Alex Caserta ’74 FILM PRODUCER What better way to arrest the passage of time than by recording it? Alex Caserta is able to do this with the films he produces. “The documentaries I have worked on during the past 19 years all have to do with bringing a story to the public on objects and people working in areas that are of historical significance and a way of life that could be in danger of becoming extinct.” In May 2013, a preview of Caserta’s latest project, the documentary Vanishing Orchards: Apple Growing in Rhode Island, was screened at the Jane Pickens Theater in Newport. The film focuses on the fragile yet tenacious life of the state’s apple growers. The film follows the growers during a ten-year-period as they learn to balance their traditional techniques with the concessions they must make to the changing economic and technological climate. The full version was set to premiere as this issue went to press. In addition to producing films, Caserta was an art instructor for 33 years and frequently exhibits his paintings and photographs, some of which have been added to the permanent collection of the Library of Congress. • vanishingorchards.com
“A production designer is the visual storyteller of a feature film or television show.” — MATTHEW JACOBS ’77
Matthew Jacobs ’77 PRODUCTION DESIGNER/ART DIRECTOR It was just a typical day at work for Matthew Jacobs when 17 shipping containers and 40 dump trucks full of dirt came together to simulate “Fort Reno, Afghanistan” on a football field-sized set for the hit show Army Wives. As the production designer and/or art director for the show, Jacobs was in charge of everything revealed on screen except the people themselves. “A production designer is the visual storyteller of a feature film or television show,” he explains. It’s a big job and one for which the Michigan native gained considerable experience while earning a theater degree at his alma mater. “URI gave me some very good training designing sets and interpreting plays and scripts.” In the fall following his graduation, Jacobs went to work for Eugene Lee, the Tony award-winning set designer and production designer of Saturday Night Live, who also has a studio in Rhode Island, where he serves as the resident set designer at Trinity Repertory Theatre in Providence. For Jacobs, designing movies, plays, and operas soon gave way to working on music videos, and then to production designing for General Hospital. Currently, Jacobs is art directing the drama Under the Dome for DreamWorks/CBS. • mcjart.com
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