A cluster of period pieces this season highlights the key yet often overlooked role of production designers. Here (and on Page 32) is their chance to describe . . . : How They Got the Look

“Anna and the King,” which opens Dec. 17 with Jodie Foster and Chow Yun-Fat, filmed for months on location in Malaysia. Luciana Arrighi and her team built from scratch one of the largest sets in movie history, costumed thousands of actors, extras, elephants and horses, and did it all in the midst of the country’s unpredictable weather, which created some “nasty accidents. Two people got struck by lightning.” Would Yul Brynner have put up with this?

“I’m a big fan of the ‘The King and I,’ ” said Arrighi of the 1956 musical, co-starring Deborah Kerr as the widowed English schoolteacher who is romanced by the King of Siam. “It’s a wonderful musical, and it’s absolutely designed superbly for that. But it’s a studio picture, so I hope ours is very different. Ours is more of today, although it’s a period picture in the look, meaning it should look more like a big spectacular documentary. We were after almost super-reality and huge wide scopes with locations.”

Arrighi won an Academy Award (with Ian Whittaker) for her work on “Howards End” (1992), and the two paired the following year for a nomination on “Remains of the Day,” both Merchant Ivory productions. Her other projects include “Midsummer Night’s Dream” (1999), “Oscar and Lucinda” (1997) and “Sense and Sensibility” (1995).

Describe what you do.

My job is to conceive the visual side of the film, the look and style, with the director and DOP [director of photography]. I’m responsible for looking for and choosing the locations, designing the sets and working with anyone in the creative departments. We all form a creative team to visualize the film for the director.

How did you become a production designer?

The long and hard way. Art school, where I studied painting and sculpture, then I was an assistant to a theater designer in Australia. I worked my way up from picking pins and cutting bits of paper to more responsible jobs. I studied painting a little in Italy. I went to England and worked in the theater, in prop shops, any and every job until I was accepted by BBC television--they were training young designers. We could study in any department we wanted--color, television, techniques. I became an assistant to designers, then became a designer in the television world. Ken Russell, who was doing documentaries at that time, later remembered me and asked me to do his second feature film. I then went into art direction and design straight away..

Are you most involved in a film during pre-production or production or a combination?

It’s the whole time. Pre-production, research, looking for locations and all the wonderful prep work we do. I oversee the technical drawings, and I’m responsible for any design decisions within that department. With my team I check out the sets and locations as they sort of grow. Once filming starts, I’m there every day looking at every detail.

So you don’t just come up with the design and concepts and then let others execute them?

No, because my training with the BBC was very hands-on, and because our unions don’t stop us--in fact, they encourage us to be hands-on. I’ll pick up a paintbrush. I’ll do anything to do with the design. I don’t stay in an office and reign from the telephone. I work closely with the costume designer--sometimes I’ve designed the costumes as well. I’m also close to the hair and makeup [departments].

The Academy Award category for this work is “art direction.” Many production designers have worked or do work as art directors. Explain that.

It’s a funny term, production designer, sort of a posh term. In the old days, in some of the greatest films ever made, like “Citizen Kane,” they were called art directors. As films got bigger and far-stretched, the art director became the practical right hand, and now they deal with the crew and the hammers and nails, the construction and the running of the department.

How did you become associated with “Anna and the King”?

They thought I would be suitable because I knew the Far East, I’m very at home with the period and I knew that world. I’ve lived in the Far East, in my childhood and my adulthood, and I’ve worked there.

How did you prepare for this film?

Every film is a different subject, which is wonderful because every time there is something you don’t know. You do research. I didn’t know very much about Thai architecture for instance. Thailand would not give us permission to film there because of the sensitivity of the subject matter to them, so we went to Malaysia and had to build every single stick. The country is wonderful topographically and matches up with Thailand, which I knew. It’s film-friendly and English-speaking, and Thailand was not either. [In Malaysia] we had to build everything because there’s nothing existing there obviously that looks in the remotest bit like Thailand. We built the whole palace. We built temples. We built monuments. It was quite a challenge. I had a very large team.

Was there any other major problem during filming, and if so, how did you solve it?

Every day there were problems because it was such a big set. The palace set was on six acres and at one time there were 1,100 people in my team in the construction. I think [the set] was bigger than “Cleopatra.” The conditions to do such a big work, such a challenging work, were very difficult because it was hot and it rains for two hours a day.

Is there a scene that best shows what you do or a sequence you’re proudest of?

I think [director] Andy Tennant and Caleb [Deschanel, cinematographer] really showed off the big sets, especially the palace set. There’s one scene which is wonderful, which Andy conceived. It starts black and then the king opens up his study doors and you see not only the whole concourse of the palace but also over 1,000 extras all bowing and kowtowing. That’s a very good scene for a production designer.

Do you have a favorite part of your job?

I love the pre-production and the research. I love getting a new script and attacking a new subject, and I love traveling and exploring a country I know nothing about. For instance, in Thailand, we were up near the Burma border, a place I never would have visited.

Do you have a person who is a source of inspiration?

Many. I was brought up looking at all the great films like “The Third Man,” Vincent Korda. And “Citizen Kane,” which was Van Nest Polglase. Then there’s a wonderful Italian, Garbuglia , who did the [Luchino] Visconti films. I’m a great admirer of that school of filmmaking, and also the neo-Realist Italian cinema. I also admire a lot of American designers, like Richard Sylbert [“Reds,” “Dick Tracy”].

What is your next project?

I have two. One we don’t have a green light on yet, . . . but it’s a film in Italy based on an experience that happened to Orson Welles in 1947. Then I have “La Scala” in Milan, an opera, with John Schlesinger, the film director.