Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1544300
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 37 the track reading department. Then they promoted me to sound editor. SSS: That's amazing! Your musicianship, did you grow up in music? Were you a musician your entire life? MM: When I was 8 years old, I saw the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 and that was a bolt, you know, a lightning bolt. And I thought, then, that's what I wanted to do. I told my mom and she bought me a guitar for my 8th birthday, and I taught myself a lot of Beatles songs. And from 9 years old and up until 19, when I left for LA, I played in bands and I learned to be a good guitarist. Took lessons, wrote songs, blah, blah, blah. Playing in bands was fun and got me out of having to ask girls to dance. SSS: Did you know how to read music? MM: Yes. I took guitar lessons and I learned how to read. I'm not very good, but I can read. SSS: And then, did you go to college? Did you study? MM: Yes. I was still making animated movies in high school and having fun, but I knew I had to go to college because I didn't know what I was doing with my life. It so happens that I was good in languages in high school. I had taken Spanish and Russian and I did well in those classes. So, I thought I'll go to college and study languages because it'll be easy, because I'm good at them. I enrolled in Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts, and enrolled in their foreign-language program with the goal of becoming a translator for the United Nations. Turns out, most of the students in my classes were the sons and daughters of wealthy international families that had grown up speaking three languages … natively. By the end of my freshman year, I realized this life track wasn't going to work. I dropped out and floundered at home for a while. That's when I saw the Oscars Above and below: Mark Mangini recording the Mars rover Opportunity c. 2021