Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1490686
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S I 27 mixing, we were re-writing lines. Especially with Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man. It's a constant process of looking at emails and asking, "Okay, now what is he going to say?" It's important to have a shorthand with the actors and for them to trust you. I'd just say, "Here's what we're doing today. Robert Downey Jr. actually had hurt his back and had just had a baby. He was out at his house, and we needed to do some last-minute lines. He asked, "Is there any way you can come out here?" So I went to his house in Malibu and we went into his barn, which had an office in it, and recorded many of his lines there. MA: You've worked with Robert Downey Jr. a few times, right? BS: The first show I did with Robert Downey Jr. was Rented Lips, which his father directed. We were at a big ADR stage at Director's Sound in Burbank and Robert Downey Jr. showed up, but there was no director, no producer, no post supervisor, just the mixer and I. He arrived in a limousine, wearing sunglasses, pajamas, and a robe, and was not in any shape to do ADR. He lay down on the couch and I said, "Good to see you. Just so you know, the director is not going to be with us today. It's just going to be you and me. I've got a few things for you to do. Whenever you're ready, I'll show it to you. We'll do the three beeps, you say the line, and we'll get it until you feel it's right and I feel it's right. Then we'll go on to the next line. Okay? Hello? Is that good for you?" "Okay, we're going to start now. Let me show it to you." He's laying on the couch. I show it to him. I don't know if he's paying attention because he's got sunglasses on. "Okay, here we go." Beep, beep, beep… He jumps up and gets in front of the mic and nails it, then goes back and lays down. Cool, awesome. We go to the next one. But he was out of it. Not in good shape to be doing this type of work or to be out of his house. So we finished and we got through it. And off he went. The next time I looped Robert Downey Jr., he was on a film called US Marshals. But he was in jail. MA: How did you make that work? BS: I talked to the producer Peter McGregor Scott who I had done The Fugitive with, so we knew each other very well. I said Peter, there's no way we can save his dialogue in some of the sequences. We have to get him to loop. I don't know how else to fix it. And you've got line changes and different things you need story-wise. Peter was an amazing producer who was able to talk to a judge. On a Saturday with 10 police deputies and an unmarked van in Hollywood, they drove him up in an orange jumpsuit with shackles on his hands and legs. It was only me and Tommy O'Connell, our mixer. No director. Robert Downey Jr. shuffled in and I said, "Here's the things we need to do." There was a deputy in the room with us. There was a deputy in the room with the mixer. There were deputies outside; they were surrounding the building as if he was going to escape. We did his first line. And I looked over at the deputy and said, "He can't work this way. He's shackled. And he's an awesome actor that needs to be free to perform." After a bit of talking on the radio they said, 'Okay,' so they unshackled him and we did the work. At the end, they shackled him back up and off he went back to jail. The next time I worked with him was at his house in Malibu with his wife, his baby, his horses (that he had saved from slaughter), his goats, and his chickens. He had just had a newborn baby and was on top of the world with Iron Man and The Avengers. It was great to see that he had turned it around. MA: In 2014, you joined forces again with Angelina Jolie on her WWII film Unbroken, which you supervised. You picked up an Oscar nomination and a Golden Reel win for Dialogue and ADR Editing. Can you take us through the challenges of this film? BS: Unbroken holds a very special place in my heart, my daughter actually gave me the book to read and I was so moved by Louis Zamperini's story. It's such a story of challenge and war and the horrible torture and all the things that happened to him. And yet, he found redemption and forgiveness for his captors in the end. Angie called me and said, "Have you ever heard of the book Unbroken?" I said, "Yes, I've read it twice." And she goes, "Well, I'm about to sign on for it and I want you with me." I couldn't believe it. It holds such a special place in my heart because my father was in World War II. I just love the people of the greatest generation who went to war. It's an amazing story. So, to get that movie and start working on it was a dream come true for me. I had worked with Andrew DeCristofaro for several years on and off. I said to Andrew, "Come with me on this ride, it's going to be awesome. It's going to be a big one." I started calling around the country for a B-24. I tried to find this because so much of the action in the movie takes place in a B-24. They actually found two, one in Texas and one in Florida. The one in Texas had been modified, but the one in Florida had been restored by the Collings Foundation. I talked to the guys at the Foundation and they, of course, knew of the book. I said, "I need to get a hold of your B-24 and I need to shoot it." So, they crisscrossed the country to come our way. On May 5, it was in Van Nuys Airport, and Andrew and I went out there. We put 30 microphones on that plane in every place you could put a microphone. L-R: Laura Harris Atkinson, Becky Sullivan, Andrew DeCristofaro, 2015 Golden Reel Award winners Best ADR, Dialogue Unbroken. Photo courtesy of MPSE