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I usually write about my experiences in TV production here, and I promise I will get to that. But first, a little backstory.
I grew up in Van Nuys, California, spitting distance from all of the major movie and TV studios. When I was a kid, film production crews were a common sight in our neighborhood, and I never paid much attention to them. They were just part of the landscape of the San Fernando Valley. As a teenager, I was a grade A marching band geek. I was a member of the Royal Cavaliers Youth Band, one of many youth bands in Southern California. Now, without blowing my own horn (see what I did there?), we were among the best marching bands in the country (7 time California State Champions, 1975 VFW National Champions). During the summers, we toured the country, competing against some of the top youth marching bands around. This didn’t come cheap. Paying for buses, meals, and accommodations, not to mention uniforms, props, flags and all of the stuff you needed to put on a show, meant that we had to raise money year round. Candy sales, bake sales, raffles... you name it, we did it. You’re probably wondering what any of this has to do with TV production. I’m getting to that. Being within spitting distance of the movie and TV studios, another fund raising activity we did was appearing on TV shows, usually in the background of larger scenes. We were featured on the Premiere episode of The Captain and Tenille Variety Hour. We did some long forgotten game shows (anyone remember The Girl In My Life?). We were featured in, and even front end credited on the Disneyland 25th Anniversary Celebration on ABC. We even appeared (twice!) on stage with Alice Cooper. Of course, they all paid us (and also gave us those all important exposure bucks). By the way, our appearances on the Disneyland anniversary show and The Captain and Tenille show are on YouTube, if you're really bored and want to look them up. Another easy way we made quick cash was to provide audience members for many different game shows. They would either pay us, or donate a large prize (TV, Washer/Dryer, Dishwasher) that we would then raffle off. In fact, what got me thinking about all of this was the recent passing of Peter Marshall, legendary host of The Hollywood Squares. I can’t tell you how many times I attended tapings of that show. Rest in peace, Mr. Marshall. Safe travels. Being around the sets of these productions gave me a chance to watch everything that went on behind the scenes. I was fascinated by the cameras, the sound, the blocking, the lighting. Whenever I could, I would talk to the crew members and ask about their jobs. It all seemed like so much fun. On Hollywood Squares, I especially loved watching the center camera during commercial breaks, when it would zoom in for a closeup of “the secret square”. It made me feel like an insider knowing who it was. Peter Marshall was an absolute pro at keeping that show fun and entertaining. Of course, being a band geek, I entered college as a music major. But within a few semesters, I realized I wasn’t going to be a world famous concert musician. I was squarely on course to wind up a junior high school band teacher. Suddenly, music no longer felt like my life’s calling. But at Cal State Northridge, right next door to the music building sat the Radio/TV/Film building. I took a couple of elective courses, then switched majors and never looked back. It turned out to be a good move. I’ve spent 40 years working in the TV industry. Those early days, waiting around on a set, or sitting in the darkened audience of a taping left a lasting impression on me. And as an editor, I still rely on my musical knowledge and timing in my work. It sure beats listening to the strained tones of a junior high school band.
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SURVIVOR’S GUILT
noun: survivors guilt
I feel like I’m dealing with a version of this right now. If you’re not in TV or Movie production, you may not know this, but there is a severe work shortage going on right now. Between the pandemic, strikes by the Screen Actors Guild and Writers Guild, and a general reluctance of networks and studios to greenlight new productions, work has been extremely scarce for almost 3 years now. The current unemployment rate among all US workers is 4.1 percent. In the Film and Television industry, it’s more than 20 percent. Every week, I hear from at least 3 or more of my friends and colleagues in search of work. People who’ve worked in this field for years are changing careers. Many of my former co-workers are now real estate agents, construction workers, insurance brokers, property managers, teachers, travel agents, and a host of other new fields. Many who have tried to stick it out have been unemployed for months, even years. I have one friend who has worked 2 weeks in the past year. Others survive on very low paying production jobs that they are ridiculously overqualified to do. They drive for Uber Eats and Doordash. They are losing their life savings, losing their cars and their homes. It is a dark, depressing feeling and so many people are losing hope. I just read yesterday of a woman in film production who ended her own life because of it. But my story couldn’t be more different. I have been in this industry for almost 44 years. My longest period of involuntary unemployment came 12 years ago, and it lasted 3 months. (I also took some time off years ago to travel and didn’t work for about 6 months, but that was by choice.) I spent 10 years in network news in LA. Then, for the last 34 years, I’ve been cutting long form documentaries and reality shows. It’s been a good living. When I first started out, editors were in a very exclusive club. Before the days when everyone had digital editing software on their laptops and tablets and phones, editors worked in huge rooms with walls filled with monitors, video switchers, audio mixing boards and giant reel to reel videotape machines. High end edit bays (they called them “the big iron”) cost a million dollars and up to build. So they didn’t let just anyone sit down and play around. You had to learn it from the ground up, and it took a long time. And if you were one of the top guys, you were treated like royalty. Every post house tried to steal you away, because they knew your clients would follow you. But those days are long gone. Every college, and even most high schools now teach video production. This has created a glut of people all competing for the same jobs, and