Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1124770
45 Q2 2019 / CINEMONTAGE "Our director Ava DuVernay — herself a person of color — wanted a specific, urban feel for the soundtrack," Benson says. "She asked us to create the sound of New York in the dialogue, Foley and effects tracks — to really put the audience into those closed environments and follow the action as the film moves from the boys' homes in Harlem, to Central Park, to the police station, to the courtroom, to juvenile detention, then to the Rikers Island and Attica prisons. 'Realism' was our watchword when making soundtrack decisions." CONTRASTING PERIOD SOUNDS The team's primary focus was to establish and contrast the 1989 sound of Harlem projects with uptown Manhattan, and the more affluent neighborhood of rape victim Patricia Meili. "We wanted to contrast the neighborhoods and cultures within New York City, and the authority of the police stations and courtrooms," Benson explains. "The audience needs to understand how it felt to come from these poor backgrounds, and the cultural differences between that and the courtroom environments." Benson asked Tanis to oversee sound design to enhance the fear and anxiety that the accused teens were experiencing, and to integrate that with the music score to develop a feeling of oppression and isolation, "specifically during the prison mess hall scenes and flashbacks." Adds Tanis, "Obviously, the basic intention was to cut full backgrounds and hard effects, but also that spotted sounds would form a large element of the edit, especially street-based call-outs and people talking and shouting back and forth to each other between tall buildings." Tanis discusses the director's intention that Harlem should sound vibrant and alive, with crowds of people, loud traffic, sirens, buses and jackhammers, noting, "This would be contrasted with Central Park, which was 'big city' around the edges but would become much quieter and pastoral as we moved deeper inside to the crime scene. This serene woodland sense evolved through further discussions with John [Benson]. It became a sort of leafy, wind transition swell, as a memory of the last place the boys were free — each time we see one of them being released from prison, in Part 3, and a few other scenes." Benson, along with Dudeck and Tanis, spotted each part with DuVernay and each part's specific picture editor. (See related story on the show's picture editorial crew on Page 38.) "We discussed all specifics of the scenes, problems with dialogue, the ADR When They See Us. Netflix John Benson.