Photographer Marc Karzen
Interviewed By Jimmy Steinfeldt on September 26, 2025
Beverly Hills, CA (The Hollywood Times) 9/30/25
Jimmy Steinfeldt (JS): How often do you clean your lens?
Marc Karzen (MK): Once a month, maybe.
JS: What photographers influenced you?
MK: My big influence is when I was studying photography at Santa Monica College, and I’d go to the library and look at magazines two or three times a week. I’d look in French Vogue, and Guy Bourdin was in the middle of his Charles Jourdan campaign. It was like nothing I’d ever seen. There’s a brand new book of all of this work that I just go too, from Rizzoli. Also, Avedon and Penn in those days were the big fashion photographers but there were other smaller photographers that I kept an eye on like Jeanloup Sieff and Helmet Newton. On the art side Lee Friedlander and how he sliced things up in his frame. When I moved to France to take a semester abroad I ended up living there – and I went to an exhibition of Lee Friedlander next to the Pompidou Center. A little gallery where I met him and saw his work. I had seen a few of his books and it was cool to see his images on the wall. Also Robert Frank and his book The Americans. But the photo art scene was in very early days in the ’70s.
My mother’s a painter, an abstract expressionist. I was raised around painters, architects, crazy theatre people and graphic designers. When I was a little kid, we moved to L.A. My mom would drag my sister and me to art galleries. I was a teenager and thought, okay, whatever, can we leave now? I got stuck in front of different types of paintings and graphics and posters, and graphic designers. Peter Max posters had a huge influence on me when I played drums in grade school. When we went to New York I saw the musical Hair. I was 12 years old, which blew my mind heavily. Then, as I got older David Hockney had a major influence on me. I met him at the Gagosian Gallery several years ago. I stay tuned to all his stuff that he does here in L.A. and when he was in France.
JS: What was your first camera?
MK: My very first camera was a Canon Ftb. Later I jumped over to Nikon and Leica. Then I got a Polaroid which was my light meter when I was doing assignments. I also shot Pentax 6×7 and rented 4×5.
JS: Tell me about Leica.
MK: My best friend, Dana Ross, when I started taking pictures, shot with Leica’s. He was a photographer and cyclist, buddy of mine when we were teenagers. He had a group of friends and they were all shooting with Leica’s. One of our friends’ parents owned a camera store. They got cameras at a little bit of a discount. You shoot different kinds of cameras for different things then. Now, the iPhone is good for many things. If you’re in a situation where you don’t have your camera or you want to be discreet or you just want to literally look like a tourist. A photojournalist might shoot with an iPhone, because they’re in a restaurant next to a politician and need to quietly grab the image. I still shoot some film. I shoot digital on different cameras and I shoot iPhone all the time. I think I’ve had a camera on me since I was 18.
JS: Is there a camera you always wanted but never got?
MK: I obsessed and figured out how to get the right gear. The camera that I needed was a Polaroid with a manual shutter. I didn’t know how to find one when I was in Paris. I was 21, and went to the flea market and bought a Polaroid 250 with just an automatic lens. And then got another Polaroid 110 which had a manual lens. There was a camera repair guy who was like a magician. I brought him the two bodies and he took the manual lens off one and put it on the other. He would make a camera for you. I have it to this day, my photographer son has shot with it.
JS: Does that have a sync where you can sync it to strobes?
MK: Totally. I used it as a light meter. I’d shoot a few Polaroids to make sure the background was lit right and go.
JS: What do you think about digital? When did you make the move?
MK: I didn’t resist. The most nerve-racking part of being a film photographer was waiting until tomorrow or the next day when we got the film back. My greatest story of shooting film and not knowing the outcome was when I got hired by CBS News to shoot the Mike Tyson vs. Michael Spinks fight in Atlantic City in 1988. I’m shooting with a 400 millimeter lens from up in the rafters. I didn’t know if I was going to be ringside or somewhere else. Tyson comes into the ring, and then in 91 seconds it’s over! I have no idea if I got the shot. I’m shooting a motor-drive with a 400 millimeter lens!
