Master of the moment

A recent photograph captures much of the tension in "A View From the Bridge," the Arthur Miller drama currently up at the Guthrie Theater. In the picture's foreground, a large man in a plaid shirt sits on a frumpy loveseat, holding hands with a pretty teenage girl who stoops in front of him. Their eyes are locked and their tilted heads prefigure a kiss.

In the background between the two sits the man's wife, worry and disapproval combined on her face. The image telescopes the narrative of Miller's classic about a longshoreman deeply attracted to his wife's niece, whom they have raised as a daughter. It was taken by Michal Daniel, one of the nation's best stage photographers.

Daniel has shot for theaters in the Twin Cities, New York, Oregon and Houston. In nearly 30 years, he has risen to the top of the specialized form by capturing actors, dancers and singers in their milieu: the stage.

"What distinguishes him as a photographer is that one, he has an astonishing eye and two, he emotionally invests himself in each production," said Tony Award-winning director and playwright George C. Wolfe, who staged "Bring in Da Noise, Bring in Da Funk" and "Topdog/Underdog" on Broadway, both photographed by Daniel. "His enthusiasm and commitment to getting the photographs right is exciting and joyful to watch."

Daniel "captures the emotion and truth of the whole story," said Melodie Bahan, communications director at the Guthrie, where he shoots regularly. "And his shots are stunningly beautiful; they are art."

Daniel's career may have arisen in part from the classic struggle between fathers and sons.

He was born into a celebrated film family in Prague in what is now the Czech Republic. His father, Frantiek (Frank) Daniel, directed and produced films, including backing Jan Kadar's "The Shop on Main Street," which won an Academy Award for best foreign film in 1965.

Frank Daniel moved his family to California in 1969, a year after the Soviet Union invaded his homeland. The elder Daniel became head of the American Film Institute, and later led the Sundance Institute and the University of Southern California's School of Cinema-Television. He also taught at Columbia University and at Carleton College in Northfield, Minn.

Frank Daniel, who mentored such notable directors as Milo Forman and David Lynch, regarded photography as a limited medium.

"My father considered it a poor cousin of moviemaking," said his son, nicknamed Misha. "He looked at photographs as a descriptive, just-the-facts form that couldn't really tell a story."

After rejecting filmmaking as "too much of a team sport," Daniel set out to disprove his father.

"In a movie, the story is in there," he said. "But in photography, you can choose the moment or composition or situation that will elicit a process in a viewer -- help them make up the story."

As the Vietnam War was ending, Daniel enlisted in the U.S. Air Force at 18, getting stationed at a photography training school at the former Lowry Air Force Base in Denver. "They taught no aesthetics, just the technical stuff," he said.

He remembers developing his first photograph. "It was of a military boot stepping on a flower," he said. "I get shivers thinking about it. Suddenly, I saw that I could tell stories on my own."

His father remained skeptical.

During his five-year spell in the Air Force, Daniel married. In 1980, he moved to Minnesota, where his father had become the Luce Professor at Carleton College, to study photojournalism. His then-wife wanted to study veterinary medicine.

Jeune Lune connection

Daniel enrolled at the University of Minnesota, but left in 1982 after two years, when his son was born. He ran his own photo lab. A filmmaker friend was doing a documentary about Theatre de la Jeune Lune, then a fledgling theater troupe, and asked Daniel to shoot still photographs.

Jeune Lune, which folded this year, became not only his entree to stage photography but also an artistic soul mate.

"They gave me a freedom to do anything I wanted," he said. "Those guys were geniuses."

Old-school stage photos were set up so the photographer could control the lights, angles and motion. Daniel detests setups. He shoots live performances, often dress rehearsals, with their own special challenges. He usually has only one chance to get his shots.

"To do that, you have to totally be in tune with the show," said Carol Fineman, who hired Daniel in the early 1990s when she headed publicity at New York's Public Theater. "Theater photographers have to love the form, to the point of being artists themselves, and Misha has a fever about it."

With his thick black glasses and penetrating intensity, Daniel looks like a muscular version of Woody Allen. During shoots at the Guthrie over the past year, he ran all over the theater, anticipating each shot. When he put the camera to his eye, it sounded like paper ripping. He shoots as many as 10 frames per second with his Canon EOS.

With glances and twinkles of their eyes, actors signal when big moments are coming, Daniel said. "You just feel the tension, the energy and the rhythm, and you flow with it," he said. "It's like a dance. I try not to think ... just react. If I have too much time with the moment, I probably screw it up."

Time, plus overconfidence, caused him to flub one of the biggest jobs of his career. It was for the Broadway production of Suzan-Lori Parks' Pulitzer Prize-winner "Topdog/Underdog." Daniel, with two cameras hanging off his shoulders, was on a 10-foot ladder in the theater when a producer came up to him with a request. The producer wanted a shot of the two actors doing a toast with paper cups. It was needed at 5 p.m. the next day for ads.

Daniel got cocky, assuring the producer that he would not only capture that moment, but everything that came before and after it. As the moment came, however, he ran out of film, and was at the top of the ladder, while fresh supplies were on the floor.

"At intermission, I go to him, all sweaty, and apologize," Daniel recalled. "He laughs, 'You are a funny guy.' When I told him that I blew it for real, he shot daggers out of those eyes. I just knew that my career was over. But here comes George [C. Wolfe]. And without blinking, he said, 'I'm re-staging that scene tomorrow, anyway.' I shot it at 3 the next day and made the deadline, barely. My stupidity and arrogance. Whew!"

Shooting stars

Daniel has gotten to know many actors over the years, and they trust him. When he has to shoot new celebrities, he usually meets them in advance, sans camera.

"It behooves everyone to let them know that I'm not just another guy with a camera, that all of the outtakes will be thrown out and that they have approval," he said.

Of all the stars he has photographed, he was most taken with Meryl Streep, lead of "Mother Courage" in New York's Central Park.

"She's honest, straightforward, with no ego," he said. "I had a chance to watch her during an afternoon run with no lights. Even then, she was mesmerizing. And the topper is that when it rains, she goes out there and mops, just like everybody else."

He did not have a meeting with Mark Rylance before he was to shoot him as "Peer Gynt" at the Guthrie, which riled the star, who was clearly disturbed during the dress rehearsal. "That was my fault, because I should have known," said Daniel.

One time at the Guthrie, where many of his images adorn the walls, Daniel lost his cool with some actors.

"They had had an exhausting 12-hour day, and he starts giving them directions, but not in a nice way," said Bahan. "The actors start getting more and more frustrated, the stage manager was concerned, and I put my hand on Misha and said, 'You're done.'"

Daniel had gotten his shot, though he didn't know it then.

"That was one of the hardest moments I'd ever been in," he said. "I like photography because it's not a team sport. I'm just a fly on the wall but I was in an uncomfortable position of giving direction."

Daniel has been recognized for his work, both on and off the stage. Yet his father remained reticent for at least a decade, until he saw an exhibition in Washington during the first Clinton inaugural. The show of street photography from the Czech Republic was in a rotunda in one of the great halls of Washington. Frank Daniel walked quietly through the exhibit, looking at his son's images. After he had gone around the show, father looked at son and said:

"You can tell stories with it," Daniel remembered his father saying. "The argument was off."

His father died four years later, but his blessing was deeply accepted. "I hope to do this until all my teeth fall out," Daniel said last week. "I love the challenge of capturing peak moments onstage."

Rohan Preston • 612-673-4390