Film Images Conjur Memories From Iconic Movie Sets

With one finger on the mouse, Deirdre Brennan clicked through Susan Wood’s online photography archive. Behind-the-scenes shots from iconic film sets of the 1960s and 1970s darted across the screen—“Easy Rider,” “Billy Wilder” and “Modesty Blaise,” to name a few.Ms. Wood inhaled sharply and threw her hand up toward the monitor, narrowly missing it as she animatedly wiggled her fingers.

“There. Back one,” Ms. Wood said, urging her longtime friend and archiver to pull up the previous picture, as they stood in the photographer’s workroom in Amagansett.

“Ah, yes, that one.”

She tilted her head to the side and considered the scene, her mouth breaking into a slight smile as she eyed the likeness of actor Marcello Mastroianni swimming in a pool on the set of “Leo the Last,” surrounded by beautiful, naked women—and a few men.

“He was flirting with me before I took that photo,” Ms. Wood said. “Even though he doesn’t look like he was there.”

“Well, he looks like he’s looking for you,” Ms. Brennan commented, eliciting a girlish laugh from the photographer.

The year was 1970, and by this time Ms. Wood had landed herself on sets with the legends— from John Wayne in South Africa to Peter Fonda on the West Coast—and established herself as a film photographer. But to this day she does not define her decades-long career by this niche. She is simply a capturer of moments, she explained.

“I’m kind of a romantic,” said Ms. Wood, whose film photographs will be on view for the first time, starting Saturday, at Mulford Farm Museum in East Hampton. “I really like to find either the beauty or the energy that is extraordinarily appealing about the people I photograph. Their reaction to life and what they’re about. It’s usually somewhere in the eyes.”

As a young girl, Ms. Wood was surrounded by art in both her Manhattan home and during weekend activities. Every Saturday morning, if there wasn’t a concert to attend, her parents would take her to an artist’s studio, where she would draw and paint—what would later become, she said, the foundation for her photography.

Her first job out of school—Ms. Wood earned a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College, followed by a master’s from Yale University—was a lucky break, she said, working in the lab of the Time & Life Building in Manhattan. It wasn’t long before Sports Illustrated tossed a handful of soft assignments her way, leading her—rather serendipitously—into the film world after an executive at Paramount remembered her work at the magazine.

Three days later, she was on a plane to South Africa and director Howard Hawks’s new John Wayne movie, “Hatari!”

“Some poo-pooed it. They said, ‘It’s Hollywood. Be careful. Make sure you have a round-trip ticket,’” Ms. Wood said. “They were absolutely right. Howard Hawks’s girlfriend was a photographer. Elsa Martinelli had Willy Rizzo there, who worked for Paris Match. And it was like they would stretch a wire to trip me.”

She laughed, and continued, “No, not quite, but they didn’t want anybody else getting good shots.”

Between dealing with the competition and Mr. Wayne’s occasional temper—“I wish I had a picture of John Wayne chewing me out for moving around too much, disturbing his focal point,” Ms. Wood said—the photographer got her shots, creating stories on the periphery of the films themselves, which took precedent over her assignments, no matter what.

“Working for Hollywood, on location like that, is like being in the Army. There’s a hierarchy of command, which I knew nothing about,” she recalled. “I had always been a free spirit. There were conflicts, things that worked. But that was my first job. It was very tricky, but somehow things worked out. It was supposed to be a one-month event—I ended up staying six. We went to a Christmas there, in Tanzania.”

Moving from movie set to movie set—about 20 over the course of her career, Ms. Wood said—the photographer compares the experience to living in a circus troupe, or even a shipboard romance. The tight-knit group, separated from the age- or socially-defined atmosphere around it, worked together and played together. And as soon as the shoot started, it was over. They were never to see each other again, except in photographs.

“I would say I went through about 5,000 pictures to get to the final 30 for the show,” Ms. Brennan said.

“She has a quick eye,” Ms. Wood interjected.

“We probably have close to one million in the basement,” the curator added.

“My second career now, showing the work of the ’60s and ’70s, that’s really due to Deirdre going into my basement, discovering things she thought were interesting.”

“I thought such great work shouldn’t stay in the basement,” Ms. Brennan said. “I thought it needed to see the light of day.”

“My savior, there.”

“Well, you’ve been my savior in many occasions, too.”

Ms. Brennan left the work space, and Ms. Wood walked into her living room, sinking into her chair with a cup of coffee. As an aside, she added, “You know, that’s the fun of it, ending up with funny stories, like with Marcello. When I got onto that set, everyone except for the cameraman and the director were in the swimming pool, naked.”

She remembers getting over her initial wonderment and joining her clothed comrades on the balcony, preparing to take her shot, when a shout from the pool grabbed her attention.

“Pretty photographer!” Mr. Mastroianni called up to her in his Italian accent. “Why don’t you take off your clothes and come and join us?”

“I’d love to,” Ms. Wood had flirted back. “But I have a job to do. Later.”

She laughed again at the memory, putting her hand on her cheek as she took a sip of coffee.

“Long ago and far away,” she mused.

The East Hampton Historical Society will open “Close-Up: Iconic Film Images from Susan Wood” with a reception on Saturday, October 4, from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Mulford Farm Museum. The exhibit will remain on view through Sunday, October 26, on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sundays from noon to 5 p.m. In addition, the museum will be open during the Hamptons International Film Festival on Thursday, October 9, and Friday, October 10, from noon to 5 p.m., both days. Free admission. To contact the historical society, call 324-6850. For more information about the photographer, visit susanwood.com.