Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1383665
28 I M PS E . O R G OB: Yeah, this is not glamorous, guys. [laughs] It's really hard, painful work. Like Todd said, sometimes you don't get appreciated for what you do, or you may have even come up with the perfect sound, but at this point, all they want is music. There was this great ADR thing that Christian Bale did in The Fighter at the very end when Mark Wahlberg wins the fight and Christian Bale enters the ring— it's off-screen, so you can't see it. He says, "You did it! You fucking did it!" And he said it in this way that just melted everybody. Everybody on the stage was like, "This is incredible! This makes the movie even better." And David Russell said, "No, lose that." It killed everybody on the stage. They kept coming back to me—"Odin, go back, ask David. Reinstate that ADR line." I went back three times to David, and the last time David finally said, "Odin, look, the reason why that line isn't in the movie is because this moment is bigger than just the two of them." And so, I was like, "Okay, that's his idea." He had a valid reason for rejecting it—it wasn't because of temp love or whatever. I mean, it was the perfect ADR line at the perfect moment, but David had a different vision. You could make the best sound effect, and if it doesn't get used, you gotta say, "Look. I did it. I did that job. I did the work, it's there. They chose not to use it. And I'm going to use it on another movie." You know? [laughs] That's the one thing that I'll always do, "All right, it didn't get used on this one, but I'm going to keep this in my back pocket and find another place for it to be used." Usually, it ends up somewhere. Nowadays, recorders are so cheap. If I was a sound person just starting out right now, I would get myself a Zoom for $300 or less and start recording sounds. Build a library. One of the ways you can make a movie sound unique is to have all new sounds in it. I'll be watching going to end up in the movie, and you have to be satisfied knowing that. This is a creative job, but it can't be your only source of creativity. I think everybody should have something outside of work to explore personal creativity, on weekends or at night or when they're in-between shows. I think that if you do that, it will somehow find its way into your work in sound as well. OB: I mean, it's really, really hard. I remember once years ago we had an intern helping us when we were on film, and we had a temp dub the next day, and the intern was helping us out. I think Chris Welch and I had run over to Taco Bell, and we were sitting on the floor of the sound library room, eating Taco Bell off the floor as we were planning the next temp dub. The next day, the intern did not come back for work. [laughs] TT: [laughs] You can tell the ones who want to do it are going to find a way to do it. Togo communicates with Constance Seppala (Julianne Nicholson). Photo courtesy of Walt Disney Studios