MPSE Wavelength

54 I M PS E . O R G aware of. And it shows the power of music to bring all walks of life together. How did the pandemic change the way you and your team worked on this project? PETER: Massively... On March 9, I hopped a plane to Akureyri in Iceland, where we were to record the score. On March 11, while in the recording hall when I got a call from Netfl ix informing me that the "orange with a comb over" had mandated international travel bans and US citizens who wanted to go home needed to do so immediately. I was on the ground in Iceland less than two days... Not having the pleasure to be present for the recording process was disappointing, as we live for that sacred time when music leaves the page and enters the cosmos and our hearts. We ended up running source connect sessions (a technological virtual window into the sessions) from LA, allowing us to monitor the recording sessions. The fi nal dub was also done remotely which offered many new challenges to overcome as well. All in all, I'm very proud of how the fi lm turned out. Was your vision seen through from initial spot to fi nal mix or did any interesting new perspectives arise along the way? PETER: This show was chock full of surprises. Adaptation and thinking on your feet were the norm and as far as I'm concerned, the silver lining which kept it from being just another movie. Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing Feature Dialogue/ADR TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7 Netfl ix Supervising Sound and ADR Editor: RENEE TONDELLI Dialogue Editors: MICHAEL HERTLEIN MPSE JEENA SCHOENKE JON MICHAELS What was the biggest challenge you and your team faced? RENEE TONDELLI, SUPERVISING SOUND EDITOR: COVID. Why are the MPSE Awards important to you? RENEE: To me, it's most important and humbling to be recognized by your peers. Was there anything specifi c within the story that infl uenced your decision to take on this project? RENEE: The subject itself, Aaron Sorkin and the team that was assembled. I'm from Chicago and it is a very dark, painful part of our history. I was very excited to be a part of the telling of this story because the sad fact is not much had changed in 50 years. Then while we were mixing this movie, the BLM protests started which sparked a revolution. And our fi lm became more relevant than we expected. How did the pandemic change the way you and your team worked on this project? RENEE: We were the fi rst fi lm in post and there were no protocols yet. So we ended up improvising and coming up with creative solutions that were out of the box. I think everyone expanded this year in their creativity and found just how resourceful we can be. Was your vision seen through from initial spot to fi nal mix or did any interesting new perspectives arise along the way? RENEE: My point of view of the fi lm was the courtroom represents the controlling, authoritarian hand of the federal government. Through reverbs, EQ's and sound effects, we created the feeling of an environment in which individual voices seem small in a cavernous space, unlike Judge Julius Hoffman's voice and gavel, which is magnifi ed and enhanced. By contrast, everything outside of the courtroom refl ects the point of view of "the people"— we developed the sound design as increasingly unstable chaos— multiple points of view told with layered aural elements, varying the pitch of the existing crowds. The riots were my major focus in the beginning. Most of it was lensed in tight to medium shots which gave us the ability to draw focus on the individuals rather than the whole crowd. It was important to me for it to sound real, not overproduced so the audience could relate to the veracity of the hits and blows. We spent a lot of time getting this just right. It's pretty horrifi c to see someone getting hit in the head with a wooden baton, etc. Next, we tackled the crowd. We had arranged for 200 people to come to the WB lot and record the chants, yells, cheers, etc., but then lockdown happened and everything had to be done with actors in their homes. That created an entirely new challenge. I learned how different and sometimes interesting it can be to layer one voice at a time. It creates a new dynamic.

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