I race out of the stadium and there’s a limo waiting for me, which takes me to the airport on a jet back to Teterboro airport. I get in another limo to a lab that’s staying open late for me. I sit there and wait for them to process the Ekta chrome. I look at a clip test, approve it and they process the rest of the roll. At two or three in the morning, the lab says “Here’s your film” I get in a cab and I said to the driver “Can you turn the light on in the back seat?” It becomes my lightbox. I’m holding the film up to the light and thank god. I got the moment. The before, and the moment of the punch, and the moment on the ground. I raced over to CBS News on 57th Street, drop off the film, Done. And at 5am, like three hours later, my photos are on the morning news. So, back to your question. If digital existed back, then why would you even think for a second to shoot film.
JS: Have you shot movie stills?
MK: No. I shot for TV. I shot for Letterman and SNL. But I never shot movie stills because you had to be in the union. I had full access to the Letterman show any night I wanted to walk on set and shoot stills, which I knew I could sell to Rolling Stone magazine, and then syndicate through my agency, which was Outline Press and later Gamma Liaison. I just gave my agency photos like Tom Hanks, Pee-wee Herman, Talking Heads, Hunter Thompson, James Brown or Bob Dylan.
JS: The Late Night with David Letterman bumper photos, where did the ideas come from?
MK: At first we’d have a production meeting and we would shoot like once a week because we had no inventory. The original order from NBC was for six weeks. We didn’t know if we were going to continue. After only two weeks, they gave us another six weeks. And then give us another three months. And then finally, we got a one-year pickup. But it took a year and a half until we knew this was an actual show, and there was an audience. It got hot quick.
But there were all sorts of logistical issues. We were going out once a week, shooting ten bumper photos per shoot. We’d have a production meeting between myself, Edd Hall, who was the graphics producer, and Bob Pook, who was the graphic designer. The three of us would sit down and make a shot list. Then Edd would coordinate whatever needed to be figured out in advance, but most of it was done on the fly. If we needed a hotel room that would be booked in advance. If we were going to Yankee Stadium we’d figure that out in advance. But if we wanted pictures in a deli we’d walk into a deli and say, “Can we take pictures? It’s for a student film.” They’d say yes.
About half of the shots, we did were completely in camera. We’d bring a prop like a beer can which was the most popular, or a sponge, a newspaper, Late Night turkey stuffing, Late Night Suntan Cream or some other prop. But, otherwise, the graphic artists would airbrush Late Night With David Letterman onto the print, or collage. All before Photoshop.
JS: How did you get the Letterman gig?
MK: My roommate. When I moved to New York, and a friend of a friend said, “Oh, this friend of mine needs a roommate. Why don’t you go meet her?” And it turns out this woman, who is also originally from Kentucky like me, was a production assistant to the writers’ staff on SNL. I was shooting fashion and rock & roll working on getting assignments for magazines. After room-mating for a few months, she says, “I have tickets for the SNL dress rehearsal and my friends can’t make it. If you want, here are two tickets.” Wow. I’m now going to a dress rehearsal at SNL. Two weeks later, “Hey, Marc, I got another set of tickets.” Eventually I’ve gone to the SNL dress rehearsal three or four times and I’m invited to the after party. I’m becoming pals with staff on the show including the art director for SNL.
This is at the last of the famous first five years. I’m there during the SNL old guard. Jane Curtin’s still on the show, and Belushi would come and go, Bill Murray’s on the show, Garrett Morris, Loraine Newman, Gilda Radner. I’m there for the after party of the final show May of 1980. And there we are at the skating rink in the summer in front of 30 Rock, and there’s a band playing, and the sun is coming up, and it’s 5:30am, and everybody’s hammered, and the band starts to play The Beatles, “Here Comes the Sun.” And I’ll never forget that moment. I’m officially a New Yorker, and I’ve been in New York for like, seven months at this point.
