Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/756468
34 CINEMONTAGE / Q4 2016 dynamic. "I learned to appreciate what great talents they were," Schell recalls. "Everything was so perfect. Nothing was left to a mistake." The atmosphere reminded Schell of the magical, slightly mysterious world he encountered on entering the film business in the mid-1960s, when he started out as an apprentice picture editor for documentarians Albert and David Maysles. "I met a whole lot of different people," Schell says. "They were intellectual, very creative and more liberal. It was a broadening experience in that way." Schell was born in Paris to Jewish parents in 1937. In 1940, with the Nazis occupying France, he was taken out of the city and kept in hiding with members of the French resistance on a farm near the village of Chartres. "I was by myself for four years," he remembers. "My father survived; my mother didn't." After the war ended, Schell was reunited with his father, who eventually remarried. The three immigrated to New York in 1948. In 1960, Schell entered the US Army Reserve, and after six months on active duty, he began working in the inventory department of Miles Shoes. On a whim, he quit his workaday job and started seeking a career in film, a medium he had enjoyed since arriving in the US. Initially hired to help the Maysles move their office space from one floor to another, Schell remained in their employ and, within a few months, found himself working on their classic documentary film, Salesman (1968). After breaking into features — moving from apprentice to assistant editor on The French Connection (1971) — Schell shifted from picture to sound editing. In 1978, he was recommended by sound editor Jack Fitzstephens to work on All That Jazz. "[Jack] may have started working on it, but then he had to leave to do another thing," says Schell, who in short order found himself on location in Purchase, New York, where the finale — a musical number called "Bye Bye Life" — was being shot. "Fosse would come to me and say, 'Well, how is it?' Who am I to tell this man? The whole thing is surreal." As supervising sound editor, Schell oversaw a busy department, including sound editors Stan Bochner, Jay Dranch, Bernard Hajdenberg, David Rogow and Paul Trejo. As it turned out, however, Fosse was interested in Schell's opinion — and was, in the sound editor's experience, a far cry from the temperamental, moody characters he frequently wrote or directed. "He was so meticulous about every little thing," Schell says. "There was no compromise, and I loved it because it forced me to be the best that I could be at the time." According to Schell, the sound design of the film was dictated by Fosse and Aurthur's screenplay. "A lot of it was in the script," Schell says. "It was really a question of execution in that particular film." For example, one famous scene features Gideon leading a table read for his Broadway show. The scene starts in straightforward fashion as one of the assembled actors speaks her lines in a flat, disinterested tone: "You see, Sammy, in California everybody needs a car. I got a friend who bought a Mercedes just to get to the bathroom." The corny punchline draws a roaring laugh which overtakes the soundtrack. Soon, however, all sound is dropped from the scene — except, that is, for the noises made by the somewhat disgusted, very distracted Gideon. We hear him tapping his fingers on a table, grabbing a section of scaffolding, extinguishing a cigarette, and (most memorably) splitting a pencil in half — each in isolation, without ambient sound. The scene is an extreme example of the power of sound editing to contribute to the development of a character. The mostly sound-less segment — described by Schell as consisting of "all Foley, actually" — was originally twice as long than its current length of about 90 seconds. Schell thought Fosse was satisfied with the sound editing, but about nine months after work was completed, the director changed his mind. "Suddenly, at the very end, he said, 'You know, those snaps are just not right,'" Schell recalls. "So he went onto the stage and he did those snaps and he felt better about it." More than once, Fosse threw curveballs at Schell. For general background ambience in scenes set in dance studios, the sound editor relied on material recorded by production mixer Christopher Newman. "He recorded a whole lot of stuff for me to use," Schell says. "Then I went out and recorded more myself from the same location from different times, so that we have a background to make it authentic — but not that it would take over, just to MY MOST MEMORABLE FILM Maurice Schell working during the period of All That Jazz. CONTINUED ON PAGE 37