the pay rates keep dropping because the market is oversaturated with people willing to do it for less and less. But, as I said, I have somehow managed to keep working without stop. I was informed in May that my employer was going out of business at the end of July, victim of the work slowdown among the networks. We would finish up the shows that were already in production, but there would be no new orders. You can’t produce shows if no one is paying for them. I was given an “out date” for the 3rd week in July. I immediately started a job search and contacted probably 100 or more companies looking for anything I could find. Out of all that, I got one response from a company that wanted to “pencil me in” for a job in September. As late July approached, I was heading into mild panic mode. I started seriously wondering if I could hack it as a GrubHub driver. Friday, July 18th, was my last day on the job. As of 6 p,m., I was unemployed. And then, after a total of 2 hours being jobless, my phone rang. It was a post-production executive I had worked with over 11 years ago. The last time I’d talked to him was in 2013. He asked if I was booked and I told him I was available. “Can you start on Monday?” HELL YES, I CAN START ON MONDAY! People tell me, “You keep getting hired because you’re good at what you do”. And I won’t argue that. After 44 years, I know I’m good at what I do. But… so are my friends who aren’t working. Some of them are insanely talented, but they can’t even get an interview. People say “You’re good at networking and keeping your name out there”. My friends are good at all of that too. They say “You have so many connections from over the years to call on”. So do they. So why am I working and they’re not? I can’t explain it. There is apparently some great cosmic force in the universe that is watching over me. As the blog title states, I’m feeling a little bit of survivor’s guilt. I wish I could help them. But I’m not the person who pays for the shows, and I’m not the person who does the hiring. If I were, they’d all have jobs. All I can do is offer my support and try to pass along any leads I hear about. I truly hope this slowdown ends soon. I know that eventually it will. I just hope everyone can survive until the day we’re turning down work because we’re just too busy. Hang in there!  I’ve recently seen and contributed to a couple of social media posts about how film and TV editors are well known for their Hawaiian shirts. I don’t know why this is the case, but there’s no denying it. I personally have enough Aloha tops to wear one every day of the month without any repeats. Many of my friends in the editing world have similar collections. This got me thinking about how the whole tradition got started. Beyond the fact that they’re comfortable and colorful, there must be a reason why we were drawn to them. I can’t speak to anyone else’s story, but here is mine. Very early in my career (about a year out of college), I was hired as a News Editor at KNBC-TV in Burbank. Within the first few weeks I was on the job, I started seeing flyers on bulletin boards all over the building advertising “Carl LaFong Day.” They urged people to come to work in Hawaiian shirts on a certain Friday. The flyers featured a cartoon man with a tropical drink in hand and had the slogan “Long Live Carl LaFong!”. At the time, I didn’t own a single Hawaiian shirt, but with Magnum, P.I. being one of the most popular shows on TV back then (albeit on another network), they weren’t hard to find. I bought myself a shirt and joined in. The story I got at the time was that Carl LaFong had been a technician working in the dungeons of NBC Tape Operations. Apparently, one day, he went on a vacation to Hawaii and was never heard from again. No date was attached to this story, but I was under the impression that it happened sometime in the 1960’s or 70’s. Now, the Tape Operations area in Burbank was a dark, depressing place during that time. Located in the basement of the building, it was noisy, crowded, claustrophobic, and reeked of cigarette smoke. It made the story very easy to believe. Anyone who managed to escape, especially to a tropical paradise, deserved to be celebrated. I recently did some research, asking some of the old guard tape people long retired from NBC (thank you Facebook Alumni groups) and learned that the story wasn’t true. The real story isn’t nearly as good, but here it is… Carl LaFong was actually a name from a comedy routine by W.C. Fields (you can find the clip on YouTube). A tape librarian named Michael Hayne was a big movie buff, and was talking about Carl LaFong to some of his buddies in the basement library. They decided to start “Carl LaFong Day” as a joke. I don’t know how or why they chose Hawaiian shirts as the required attire, but they did. It became an annual event among the union editors and tape operators and was eventually updated to “Carl LaFong Hawaiian Friday”. Fast forward several years, and my collection of Hawaiian shirts was beginning to grow. I started my own personal tradition of wearing one on the first Friday of every month. Soon after that, I decided that EVERY Friday should be Hawaiian Friday. I’ve been doing this for years now. In the last few years, as my collection grew ever larger, I stopped limiting myself to Fridays, and now wear them whenever the mood strikes (usually 3 to 4 days a week). Many of my editor friends are also regular wearers of the bright floral garb. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we spend countless hours in small dark rooms, seeing almost no light other than the glow of our flat screen monitors. Anything to brighten up the room is a welcome sight. It’s now a tradition that my wife and children gift me every birthday and Christmas with at least one new Hawaiian shirt. I have Christmas themed shirts, Dodgers themed shirts, cocktail themed shirts, and many animal themed ones. There are parrots, monkeys, dogs, sharks, dolphins, flamingos, fish, mermaids... you name it, I've probably got it. The louder, the better. I imagine that when I die, I’ll be laid to rest in one. What about you, fellow editors? What is your Hawaiian origin story? How many Hawaiian shirts are in your closets? Post pictures of them. Be proud of your Aloha Spirit, and LONG LIVE CARL LaFONG!!  Photo Courtesy of David Crosthwaite
Editing long form documentaries can be a daunting task. Each new project brings it's own challenges. Sometimes it's the script. Sometimes it's the footage and archival material. Sometimes it's the format.
