A daily chronicle of creativity in film, TV, music, arts, and entertainment, produced by Southern California Public Radio and broadcast from November 2014 – March 2020. Host John Horn leads the conversation, accompanied by the nation's most plugged-in cultural journalists.
As the Academy Awards ceremony nears, we're taking a closer look at one of the categories that often goes under-appreciated: sound editing.
Aaron Glascock was the sound designer and co-supervising sound editor on "Birdman," and he came by The Frame to talk about his work on the movie's infamous Times Square scene.
Glascock reveals he was thinking not only about the sounds themselves, but the spaces in which they'd register.
"When [Michael Keaton's character] goes out into the alleyway and then the door locks, it's a very calm scene, but you're hearing these distant drums. At that point, they're abstract — he's outside his element, he's locked out. But you have other elements in the foreground like the rain gutters, people walking around, and his physical actions that keep you in place so you're not lost, you're not drifting away.
But when he emerges from the blue scaffolds it's like he's coming out of a tunnel, like, boom! And then he falls into this pit of Times Square and the drums are everywhere, bouncing around the buildings. Even though the drums are right there and they're hugely the main sound, the passers-by yelling at him hold up the scene.
As the drums go away and echo out, it actually becomes more frightening as the crowd just chews on him. As the drums get weirder and more abstract, it's like the seams are coming apart.
Aaron Glascock is nominated for an Oscar in the Best Sound Editing category.