So, art director, Bob Pook, and I became friendly. The next year they hired a new photographer who was a little green, and Pook leaves a message on my answering machine. “Marc we have a problem. We have to do a photo in front of 30 Rock, and we’ve got a cement truck, and they’re going to lay down wet cement. And the photographer the producers hired is nervous about the lighting, and I you’ve told me you have some battery powered strobe thing, so can you help us?” I show up, and I shoot it, and I nail it, and it’s perfect, and three weeks later, “Live from New York, it’s Saturday Night!” and there’s my photo on television for the first time. That changed my life. That one moment. All of a sudden, I’m a photographer for television. I never even thought about it. Images that were in-air, not production stills, so I’m shooting freelance jobs for SNL.
Pook calls up one days and says, “Marc, come over, I want to meet.” He says, “David Letterman, they canceled his morning show, and they’re giving him Tom Snyder’s slot in late-night, 12:30. It hasn’t even been announced yet.” Pook wants to figure out an idea for the opening titles and for the bumpers. We brainstormed and he had this idea of having no logo. We’re gonna name the show Late Night with David Letterman. That’s the name of the show, but the idea is there’s no logo.
We designed the name of the show into New York nightlife. It’s simply gonna appear anywhere. On a freeway overpass sign, on a subway entrance, on the side of a bus or on a concert poster. Like all these little obvious things. The ideas just kept flowing and got more complicated and more fun and more playful. I did that for twelve years. The stylized name was the logo. It was called the “No Logo” concept.
JS: What is you’re feeling about the loss of Kodachrome?
MK: Well, everything I shot during the day was on Kodachrome. And even in the studio. I shot 25 and 64 ASA all the time. It had to come out of the camera perfectly. Your film had to be perfect. You couldn’t say “Fix it in the separation.” It’s just mind boggling to think now about having to get everything perfect in camera. Today you could just shoot and in post, warm everything up. Or just warm up the face. Or darken the sky. Before, nobody could begin to think like that. That was the difference between a real photographer. Back in those days, you had commitment to the craft. You couldn’t be sloppy.
JS: Were you a photo journalist?
MK: No, I was never a photo journalist. I would shoot things that were newsy, but I never was a working photojournalist. But, I was a producer on a PBS documentary called, On Assignment in 1981 featuring Alfred Eisenstaedt at Life, David Burnett shooting for Geo Magazine in Dallas, Jodi Cobb shooting for The National Geographic in Jerusalem and Jay Mather shooting coal miners in Kentucky. So, that was my dive into that world.
JS: Were you ever in APA or ASMP?
MK: I was an ASMP member for years.
JS: So was I. Cool, we we’re in the same organization. Anyone or anything that you’d really like to photograph?
MK: It all starts with an idea. I’m working now on a big idea for a portrait series and I’m fine tuning the parameters of it, about creative people but with an angle. So that’s a work in progress. I’m also working on a book about the Kentucky Derby that I shot in 1984, plus some art show projects this Fall and next year.
JS: I hope you’re able to achieve that. Tell me about RelishMix.
MK: Over the years working in television, starting on SNL and Letterman I got involved in the main title sequences for TV shows. The opening :20 to :60 seconds that would introduce the logo for a show. When I moved back to L.A in 1992 I was still shooting but I was working more and more on these title sequences and promos. Apple announced that they were going to make these computers that would let you animate on them. You could bring in footage whether it’s stills or video footage, and put graphics on top of them using your Mac. Prior to that I would go to a post-production facility and design, composit and spend your entire budget.
You would take footage and then add graphics by gluing them together using a paintbox or one of these super high end Quantel compositing systems. All of a sudden, I could actually control my work and design it and output it and deliver it to a network. I did a lot of work for E! Entertainment. I worked on The Howard Stern Show including when he got going on E!. So E! hired me to design the graphics for the Letterman Show and reruns that previously had my graphics in the show. That was funny.
Over the years working on TV shows with producers and networks led me to a point where I started pitching shows. I got to know development executives, and I would say I got an idea for a show. I’d get a team of people that I worked with who shot and cut and designed and I started working as a creative director. I ultimately sold a few shows and now I’m a producer and I’m pitching. I know how to make sizzle reels because I’ve done this for so many other production companies over the years.
