Cinema Editor is a magazine "for film and television editors, assistants, and postproduction professionals."
The 4th Quarter 2007 issue has Johnny and Helena on the cover as Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett in the scene where Sweeney is kneeling down on one knee holding one of his blades up while Mrs. Lovett bends down behind him and is looking over his shoulder.
The article in the magazine is technical, but reveals a lot about an editor who has worked on most of Tim Burton's films, and the process that goes into it.
Sweeney Todd
Cutting for Tim Burton
by Scott Essman
For the last fifteen years, Chris Lebenzon, A.C.E., has served as Tim Burton's editor on all of the director's feature films starting with Batman Returns in 1992.
Since 1986 and Top Gun, Lebenzon has also been the director Tony Scott's key editor, putting him in an elite class in that he works as the exclusive editor for two top-tier directors. He has also worked twice with Michael Bay and with producer Jerry Bruckheimer on many projects. Recently, he has been in England cutting the musical Sweeney Todd, Burton's third outing as a director of a musical film, following The Nightmare Before Christmas and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. However, as Lebenzon explains, Sweeney Todd will surely be as unique a musical as the aforementioned.
Naturally, working with the same director for more than a decade has built-in advantages, even when the director is as idiosyncratic as Tim Burton. "Our relationship is second nature after all these years," Lebenzon said of Burton. "I know him really well and when he starts a sentence I usually know what he's going to say. He's even more intuitive and knows what I'm going to say before I say it. We're both basically non-verbal types so we get along really well."
As Burton and Scott make completely different types of films, Lebenzon noted that editing for each is a wholly separate experience. "Tim's movies have a very controlled designed feel," Lebenzon said, while "Tony primarily makes hard-edged, fast-paced action movies. Tim's movies unfold and Tony's don't draw breath. I'm lucky to be able to jump back and forth between the styles."
As he did on Batman and Sleepy Hollow, Burton decided on England as his production hub for Sweeney Todd. Because of the film's lower budget, Lebenzon atypically has only two assistants and an apprentice to work with in his London location. "Tim calls it 'the Roger Corman' crew. They work very hard and look forward to Thursday - Londoners refer to it as 'Thirsty Thursday.' I try to cut them loose to the pub for the ritual."
Contrasted to working with Scott, who is often too busy shooting coverage to visit the cutting room, Lebenzon revealed that the process of collaborating with Burton is thoroughly interactive. "During shooting, Tim is always in the cutting room looking at what I'm doing and seeing if he needs other coverage," Lebenzon explained. "He basically works around the cut. I work with the video feed so I'm always only two or three steps behind the shooting crew. The video feed or tap looks pretty bad, so when the previous day's dailies are ready in the morning, the cut is conformed. Then I make adjustments based on the new impression I get."
Mornings with Burton involve watching dailies together while the crew sets the first shot of the day, followed by Burton entering the cutting room. "I'll show him what he hasn't seen from the previous day before he goes to the set," said Lebenzon. "Then, I'm left alone in the morning to cut the previous couple of setups that I didn't get the evening before. Around 10:30 a.m., the early morning's new setups are loaded in the Avid and I keep cutting. Tim comes into the cutting room at the lunch break and we discuss the scene and the state of the movie in general. Sometimes he'll call his assistant director from the cutting room and ask to set up a shot that we feel we need in the cut."
Lebenzon detailed that the process continues to evolve as shooting progresses. "As we go further into production we make script changes based on the cut to date. On Charlie and the Chocolate Factory we eliminated a long scene before it was shot. We also eliminated sections on Big Fish. On Sweeney Todd, we cut many songs way down before they were shot.
According to Lebenzon, the process of cutting Sweeney Todd is only different from editing other features in that it is a musical. "A majority of the story is told in the songs," he said. "We took a timecode feed from the sound recordist which matched up to the timecodes of the pre-recorded musical tracks. This then enabled us to sync up the dailies to the pre-recorded music. I would use the Avid time code window to display the music tracks and could cut using time code to ensure we were frame accurate on the musical numbers."
Lebenzon added that the music also influences creative decisions as to which pieces of footage you can use in a particular scene. "Before I dive in to cutting a musical number, I listen to the song over and over to get a feel in my head where to cut even before I've seen anything shot," he explained. "With musical numbers, sync is a factor in choosing takes. If a particular take is better but slightly out of sync, sometimes it can be fixed and sometimes it can't. If I want to cut something out of a song, I have to do it in a musically pleasing way between the verses or bars."
In many instances throughout the production, an actor would stop singing, begin dialogue and then resume a song, necessitating some serious maneuvering on Lebenzon's part. "I had to make the dialogue between the singing fit the score that continued," he said. "On occasion, I needed more time so I would cut extra bars of the underscoring together to accommodate the length that I wanted. If it still didn't fit into the song, I would slow down or speed up the underscoring."