After more than 20 years of cutting docs, my latest project for Jupiter Entertainment is breaking new ground for me. I'm editing one show for two different clients. My new series is a joint production for CNN Headline News in the U.S. and Sky Witness channel in the United Kingdom. It's 40 episodes of a true crime anthology. But it's really 80 episodes. Or maybe 120. Or, depending on your point of view, it might be 160. That's because each episode must be versioned for a U.S. audience, then versioned again for a British audience. Then another version for international sales. The delivery requirements for the U.S. version call for a 6 act show that runs a total of 40 minutes. Each act must be at least 6 minutes long, but no more than 8 minutes. Except the final act, which must be between 5 and 7 minutes. Each act must start with a recap of the previous act and end with a "coming up" tease. Simple enough if you have any kind of documentary TV experience. But then it gets complicated. The British delivery requires telling the same story, except it must be told in 4 acts that total 44 minutes and 24 seconds. Each act must be at least 7 minutes long, but no more than 15 minutes. And then there's the International version, which is a continuous program (no commercial breaks) that must be at least 44 minutes. The workflow we've come up with begins with what we have dubbed the "Super Sequence". It's the entire show with all content for all versions cut in 6 acts, aiming for about 46 minutes. Now that the show timing has been established, I next get to think about content. American audiences want to see fairly graphic depictions of the crimes and their aftermaths. The British are much more reserved. Often, the same scene must be cut differently for each audience. Too much blood in a crime scene photo is sure to get a note from Sky. Too many close ups in the re-enactment scenes will bring notes from CNN. Even the narration has to be tailored for each audience. A crime that happened on "August 25th, 2005" in the U.S. happened on "the Twenty Fifth of August, 2005" in Britain. The "attorney" we just identified in the US isn't an attorney at all the Britain. He's a "solicitor". Teases for CNN all start with the narrator saying "Coming up..." But Sky doesn't like to use those words and wants different narration for each tease. After all that has been considered and the story has been told, we create a CNN rough cut and a Sky rough cut, each to be sent off for network notes. For the CNN cut, we have a script marked with "Snap Outs" (Kind of a reverse of the international "snap ins" common to US programs sold internationally.) The extra content must be removed and the cut smoothed out in terms of the music, timing and transitions. Once we get it down to around 40 minutes, off it goes for network notes. At the same time, we create a Sky cut. This version will have a couple of instances where 2 shorter acts are combined into a single longer act. That gets us from 6 acts to 4. We have to remove the "coming up" teases and the recaps from these combined acts, and make sure they play smoothly without an obvious break. Once that's done, off it goes to London for their notes. Oh, and did I mention that the same show has a different title in each country? That means different graphics packages for titles and bumpers. It's "Vengeance" in the U.S.; "Killer Lovers" in Britain. Whew! Now I get to take a breath while I wait for network notes! (Not really, with 40 episodes to deliver, I'm not getting any breaks any time soon). Once rough cut notes are back from the networks, one of the producers will take the two sets of notes and apply them to the Super Sequence. If there are 25 notes from the CNN execs and 15 notes from the Sky execs, that means I have 40 fixes to do, right? Wrong!! Because we now have 3 separate versions of the show and we want to keep them as similar as possible, I get to address each note 3 times. So that's 120 fixes. Then it's back to the networks for a second round of notes. Another round of fixes and we lock it. We start by adding in the final narration - both British and American. Two narrators read the same script and hopefully match the same pacing. The online edit is also done in stages. First, the Super Sequence is onlined and mixed. Once that's done, I can take the online sequence and the mix stems from ProTools and re-cut them to match the locked offline versions of the CNN and Sky cuts. This saves the ProTools mixer from having to mix the same show 3 times. I give him the cut up stems, and he can just smooth out the cuts and marry it back to the onlined versions. The final step in the process is creating a version for International sales. This is my favorite part. Take the Super Sequence, remove the bumpers and breaks to create a seamless cut and I'm done! As long as it's over 44 minutes, timing doesn't matter. So far, we have completed seven of the forty episodes. The process is becoming more streamlined as we go and we're starting to recognize and anticipate the potential problems that will arise with two separate clients. It has been an interesting learning experience for all of us involved. And I think we have proved that, despite the old addage, you CAN serve two masters. http://www.avidblogs.com/timeline-tuesday-fatal-attraction/
http://www.avidblogs.com/building-community-with-editor-steve-pomerantz-and-avid-link/
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AuthorSteve Pomerantz - It's me. It's what I say, when I feel like saying something. Archives
August 2024
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