Rehearsal and filming
Once the writing was finished, Iñárritu contacted friend and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki to discuss his idea for the film. After reading the script, Lubezki was worried that Iñárritu would offer him the job since Birdman "had all of the elements of a movie that I did not want to do at all" – comedy, studio work and long takes – but changed his mind after further discussion with the director. The pair had worked together on commercials and a short film in the anthology To Each His Own Cinema, but not on any feature films. Lubezki wanted to be sure that this was a decision Rodrigo Prieto, cinematographer of all four of Iñárritu's feature films, was comfortable with, but after receiving his blessing, the two headed into pre-production.
Lubezki was concerned that no film had been shot in the way Iñárritu envisioned, meaning there would be no reference material to look up. The two decided the only way to learn how to shoot it would be to shoot it themselves, so they built a proxy stage at Sony Studios in Los Angeles. The setup was minimal. Canvas and C-stands were used for walls, while tape and a few pieces of furniture marked out areas. Using a camera and some stand-ins, the duo worked through the movie to see if it was possible. Realizing no theatre could accommodate the intricate camerawork they needed, they hired Kaufman Astoria Studios in New York. Still, Iñárritu wanted to shoot at a Broadway theater, but would have to wait until several weeks into rehearsals before securing St. James Theatre. They then spent a few months designing and making "blueprints" of the shots and blocking the scenes, using the stand-ins to read and walk through the script. The planning was precise. Iñárritu said: "There was no room to improvise at all. Every movement, every line, every door opening, absolutely everything was rehearsed." The actors started rehearsing once this preliminary work was completed: According to Lubezki, they did the scenes with the actors "once we kind of knew what the rhythm of the scenes were". He described the atypical approach "like an upside down movie where you do post-production before the production".
Editors Douglas Crise and Stephen Mirrione were involved in the project by this stage. When Iñárritu told Mirrione that he planned for Lubezki to record table readings and the rehearsals, he suggested they edit them immediately to discover what was and was not working early on. The editing also allowed the editors to discuss pacing issues with the director, such as the position of the night-day transitions and other moments of rest in the film. Production designer Kevin Thompson was on hand too, and mapped out the scenes. The camerawork required many elements of the set to be built in a certain way. For example, Riggan's makeup mirror and desk were constructed so that the camera would see his reflection. Thompson also took into consideration the needs of the crew, for instance designing the stairs a little wider for Steadicam operator Chris Haarhoff's footsize.
He then constructed a template of the set they would build when in New York. The writers were also involved in the rehearsals, fine-tuning the script to "make sure the film was fluid and never stopped".
Once the logistics of the scenes were worked out and they had the timing down, the team headed to Kaufman Studios for more rehearsals, followed by principal photography based exclusively in New York during the spring of 2013. The studios were used to film the backstage areas of the film, including Riggan's dressing room and the theatre corridors. St. James Theatre was used for two weeks; it was the location for the stage scenes. The bar segments were shot in The Rum House on 47th Street, and 43rd Street was used for the action-sequence. The film was unable to be shot chronologically because of scheduling with the theatre. Throughout the locations, including the studio, the scenes were lit with natural light, since Lubezki wanted the movie "to look as naturalistic as possible". The night-time scenes were possible to film in this way due to the brightness of New York. Lubezki found lighting the scenes to be the hardest part of his work on the film. Not only did the lighting need to look realistic, but also had to be designed so that the continuous movements of the camera did not project the crew's shadows onto the actors.
Throughout shooting, Arri Alexa cameras were used; an Alexa M was used for handheld sequences, and an Alexa XT was attached to the Steadicam. Neither used matte boxes, however. Steadicam operator Chris Haarhoff explained this decision: "We didn't want this big black thing gliding into their eyeline. This way we could get very close and get the light past the lens and onto the actor's face." Lubezki – who did all the handheld camerawork – had chosen the Alexa M because the camera was very small and allowed him to get into tiny spaces and close to the actors, sometimes filming two inches (5 cm) away from Keaton's face. The camera also allowed recording for such a long period – necessary for the long takes of the movie – that Lubezki went so far as to say the movie would have been impossible to do years before. The cameras were lensed with Leica Summilux-C or Zeiss Master Primes. Lubezki stated that these gave clean images, saying "You can have all these lights in the frame and they are not really causing bad flare or things like that". In terms of sizes, they initially trialled a 21mm, but this did not give Iñárritu the "intimacy" he wanted. The crew instead went to an 18mm Leica, which was used for the majority of the film. Only when emphasis was needed did they switch the lens to a 14mm, but this was rare.
Despite all the preparation, a typical shooting day would begin with rehearsals. These usually lasted most of the morning, after which photography followed. The meticulous timing for the scenes meant that takes were cancelled because of the slightest mishaps. Emma Stone, in an interview with Jimmy Fallon, recalled how a six-minute take of the scene where Riggan first meets Mike was ruined after she walked around a corner too quickly. Takes were also repeated if a scene's rhythm did not feel right to Iñárritu, or if he and Lubezki were not satisfied with a shot's framing. As shooting progressed, lines of dialog would also be dropped, giving Iñárritu more options during post-production. Because of this, the number of takes for a given scene was high, usually 20 for the shorter scenes, the takes running smoothly around the fifteenth. Chris Haarhoff described it as "a type of dance where everyone would hopefully try to peak all at the same moment". The locations sometimes placed restrictions on the takes too; the live Times Square sequence was shot only twice since they did not want to attract the attention of tourists.
Whenever shooting was taking place there was pressure on everyone involved, but the cast had a positive experience. Norton said that normally in movie production half the people can "check out" due to repetitive aspects, but during the shooting of Birdman, "everybody's on, the whole thing, and you're all on pins and needles because you're all relying on forty other people not to drop the ball". Because of this, Stone said the director was able to get the best out of the cast, saying Iñárritu's process "creates this sort of fury in you, and then you end up realizing that he just got so much out of you that you didn't even know you had". Naomi Watts commented that the atmosphere "felt emblematic of how it feels onstage – at least my long-time memories from long ago". Andrea Riseborough, meanwhile, described the process as "wonderful", mentioning how it was possible to hear the filming of a sequence from far away before the camera arrived, and then "the magic happens with you, and then everything leaves you, and everything's silent". Once they successfully completed a take though, it was obvious to everybody involved. Norton said: "I've never, ever been on a set where every day ended with an enormous, authentic sort of cheer at having made it. You're waiting for the scream from [Iñárritu], and everybody was genuinely excited."
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