MPSE Wavelength

because most of the TV spots were re-cuts of that with a few minor scenes. There would be different ones, like one with more of a love angle in it, that they thought they could put on during daytime TV when women were watching, and some more action-themed ones. I started cutting all the sound effects for all the trailers for New World Pictures. That's where I met (director) Joe Dante, (director) Alan Arkush, and (producer) Jon Davison. Joe and Alan were actually cutting the trailers, and back then, because I didn't have my own place at this point, I would just go to New World at night, and use somebody's cutting room, with permission. But I'd use their movieola and their equipment at night, because I wasn't making hardly any money on these things. I was kind of like the night shift. Gradually, they started asking me to work on the real films. I did several films for New World Pictures, working directly for them. I remember working on Crazy Mama with Cloris Leachman. Ken Sweet supervised that. I only worked on it in support. I worked on a Russ Myer movie called Up—not the one with the grumpy gentleman and the Boy Scout, and the balloons. It was kind of a silly movie. It was a movie that was almost 100 percent looped in Russ's living room! Richard also worked on several trailers for New World, including one for Death Race 2000, which he hired his friend Ben Burtt to help design sound e›ects. RLA: Ben and I designed these kind of future car sounds for the trailer. It was a mixture of some hot racing cars and jet sounds, one of the cars actually had a jet engine on it. But we made them all kind of future jet powered, as opposed to standard cars. We did make a whole complete set of everything, even though we were only doing the trailers. It was mostly just constants and pass bys. Gene Corso did the actual movie— and his version sounded more like Formula 1 race cars. Richard's first o•cial job as a supervising sound editor had a rather auspicious start … the film was green-lit on a bet between several people at New World, and Roger Corman. RLA: Jon Davison, Joe, and Alan convinced Roger that they could make a movie for a certain (VERY CHEAP) amount. So that was the first movie where I was the full supervising sound editor. Hollywood Boulevard was a parody of working for Corman that took place at the fictional Miracle Pictures. "If it's a good picture, it's a miracle!" In one scene, Godzilla, Robby the Robot, and a giant insect man hang out between takes. RLA: In a way, it was like an early version of Roger Rabbit—when they're not filming, they're still those characters. I was overwhelmed. I was working 24 hours a day. I cut everything on that show. I hired Pat Lee to build tracks. But I did everything else. I cut everything. For the few sounds that needed to be created for the film, including the "Flyman" vocal, Richard hired Ben Burtt again—who at that time had begun collecting and designing sounds (not films) for George Lucas on a movie called Star Wars. SL: Wasn't the Flyman voice a processed line of dialogue by (a certain famous Western actor) from another movie...? RLA: Right. The original source of the thing was so heavily processed you'd never know. It could have been Truman declaring war on Korea or something. After I spoke to Richard, I asked Ben Burtt if he remembered making the sound… BEN BURTT: As far as I can tell from my notes, I was playing with a mini-moog in March 1976 and produced several tapes of random electronic noises as I taught myself the device. One of the settings I came up with sounded like the insect buzzing of "The Zanti Misfits," a legendary episode of the Outer Limits. My time on Hollywood Boulevard was overlapping with my early research and collecting for Star Wars. I L to R: Steve Lee and Richard Anderson at the Golden Reel Awards, 1995. Photo courtesy the collection of The Hollywood Sound Museum

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• 10-13 EIPMA-HEALTH