Behind the Production Design in “One of Them Days” with Monique Dias

The popular, star-studded comedy “One of Them Days” arrived in theaters on January 17, 2025, receiving $11.8 million in its opening weekend. This film went on to make $50 million at the box office and has since gained a lot more attention moving to Netflix. Many moving and talented hands at play led to the film’s success. The hands behind the playful, intricate, and artistic production design is Monique Dias, who grounds her work in authenticity and color.

A comedy focusing on two best friends highlights their empowered relationships, resonating with Dias’s own friendships among women.

“I really liked it because it's the first story I did that is about two girl best friends, and I'm in a place in my life right now where I've always had a handful of really close girlfriends…my girls mean so much to me,” Dias reveals. “It was very fun to try to channel my own relationships into this story, especially with their apartment and how they live together and their different personalities.”

To get to know the area where Dreux and Alyssa call home, Dias spent a lot of time wandering around Baldwin Hills to bring the neighborhood to life accurately on the screen.

“I also always love the opportunity to dive into a topic,” Dias explains. “I've lived in LA for 15 years, but I have not spent any time in Baldwin Hills. I'm usually in East LA or on the west side. I don't venture anywhere else. So the minute we signed up for this movie, I was like, I need a pop in every store and every shop and see what's going on and what this place actually looks like. We went into so many people's apartments and we got to see how they lived and see what their everyday life starts to look like very visually, you know, I don't know what they do with their time, but you can see where they go. This is what your grocery store looks like. This is what the coffee shop looks like and so on.”

The film was shot in a span of two months, calling for a fast-paced process. Dias looks back and appreciates the challenges because of not only how the film turned out, but because of the collaborative efforts and support from different teams within various departments.

“The actual shoot itself was very challenging because we were shooting in a new place every single day,” the designer admits. “We were going in and out of space really fast, and some of the spaces, I think we had two places that we just showed up and used as is…but the blood bank and the payday loan were empty shells. We completely dressed them and modified them with paint and construction elements. Doing that very quickly was a challenge.”

Dias continues, “And then, you know, all of the steps in between. We did the electric pole, figuring that out and finding a 25-foot electric pole, and then we did a miniature version on stage so that they could be on it safely. There are a lot of special effects elements in the show, so working with them was…they were a great team. It was just a lot of communication and collaboration. So in some ways, the set that we built, once we got the plans, it just started rolling and then everything else was just all these little things kept popping up along the way that we had to handle.”

Another one of the challenges Dias faced was turning Dreux and Alyssa’s cozy and broken-down apartment into Bethany’s chic and modern-style apartment. After shooting the iconic fire scene where the two lead’s apartment is burnt to a crisp after a run-in with a toxic ex and a vengeful crook, Dias and her team redesigned the entire layout into a sophisticated, upper-class look.

Dias goes on to say, “The apartment set we actually built, we basically built it in this very modular way to change it from Dreux and Alyssa's apartment to being burn ready for the fire scene and then we flipped it overnight into Bethany's high-end remodeled apartment and designing it in a way that allowed us to flip it in 10 hours was a very fun challenge to try to figure out how to do.”

Dias further explains the drastic differences, “Dreux and Alyssa have a popcorn ceiling, and Bethany has these big panels with molding. The floor in Dreux and Alyssa's carpet is Bethany's hardwood floor. Dreux and Alyssa's kitchen is all that L.A. never-been-renovated, high gloss brown wood, and bad countertops, and Bethany's was completely remodeled. So it's like the landlord special of 2025, where all the walls are painted gray and the cabinets are white, and the fake slab marble countertops…You know, you move someone out entirely and then you pop someone else's life into it.”

Monique's work in "One of Them Days" showcases the authenticity of simple living in the Baldwin Hills inside Dreux and Alyssa's apartment.

The production designer started her journey years before this film. Her passion for theater, film, and design is rooted in her childhood. Dias reflects on where her interests and inspiration come from in designing film sets and reveals that her parents’ work and hobbies play a huge role.

“My parents used to build houses,” Dias says. “My dad's very OCD, and so he wouldn't live in a place someone else I've lived in before…He built homes growing up, and so we'd often go visit the house while it was being built.”