Additionally, there were many instances in Sweeney Todd where an actor would start singing in the middle of a scene. "One of the special challenges of the movie and probably all musicals," Lebenzon reflected, "was to make the transition from dialogue to singing as seamless as possible. Sometimes I would find the most natural angle for the actor to start a song. Then I would work backwards to the beginning of the scene."
As every seasoned editor already knows, on each project, the decision not to cut becomes just as important as when to cut, and for Lebenzon, Sweeney Todd was no exception. "There is a scene where Helena Bonham Carter realizes that she has to lock up a boy in her bake house that she has become fond of," he detailed. "It comes as the end of a song and continues under music. I listened to the music many times trying to get the feel of how best to cut it. There was a lot of coverage for the scene, but I felt like the best way to play it was a slow push in on her face as tears formed in her eyes. It felt more graceful, especially with the moody underscore."
One other such instance involved a scene in which Johnny Depp and Alan Rickman are singing a duet. "Johnny finally has Alan Rickman where he wants him and plans to slash his throat," Lebenzon explained. "I listened to how long the scene played and decided to build to the climax I needed." As such, Lebenzon held on one particular shot in the middle of the song, giving the impression of a relaxed pace. "Then, I accelerated the pace of the cutting to the climactic end."
As Sweeney Todd's music is crucial to the film's overall success, Lebenzon, Burton, and crew have determined to screen the film often during post-production with the best available sound output. "Any screenings we've done have been done from a D5 tape. It's a pretty elaborate system for running cuts every two weeks. That allows us to view in high definition with six-track sound which helps us judge the state of the movie better."
Burton fans, musical fans, and cinema fans alike eagerly wait for Sweeney Todd, due at the 2007 holiday season. As for Lebenzon, this project is sure to be another notch in his creative belt, though the editor does not ascribe his skills on any one project. Regarding cutting a Burton film, he noted that "Working on Tim's films, often I'm working with a very familiar group. The producer Richard Zanuck has been on four consecutive films with us, and we never get tired of his legendary stories. Johnny Depp often returns, as does Helena Bonham Carter. Costume designer Colleen Atwood has only missed two of the last ten films, and Tim always uses the same AD (Assistant Director). It makes the experience of editing feel like I'm working in a small company of super-talented people.
Humbly recounting that "if I do have a personal style I don't know what that style is," Lebenzon feels as though he offers the director a point of view on each new movie, Burton's or otherwise. "I respond to the material whether it's Tim's or anybody else's. I try to get to the core of what a scene is about and work the best moments into a cutting pattern that best tells the story. Tim makes very original films - his unique strength is his ability to surprise the viewer. I always bear that in mind while working on his movies."
***
Deppraved
The 4th Quarter 2007 issue has Johnny and Helena on the cover as Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett in the scene where Sweeney is kneeling down on one knee holding one of his blades up while Mrs. Lovett bends down behind him and is looking over his shoulder.
The article in the magazine is technical, but reveals a lot about an editor who has worked on most of Tim Burton's films, and the process that goes into it.
Sweeney Todd
Cutting for Tim Burton
by Scott Essman
For the last fifteen years, Chris Lebenzon, A.C.E., has served as Tim Burton's editor on all of the director's feature films starting with Batman Returns in 1992.
Since 1986 and Top Gun, Lebenzon has also been the director Tony Scott's key editor, putting him in an elite class in that he works as the exclusive editor for two top-tier directors. He has also worked twice with Michael Bay and with producer Jerry Bruckheimer on many projects. Recently, he has been in England cutting the musical Sweeney Todd, Burton's third outing as a director of a musical film, following The Nightmare Before Christmas and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. However, as Lebenzon explains, Sweeney Todd will surely be as unique a musical as the aforementioned.
Naturally, working with the same director for more than a decade has built-in advantages, even when the director is as idiosyncratic as Tim Burton. "Our relationship is second nature after all these years," Lebenzon said of Burton. "I know him really well and when he starts a sentence I usually know what he's going to say. He's even more intuitive and knows what I'm going to say before I say it. We're both basically non-verbal types so we get along really well."
As Burton and Scott make completely different types of films, Lebenzon noted that editing for each is a wholly separate experience. "Tim's movies have a very controlled designed feel," Lebenzon said, while "Tony primarily makes hard-edged, fast-paced action movies. Tim's movies unfold and Tony's don't draw breath. I'm lucky to be able to jump back and forth between the styles."
As he did on Batman and Sleepy Hollow, Burton decided on England as his production hub for Sweeney Todd. Because of the film's lower budget, Lebenzon atypically has only two assistants and an apprentice to work with in his London location. "Tim calls it 'the Roger Corman' crew. They work very hard and look forward to Thursday - Londoners refer to it as 'Thirsty Thursday.' I try to cut them loose to the pub for the ritual."
Contrasted to working with Scott, who is often too busy shooting coverage to visit the cutting room, Lebenzon revealed that the process of collaborating with Burton is thoroughly interactive. "During shooting, Tim is always in the cutting room looking at what I'm doing and seeing if he needs other coverage," Lebenzon explained. "He basically works around the cut. I work with the video feed so I'm always only two or three steps behind the shooting crew. The video feed or tap looks pretty bad, so when the previous day's dailies are ready in the morning, the cut is conformed. Then I make adjustments based on the new impression I get."