I knew more and more on the production side. I knew the marketing side. I could sit on both sides of the table. And one day I pitched a show and told this production company how we can market the show and put clips on YouTube, cross-promote them on Facebook, and get the talent to Tweet about it and create this chain reaction. And their response was “We really like your show, but we really like your idea about promoting. We know nothing about social media so why don’t you do that on our other shows, and we’ll develop your show too?”
It was about twelve years ago. I’d get on phone calls with networks and tell them, here’s what we’re seeing, and here’s what we’re delivering, and here’s our timing, and we’re going to do this. They would always respond with you are the only production company that we know of that thinks about this stuff. This is awesome. As I’m doing this work, I’m realizing, nobody else is doing this. There were no software tools that would allow you to organize all of your social media assets.
We’d have twenty clips on YouTube and five Facebook pages and seven Twitter pages. How do we just keep this in one place? That’s how RelishMix came to be. I started doing that on six shows then twelve shows then twenty shows. Then started tracking the networks themselves. Then someone got me a meeting at Universal Pictures where we were talking about Fast & Furious 6. And they said, “Why don’t you do what you’re doing on those TV shows for us?” I worked on Fast & Furious 6. And all of a sudden, I’m in the movie business.
JS: Do you have an upcoming exhibit?
MK: It’s gonna be a group show at Milk Studios. It’s a fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Club. I think it’s in November. The other thing is I’m going to be in a group show at Mark Mothersbaugh’s new arts gallery.
JS: I’ve been there. MutMuz Gallery. Chinatown in downtown L.A.
MK: That show is in November.
JS: Advice for a young person who wants to be a professional photographer.
MK: Here’s how you make a career as a young photographer. Pick a world and live with it. If it’s shooting bands commit to the music circuit in your neighborhood. I have a friend who shot opera and Philharmonic stuff for years. When people need opera photos they call him. He knows how to shoot that type of photography. Extreme sports like surfing, equestrian, cycling, diving, skiing. I met a kid the other day at an event who shoots cart racing out in Riverside. He goes out there, and he’s working for four different parents getting photos of their kids. He gets $600 per kid. $2,400 for the day shooting cart racing. And his work is perfect, and they use that photography to get sponsors and brand deals for their kids.
So that’s how you start in photography. Pick a thing that you become an expert in and just commit to it and get known within that world so you can make some money and get some good gear. Then you start getting in publications for that sport or for music. Then you get hooked in with a band who becomes famous, and they say, can you come on the road with us? That’s fun.
I have a son who’s a working photographer. He just got back this morning from shooting Thursday Night Football for Amazon Prime. He’s in season four. He goes to every game for them and shoots behind the scenes, stills and video. Amazing. When they run out on the field, he runs out with a 360 cam, and they post it on social media within minutes. He shot for the Kamala Harris campaign. He shoots for The Amazing Race and other shows. Anyway, I have a 2nd generation TV photographer son.
JS: What’s next from Marc Karzen?
MK: Every time I have a camera in my hand, my life changes. It opens doors. When I interviewed Alfred Eisenstadt, he said, “With a camera in my hand, I don’t know fear.” With a camera in your hand, you can walk through doors as a photographer that you wouldn’t otherwise go through. I’m just finding new scenarios with cameras; everybody’s got a camera in their pocket now. I’ve been back in France three times in the last year, so things will come from that. There used to be a few people with cameras but now cameras are changing the world in many ways. It’s happening before our eyes.
Also, the way films are being made, and stories are being told. Spike Lee teaches at NYU Film School, and he says to his students, “When I was your age making movies I didn’t care about a degree. I didn’t care about class. All I wanted was equipment. I came to film school because there was equipment so I could make some films. But now all of you have a movie camera in your pocket, and you can edit on your computer. There’s nothing stopping you. Make your movie.” The opportunities for the next generation of filmmakers and photographers is changing every day, and that’s exciting.
To learn more about Marc Karzen https://www.karzen.com/