“When I was a little kid, I thought it was insane that you could take a plot of land and then watch it get built all the way until a finished product and really see the process of it,” Dias continues.  “My mom was a very old school mom, so she taught me all those traditional kinds of housewife things like how to sew and decorate, and she's also very independent. We would paint and build things and do all sorts of activities together. And so, I just grew up around that. And I was a very shy kid. So my parents tried to force me into all of these different activities to bring my personality out and to get me out of just staying in my room and reading books all day. And the only thing that kind of clicked for me was theater.”

Dias grew up being a part of theater in middle school and high school. Along with that, her brother’s best friend owned a video camera, so they would shoot “little movies” which sparked the possibility of turning this beloved passion into a career. Dias went on to college majoring in film, working on her peer’s projects as a production designer. This career aspiration, at first, took her parents by surprise.

“When I was really young, I wanted to be a doctor for a really long time,” Dias confesses. “I did the gifted programs and the honors programs and applied to Ivy League schools. So when I originally switched and said I wanted to do film, they were like, ‘But why? I thought you wanted to be a doctor? You could be rich.’ And I was like, ‘But I want to follow my passion.’ 

Monique grew up with her father building homes, which sparked the production designer's passion for film and theater.

Dias reveals that working in the film industry isn’t as far out of reach as people think it is. “I wish in undergrad, they were more transparent about how much you can really make in the film if you work in the unions. I make a great amount of money, and I'm taken care of and my parents are super supportive. And they're very excited to see my name on the screen when you watch a movie, that whole thing. So yeah, it's awesome.”

In any artistic field, creative processes vary significantly among individuals. For Dias, trusting her instincts and initial artistic intuition guides essential design choices.

“I think at the beginning, I like to spend a little bit of time alone,” Dias talks about her creative process. “It's the only opportunity where my ideas can come out without the influence of other voices, because the minute you start talking to somebody, you don't know what filters in or what changes where you might have gone on your own. The biggest thing I like to do is try to find the story underneath the story.”

Dias’s love for the fantasy genre is intertwined with her visual creations for film productions. 

She goes on to say, “I really love fantasy and a lot of people look at fantasy and think it's made up in a silly story, but to me, the thing I've always loved about fantasy is that you can take a real issue and apply a fantastical story on top and kind of make it universal. There's this show “Carnival Row” that was on Amazon a couple of years ago…they were kind of a very clear and perfect example of doing that. It's about, fairies and centaurs and all these magical creatures who live amongst humans, and it's a story about racism, but instead of having it be a black guy and a white guy or whatever, it's a centaur versus a human. And so all of a sudden, anyone can

enter that story no matter what your personal identity is and understand where these characters are coming from. And it takes out your personal bias.”

“When I start a story, I'm always trying to find what is really going on underneath this topical layer of the story. Why is the director or the writer writing this?” Dias begs the question when first looking at a script. “Is it as simple as what the story is saying it is? Or is there meat behind it that they're using this story to, um, kind of cover up? And once I figure that out, I'm able to start working in metaphor symbolism, color choices, mood choices, that sort of thing. So once I get my north star of direction, I then can jump into researching images that I feel speak to that idea. I love modeling and sketching, so I'll start doodling around in there and start building stuff and coming up with ideas, and then it kind of just explodes from there.”

Her passion for creating doesn’t end with stories told through the film language. On the side of production designing, Dias aspires to get into experiential building designs and open a series of theme spaces that shift as the day continues into the night.

“I am literally in the process of designing it and like 3D modeling it and turning it into a real space,” Dias explains. “Basically my next goal that I would love to reach is to open a series of themed spaces that during the day are interactive plays for children, then at night, you can open up the walls and turn them into a bar and restaurant for adults, and then you can switch it back…It's basically a puzzle piece of a room. The first one that I am modeling and designing is based on my dream as a kid. I'm turning it into this Peter Pan story because it just works so well.”

Monique Dias is taking her production design talents next to a short film called “Inside These Walls” about conjugal visits in prison, directed by a member of the AFI DWW+ Conservatory.