Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1262492
54 C I N E M O N T A G E F E A T U R E from Mexico ("The Jaguar"). The stories are intimate and strive to bring their audiences into the specifics of the culture and personalities they are exploring, each concluding with a photo- graph and postscript about the real-life character on which they were based. "This was one of the biggest, most democratic, and collaborative produc- ing teams I've worked with in a long time," said Erb, who also cut the episode "The Silence." "It was also important to our show- r u n n e r, L e e E i s e n b e r g , t o h a v e t h e process be similar to that of feature films, where the director is involved until the end. There were many voices involved in the process; however, I felt my opinion was always heard. They assigned produc- ers to oversee each episode while making sure everyone's notes were taken into consideration. We would bounce ideas, discuss concerns, and experiment. For me, the ability to take big swings without fear of failure was liberating." Rasula, who cut episodes "The Cow- boy," "The Rock," and "The Grand Prize Expo Winners," describes a process that saw Eisenberg covering the East Coast locations and showrunner Siân Heder in Los Angeles working in the writers' room and with the editors in post-production. " We re a l l y n e e d e d b o t h o f t h e m in each place just to try to handle the thousands of decisions made each day to get the story to the screen," Rasula said. "There weren't any particular instruc- tions given during production, so much as a lack of instructions. It was really like, 'We're trusting you to know your job because we are slammed, so we need you to take the footage and run with it!'" Rasula described creative debates with producers revolving around trying to be as generous as they could be with characters while trying to be specific and Janet Weinberg. Suraj Sharma in "Little America." P H O T O : U N I V E R S A L T E L E V I S I O N