Mornings with Burton involve watching dailies together while the crew sets the first shot of the day, followed by Burton entering the cutting room. "I'll show him what he hasn't seen from the previous day before he goes to the set," said Lebenzon. "Then, I'm left alone in the morning to cut the previous couple of setups that I didn't get the evening before. Around 10:30 a.m., the early morning's new setups are loaded in the Avid and I keep cutting. Tim comes into the cutting room at the lunch break and we discuss the scene and the state of the movie in general. Sometimes he'll call his assistant director from the cutting room and ask to set up a shot that we feel we need in the cut."
Lebenzon detailed that the process continues to evolve as shooting progresses. "As we go further into production we make script changes based on the cut to date. On Charlie and the Chocolate Factory we eliminated a long scene before it was shot. We also eliminated sections on Big Fish. On Sweeney Todd, we cut many songs way down before they were shot.
According to Lebenzon, the process of cutting Sweeney Todd is only different from editing other features in that it is a musical. "A majority of the story is told in the songs," he said. "We took a timecode feed from the sound recordist which matched up to the timecodes of the pre-recorded musical tracks. This then enabled us to sync up the dailies to the pre-recorded music. I would use the Avid time code window to display the music tracks and could cut using time code to ensure we were frame accurate on the musical numbers."
Lebenzon added that the music also influences creative decisions as to which pieces of footage you can use in a particular scene. "Before I dive in to cutting a musical number, I listen to the song over and over to get a feel in my head where to cut even before I've seen anything shot," he explained. "With musical numbers, sync is a factor in choosing takes. If a particular take is better but slightly out of sync, sometimes it can be fixed and sometimes it can't. If I want to cut something out of a song, I have to do it in a musically pleasing way between the verses or bars."
In many instances throughout the production, an actor would stop singing, begin dialogue and then resume a song, necessitating some serious maneuvering on Lebenzon's part. "I had to make the dialogue between the singing fit the score that continued," he said. "On occasion, I needed more time so I would cut extra bars of the underscoring together to accommodate the length that I wanted. If it still didn't fit into the song, I would slow down or speed up the underscoring."
Additionally, there were many instances in Sweeney Todd where an actor would start singing in the middle of a scene. "One of the special challenges of the movie and probably all musicals," Lebenzon reflected, "was to make the transition from dialogue to singing as seamless as possible. Sometimes I would find the most natural angle for the actor to start a song. Then I would work backwards to the beginning of the scene."
As every seasoned editor already knows, on each project, the decision not to cut becomes just as important as when to cut, and for Lebenzon, Sweeney Todd was no exception. "There is a scene where Helena Bonham Carter realizes that she has to lock up a boy in her bake house that she has become fond of," he detailed. "It comes as the end of a song and continues under music. I listened to the music many times trying to get the feel of how best to cut it. There was a lot of coverage for the scene, but I felt like the best way to play it was a slow push in on her face as tears formed in her eyes. It felt more graceful, especially with the moody underscore."
One other such instance involved a scene in which Johnny Depp and Alan Rickman are singing a duet. "Johnny finally has Alan Rickman where he wants him and plans to slash his throat," Lebenzon explained. "I listened to how long the scene played and decided to build to the climax I needed." As such, Lebenzon held on one particular shot in the middle of the song, giving the impression of a relaxed pace. "Then, I accelerated the pace of the cutting to the climactic end."
As Sweeney Todd's music is crucial to the film's overall success, Lebenzon, Burton, and crew have determined to screen the film often during post-production with the best available sound output. "Any screenings we've done have been done from a D5 tape. It's a pretty elaborate system for running cuts every two weeks. That allows us to view in high definition with six-track sound which helps us judge the state of the movie better."
Burton fans, musical fans, and cinema fans alike eagerly wait for Sweeney Todd, due at the 2007 holiday season. As for Lebenzon, this project is sure to be another notch in his creative belt, though the editor does not ascribe his skills on any one project. Regarding cutting a Burton film, he noted that "Working on Tim's films, often I'm working with a very familiar group. The producer Richard Zanuck has been on four consecutive films with us, and we never get tired of his legendary stories. Johnny Depp often returns, as does Helena Bonham Carter. Costume designer Colleen Atwood has only missed two of the last ten films, and Tim always uses the same AD (Assistant Director). It makes the experience of editing feel like I'm working in a small company of super-talented people.
Humbly recounting that "if I do have a personal style I don't know what that style is," Lebenzon feels as though he offers the director a point of view on each new movie, Burton's or otherwise. "I respond to the material whether it's Tim's or anybody else's. I try to get to the core of what a scene is about and work the best moments into a cutting pattern that best tells the story. Tim makes very original films - his unique strength is his ability to surprise the viewer. I always bear that in mind while working on his movies."
***
Deppraved
