Upamanyu Biswas
Netflix’s ‘The Four Seasons‘ chronicles a story about love and marriage through the eyes of a tight-knit group of friends who are battling through their midlife problems. The show delves into a variety of issues, each stemming from something personal relating to the characters. The show’s format allows the storytellers to traverse numerous eye-catching locales as the contingent of friends get together for quarterly vacation getaways. In the fall episodes of the series, the group stays at the Lucy Flucker Knox Inn, a comfort-driven homely estate that becomes ground zero for complicated drama, mainly due to the situations engulfing the characters. As such, it stands out as an essential setting amidst a catalog of other picturesque sites.
Lucy Flucker Knox is a Semi-Fictional Hotel
Lucy Flucker Knox Inn from ‘The Four Seasons’ is a semi-fictional hotel crafted by show creators Tina Fey, Lang Fisher, and Tracey Wigfield. The inn’s name can be traced to Lucy Flucker Knox, a revolutionary figure who defied social expectations and traditional gender roles during the eighteenth century. In reality, the inn and its surrounding premises were likely shot at the Glynwood Farm in Cold Spring, New York. Wigfield explained that almost all the seasons, except summer, were filmed around the Hudson Valley region of New York, which offered diverse locales capturing the different climates in vibrant colors. “You have to be on the East Coast to really get the great colors in fall and spring,” she said in an interview.
While the inn has a dark and welcoming look to its exterior, a lot of the interior scenes may have been shot at Umbra Sound Stages, a production studio in New York. To that end, the film crew utilized both on-location shots and studio environments to weave together the reality of their various backdrops. Wigfield also stated that production designer Sharon Seymour was pivotal to the project because of her ability to take care of intricate details that add to the overall immersion. “It was a lot of work to make grass that wasn’t green, green, and to make trees that were green look like they had snow on them. It was VFX too, but it was just a lot of work behind the scenes,” the co-creator said. It is likely that the same treatment was applied to the inn.
The show dives into some complex drama during the fall episodes, especially as we see Nick trying to close the gap with his daughter, who is disgusted by his decision to divorce Anne. Additionally, Danny and Claude go through a rough phase in their relationship, as one feels smothered by the other. The same is true for Jack and Katherine, who, despite their ability to gel together organically, find themselves routinely stepping on each other’s toes in the pettiest of manners. Thus, the Lucy Flucker Knox Inn becomes the central location for a multitude of difficult discussions as our main characters try to find a middle ground in their relationships. The show utilizes its locales in creative ways to make it as much part of the main story as possible, adding to the weight and overall authenticity of the inn.
