,” the latter starring Josh Hartnett.
After decades in Los Angeles, Lazarow moved back to town to care for his ailing father, Benjamin, as well as recover from a cervical neck injury he suffered while working on a film in 2005. Lazarow was hit by a satellite dish that blew off a prop truck in a freak accident while working on the film “End Game.”
He plans to maintain his movie career while living here, and help bring movies to town by working his contacts. Lazarow, who worked at the Arizona Daily Star as a copy boy while in high school in the early 1970s, counts Burt Reynolds, Tara Reid, Mickey Rourke and Billy Dee Williams among his friends.
What does a property master do?
“First you get a movie script and break it down for all the props you’ll need on it, then hopefully you’re organized . . . like, a weapons budget — what weapons do you need? Once I get all that organized, I have a large semi that’s very famous in Hollywood, called the Big Blue Whale. I have a lot of things in that truck, a whole list of props. The things I don’t have, I start shopping and calling around. There are a lot of prop houses, and they’ll usually ship you what you need.
“Then you do all your shopping. Sometimes I have an assistant, usually working with me for the first or second week before the movie starts. A month before, we have a show-and-tell. The director, producers and stars are there, and all the props for the whole show are laid out on tables, and everybody agrees we’re using this prop for this. The actors will want jewelry and watches. I have 400 watches in the truck and 150 rings. Then we start shooting. Every movie is different.”
Do people try to steal your stuff?
“Stealing day is always the last two days. I close the truck up in the last two days, and the truck stays locked. People eye things the whole movie — everything that’s cool in the truck. There’s a director’s room in the truck they use to watch dailies from the day before. There’s surround sound, TVs, DVDs and everything.
“It’s pretty odd sometimes. All the guys with me have to move furniture around. Let’s say we’re shooting in a house and have to get the camera in. We bring the furniture out and put the camera in for one angle, and then move the furniture out of the way for another angle.”
How did you get into the business?
“I moved to L.A. in 1978. I started off as an extra. I went to Phoenix and did “Ninja” (also known as “Enter the Ninja”) in ’79 or ’80. That was one of my first property-master jobs. With all I’ve done, I don’t have to interview anymore. In the old days, to be a property master you had to work 5,000 hours as an assistant property master first, then take a test. I’m a member of Local 44 of IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees). It’s called IA. When I got in the union, it was really hard to get in. They had to hide me on the back lot of Universal. They’d hide me in the back lot and punch my card in the morning.”
Will you be able to help more productions come to Tucson?
“I’m trying already. I know people, and they say what it will take is money. . . . I get producers calling me now, telling me, ‘We’ll come there, but we need a tax incentive.'”
If you’re involved in filmmaking and would like to be featured in a Q&A, write to [email protected].
Jason De Bord