Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1339678
68 C I N E M O N T A G E W O R K F R O M H O M E our experiences. FULL STOP. Women in all stages: starting out, building skills, becoming mothers, raising children, mentoring newcomers. I have worked w i t h o n l y O N E m o t h e r ; I ' m u s u a l l y the only mother on a very large crew. I look around at my guild and I do not see mothers. DREW FORNI (Picture Editor) Q How has COVID impacted your work/family balance? It has been a massive life change for us. Too much time at home can be stressful, especially when work needs to get done. Not having the commute has been great. I do enjoy the additional family time. Dinners with the family were nonexistent before COVID. Now, I have the flexibility to cook dinner most nights. Q Once COVID is behind us, which part(s) of the pre-COVID work life would you like to see return? What part of working at home should become the new normal? As an extrovert, I miss the social aspect of interacting with co-workers, the water cooler, etc. I like being able to go to an office. Now the hours bleed into the night/morning. I like that, to a point, but I also appreciate the rigidity an office provides. Going forward, I would like to see a day or two in the office and the rest remote. Q What special challenges do you think post-production profession- als face in raising a family? HA! I'm trying to teach the twins AVID! I'm happy they know the space bar plays the timeline. Hopefully, they will be grouping in the next six months. But seriously, the crazy schedules, tight deadlines and constant Zoom meetings are a real challenge. Add kids and you've got steep complications. Having dinner together and being able to tuck the kids in are probably the best parts of the day. Even though to get there, you've cleaned up dirt, sand, rocks, spilled coffee grounds, toys, paint, water, milk, vomit, pee and whatever else they've managed to knock over or excrete throughout the day. Q Are there special tools or gear that have made the job easier? In May, I had a sound booth built for recording that would normally be at an external studio, so that has helped with getting voiceover sessions. Q How can the union help more with this balance? I love what our union does for us. I was a teamster at Local 710 in Chicago 20 years ago, and now I'm proud to be in MPEG Local 700 here in Los Angeles. I think the biggest thing the union can do for us is stay on top of streaming negotiations as more work becomes remote-based. Considering all the over- head we are now paying for at our homes, that should be a major focus. Equipment, electricity, office space, bandwidth/inter- net are all new costs to us, which lowers the cost for studios. MELISSA MCCOY (Picture Editor) Q Describe a typical day balancing work and family life since the pandemic. Nothing has been typical so far with two small children and both parents working in post. When COVID first sent us home to work , I was f inishing up "Ted Lasso." Thankfully, my husband was nearly finished with his job as as- sistant editor on "Single Parents." I was fortunate to be almost locked on all my episodes, so it was a lot of Zooming with producers and reviewing visual effects and sound-mix files. I could schedule those around my daughter's naps. (I'm very lucky that she takes an amazing three-hour nap in the middle of the day!) Q How has COVID impacted your work/family balance? After finishing "Ted Lasso," I went into hiatus and my next projects got pushed till after the holidays. While Bronwyn Shields.