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<\/p>\nThe idea of a concert special didn\u2019t exactly light up Ed Sheeran\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery time it was pitched to me, I just wasn\u2019t excited,\u201d says the English singer and songwriter who\u2019s spent the last decade or so among the world\u2019s top touring acts. \u201c\u2018We could do this theater and this town and this\u2026\u2019 \u2014 it was like, \u2018I\u2019ve seen that before.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
But then Sheeran got a call from Ben Winston, the Emmy-winning producer and director known for his role overseeing the Grammy Awards and as a creator of James Corden\u2019s \u201cCarpool Karaoke\u201d series.<\/p>\n
Actually, it was an email, Winston points out. \u201cYou can\u2019t call Ed because he doesn\u2019t have a phone,\u201d he says. \u201cYou have to email him and hope he FaceTimes you back from his iPad.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Winston\u2019s pitch earlier this year was simple but intriguing: What if they took the one-shot approach that helped make Netflix\u2019s \u201cAdolescence<\/a>\u201d such a sensation and used it to film a performance by Sheeran \u2014 not simply onstage but as he goes on a journey somewhere? And instead of getting a director \u201ckind of like the guy who shot \u2018Adolescence,\u2019\u201d as Winston recalls putting it, \u201cWhy don\u2019t we just ask the guy who shot \u2018Adolescence\u2019?\u201d<\/p>\n Sheeran liked the idea; so did Philip Barantini, who won two Emmys in September for directing that acclaimed miniseries about a 13-year-old boy accused of killing a female classmate. (Winston got Barantini\u2019s number from Corden and hit him cold on WhatsApp.)<\/p>\n Now Netflix has just released \u201cOne Shot with Ed Sheeran,\u201d in which a camera trails the 34-year-old singer as he roams New York City, acoustic guitar in hand, between soundcheck and a gig at the Hammerstein Ballroom. The hourlong result, which true to its title presents the roving performance in a single unbroken shot with no edits, can of course be seen as a piece of high-toned promo ahead of next month\u2019s launch of a world tour behind Sheeran\u2019s latest album, \u201cPlay.\u201d<\/p>\n But doing the special as a so-called oner \u2014 and with a limited number of chances to get it right \u2014 also posed an invigorating creative challenge for a performer who\u2019s been entertaining crowds since he was 15.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause I do the same thing every weekend, just in a different place, I don\u2019t really feel the nerves anymore,\u201d Sheeran says of his live show, which typically features him alone onstage (even in football stadiums) with only a guitar and a looping station for accompaniment. \u201cWhereas with this, I really felt the pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n Winston says the team behind \u201cOne Shot\u201d chose New York as the setting \u201cbecause we felt like every corner of New York feels like a movie set.\u201d In the show, Sheeran plays his hits as he rides in a taxi, walks the High Line, serenades a couple mid-proposal and pops unannounced into a rooftop birthday party; he also clambers up to the top of a double-decker bus and joins Camila Cabello in an SUV in the middle of traffic for a duet on his song \u201cPhotograph.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe probably could have picked a different city that was quieter and blocked off the roads and did it perfectly,\u201d Sheeran says. \u201cBut the chaos of it, I think, is what makes it interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n Philip Barantini at September\u2019s 77th Emmy Awards.<\/p>\n (Jason Armond \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Sheeran did just three takes: a dress rehearsal on a Sunday afternoon the filmmakers shot \u201cin case it went great,\u201d says Winston \u2014 \u201cIt didn\u2019t,\u201d he adds \u2014 then two performances on a Monday sandwiched between the morning and evening rush hours. Three camera operators passed a lightweight Ronin 4D rig among themselves as the singer moved from set piece to set piece, and not always as smoothly as they\u2019d hoped.<\/p>\n One of the guys proposing to his partner took about two minutes to pop the question, according to Sheeran. \u201cIt was literally like he was on his own reality show,\u201d says Barantini. One of the women celebrating her birthday, meanwhile, \u201cjust hopped onstage and started twerking,\u201d Sheeran recalls. \u201cFor the whole song.\u201d (Alas, she\u2019s not in the take they used.)<\/p>\n \u201cI was in the van watching the monitors, going, \u2018This is cool,\u2019\u201d Barantini says. \u201cThen it got to the point I was like, \u2018This is not cool anymore. Can we please get her down?\u2019\u201d The producers used a casting director to find these folks but Sheeran says none of them knew they\u2019d be encountering him as they went about their business in Manhattan.<\/p>\n For Winston, \u201cOne Shot\u201d is in keeping with his determination to \u201ctry and see where music goes in different places,\u201d he says. He compares the project to the time he had Adele sing outdoors<\/a> at the Griffith Observatory for a CBS special in 2021 and the time he put Bruno Mars on the marquee of the Apollo Theater for a different CBS special in 2017.<\/p>\n Ben Winston at the 63rd Grammy Awards in 2021.<\/p>\n (Jay L. Clendenin \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n \u201cEven in the Olympic handover,\u201d he adds of the concert he oversaw last year, \u201crather than doing it in the Paris stadium, we were like, \u2018Hold on \u2014 wouldn\u2019t it be cool if you had Dre, Snoop, Billie Eilish and the Red Hot Chili Peppers on the beach in L.A.?\u2019\u201d (Winston will serve as executive producer for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2028 Summer Games.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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