How ‘Queen & Slim’ Production Designer Karen Murphy Mapped Out the Duo’s Route

Queen & Slim” is a social commentary packaged as a film, beginning with a bang.

It kicks off when Queen (Jodi Turner-Smith) and Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) shoot a police officer in self-defense and find themselves on the run.

Slim somewhat innocently thinks his action will be justified in court, but Queen, a weathered prosecutor, knows different.Director Melina Matsoukas, a two-time Grammy winner best known for music videos, collaborated with production designer Karen Murphy to bring the real world to the screen.

While filming a current-day script mostly on location might seem fairly straightforward, production crews know that’s never the case.The script specifies only certain stops in the road trip, so Murphy mapped out an actual route for the pair.

“I made a road map quite early in the [process] and gave it to every department,” she says.

“I drew where it was starting, how long that would take and the drive.

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