The main title sequence on television is a disappearing art form.
In the 1990s, the opening credits were a fantastic but fleeting experience, highlighting a cast in quick succession before moving on with the show. In the 2000s, the dawn of prestige television used succinct but eye-catching titles to signal a heightened state of creativity. But by the time Patrick Clair entered the industry, things had changed.
“I was lucky enough to really break through just as streaming was becoming the dominant force and they were all competing with each other to prove that they could have the best main titles, so we had some great years where every major show biggest thing I wanted to have. , longest main titles,” says the title sequence designer Variety. “Those years are clearly behind us.”
That’s partly due to the addition of the ‘skip intro’ button on streaming services, which allows viewers to skip past the titles and essentially gives studios permission not to invest in them.
“The ‘Skip Intro’ button simply means that fewer shows will now have main titles,” says Clair. “But the great thing is that it is a very conscious choice that a showrunner has main titles. If it is there, it is because they want it to be part of the story.”
Apple TV+ is one of the streamers that has such a button for viewers. But above all, it also produces main titles for almost all of its series, a dedication that has paid off. Among this year’s six Emmy nominees for the main title design, Apple claimed three spots: “Silo,” “Palm Royale” and “Lessons in Chemistry.” Other nominees include Netflix’s “3 Body Problem,” Prime Video’s “Fallout” and FX’s “Shōgun.”
Perhaps even more impressive is Clair, who received three of the six nominations in the category this year. In addition to serving as the lead creative director for “Silo,” the 15-time nominee is also recognized for “3 Body Problem” and “Fallout.” He says ensuring the main titles creatively complement the series’ stories keeps the art form alive. In creating ‘Silo’s’ opening, his team worked closely with creator Graham Yost to understand the show’s underground world, where people retreated hundreds of years ago.
Opening sequence ‘Silo’
“We looked for examples in the natural world of that kind of complex life living in an underground space, and we also looked at ant colonies,” he says. “Ants form very complicated colonies underground that require very complicated social relationships, and we looked at how people have exposed these by pouring metal into abandoned ant colonies and getting these very organic, but strange and weird sculptures. It allowed us to think about this inside-out world where humanity thrives, rises and falls deep underground.”
The resulting title sequence was designed around the silo’s central nervous system, a spiral staircase, which they visually fused with images of spiral columns and DNA stems. They also found photographs of English train stations from the early 20th century, capturing the blurry hordes of thousands of commuters moving back and forth across the platforms.
“You get the impression that thousands of lives are being lived in an interconnected way, and that really led to us allowing a river of ghostly people to flow through the silo and seeing all those generations at once and their impact on the world ,” says Clair.
The intention is for these haunting images to stay with the viewer as they settle into the show, informing the centuries of history embedded in the concrete walls of the claustrophobic setting.
That creative synergy with the show’s identity plays a similarly central role in the creation of Apple’s other nominated mainline titles. For “Lessons in Chemistry,” creative directors Hazel Baird and Rob Cawdery found inspiration in one of the greatest weapons of progress used by pioneering chemist Elizabeth Zott (Brie Larson): her pencil.
Their concept perfectly complements the show’s peppy theme song, Mildred Bailey’s 1930s tune ‘Wham [Re-Bop-Boom-Bam]”, which they received at the beginning of the creative process. “That helps us a lot rhythmically,” Baird says. “Sometimes you don’t get the music until the last few weeks, which can be a challenge. That happened when we did ‘The Morning Show.’
Being able to create with the music in mind allowed everything to coexist every step of the way.
“The sequence is basically a song-and-dance number,” says Cawdery. “We tried to evoke the kind of numbers [the 1950s] to ensure that the sequence fits comfortably into the time period of the show. So knowing the music from the beginning and having all the pencils synchronized perfectly was like choreographing a dance.”
The series is based on the best-selling novel by Bonnie Garmus, meaning fans came to the series with high expectations that the creators of the titles embraced. “Certain pencils represent certain interactions and romantic relationships in her life, so there’s a range of emotions in those movements,” says Cawdery. “We wanted to reward fans right away and involve others as the series progressed.”
Story-specific designs are also what four-time nominee Ronnie Koff leaned on for his “Palm Royale” concept, which uses simple yet striking illustrations to highlight the Kristen Wiig-led social climbing drama’s star-studded cast. While some series minimize the actual typography to focus on the images, Koff says he changed the order of things. “We brought up the credits and all the graphics moved around them,” he says.
“Palm Royale” uses thematically relevant images such as pearls, high heels, brightly colored lips and pharmaceuticals, many of which seem random until viewers watch the show. For example, a whale’s tail appears seemingly at random until Allison Janney’s character tearfully pours out her heart to a beached whale in episode 8.
Koff says rewarding viewers who stick with it through the main titles could help the art form survive in a “skip intro” era. “One of the things I think makes title sequences live – and live on – is that they get a bit of a sense of humor,” he says. “It’s about mining the story for these ideas and making the audience feel like they haven’t missed anything.”
