Palace Road begins principal photography along one real London street
The estate saga shoots its entire first season on the street it is named for — with residents on camera and a portrait rig light enough to walk.
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Palace Road started principal photography this morning, and the location list is one line long. The thirty-year estate saga will shoot all of its first season on the South London street that gives the series its name, with a cast drawn partly from the street’s own residents.
The production’s rig is the story inside the story. The camera package fits in a backpack: a single portrait-native body, two primes, and a stabiliser — a deliberate bet that the format’s intimacy survives only if the apparatus disappears. Blocking rehearsals happen in doorways and stairwells, the natural portrait frames the street already provides.
Residents appearing on camera go through the same contracting as the professional cast, with a community liaison producer — a role the production created — handling consent, scheduling and re-shoots around real lives. It is the kind of job title the format keeps inventing: half production management, half documentary ethics.
A first cut of episode one is expected before the month is out. The order is thirty episodes, releasing daily.