← All Of It with Alison Stewart
All Of It with Alison Stewart
How Jennifer Lame Cut Best Picture Winner 'Oppenheimer'
00:18:38
We revisit our conversation 'Oppenheimer' editor Jennifer Lame.
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McDonald's Employee
I' ma put you on, Nephew. All right, Unc.
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McDonald's Announcer
Welcome to McDonald's.
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McDonald's Employee
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Kusha Navadar
You're listening to all of it on WNYC. I'm Kusha Navadar in for Alison Stewart. And to all of our readers, a reminder that next week is our get lit with all of it book club event with author Xochil Gonzalez. We're spending the month reading her novel Anita Laughs Last. And on Thursday, we'll gather at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library to celebrate Celebration. Xochil will be there along with special guest Caridad de la Luz, spoken word poet, singer and songwriter and executive director of the famed Nuyorican Poets Cafe. Tickets are free, but you have to reserve them in advance, so head to wnyc.org getlit to find out more. Okay, onto today's show. Today we're gonna be presenting a special special producer Picks show. That's when the excellent producers from team all of it come on the show to introduce some of their favorite segments. So today you're going to hear from producers Jordan Loff and Simon Close. And in honor of Women's History Month, they've selected segments that feature female trailblazers, focus on significant women from history, or spotlight the work of female artists and creatives. So let's kick things off with one of those awesome female creatives who is now a newly minted Oscar winner. Here is producer Jordan Loft to tell us more about film editor Jennifer Lame, who just took home the award for best editing for her work on Oppenheimer. Jordan, take it away.
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Jordan Loff
Thanks, Kuja. One of my favorite parts of every year is Oscar season when I help put together our lineup for our annual series, the Big Picture. That's a series of conversations with below the line Oscar nominees, people who worked behind the scenes to create movie magic. We speak with costume designers and cinematographers and production designers. I was so excited to book editor Jennifer Lane for the show and not just because of her work on Oppenheimer for her filmography is kind of crazy and filled with some of my favorite movies. She edited Hereditary, Manchester by the Sea, Tenet and worked for years with director Noah Baumbach on films like Marriage Story and Frances Ha. Jennifer had a really big job for Oppenheimer. She had to cut for film and for imax she had to make a three hour movie move quickly. She had to cover decades of history and and of course edit that mind blowing trinity test sequence. I thought the interview was really great and I was so thrilled to see Jennifer take home the Oscar this year for best editing. Here's Alison's conversation with Jennifer Lame.
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McDonald's Announcer
Before we discuss the details of Oppenheimer. How would you describe the responsibilities of a film editor?
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McDonald's Employee
Ooh, that's a tough question. You'd think I'd gotten better at this point, but yeah, I think my responsibility is just kind of putting the movie together and kind of preserving the initial kind of reaction I get from the script and talking to the director in the beginning. And then obviously, you know, I'm usually there the whole shoot, so I kind of see how things are evolving and, you know, issues that have come up and then, you know, then we have the movie that's shot and you know, we're trying to emulate as best as we can that script. And it's the feeling of the script as opposed to the exact scenes and lines. Because obviously my job is a lot of changing all of that and putting together the best film that's been shot, if that makes sense.
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McDonald's Announcer
Well, what's the first thing you do when you get a script?
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McDonald's Employee
It varies based on director. So you mentioned Noah Baumbach, who I worked with for a very long time, and he's incredible. And you know, I would get a script, really, he would send me a script really early and we would kind of workshop the script and I would almost edit the script with him. With Chris Nolan, I go and read it at his house and it's very close to shooting and it's very kind of locked in. You know, the two times I've read his scripts, I never. There was not much editing to be done and I just was like, shoot the script. He asked me, was there anything to be cut? And in the two times I've read his scripts, there was nothing. So it's always a different process based on what a kind of director needs from you on that level, the script.
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McDonald's Announcer
Level, which is why I thought it was so interesting. I mean, they both make great films, but a Noah Baumbach film is very different from a Christopher Nolan film.
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McDonald's Employee
Yes.
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McDonald's Announcer
So how do you. I mean, that's. That speaks to your talent, your ability to be flexible and go in between and work with different kinds of people. Is that just something that you've. A skill you've acquired over time or is that just who you are?
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McDonald's Employee
I think getting. You know, my first film was Francis Howe with Noah Baumbach, which is an incredible movie. What a great movie, that movie. I love that movie. And I just saw Greta last night and yeah, it's just. There was a. It was a great first film as an editor because Noah's so experimental in the editing room and we got to do so much cool stuff on that film. And I think getting to work with a writer director. I've actually mostly worked with writer directors. And it's kind of a specific. It's a kind of specific thing that I think I've grown quite fond of and quite comfortable doing, working with writer directors. And that's kind of the through line. Even though the films are all quite different, it's kind of a specific personality and type that I really enjoy working with.
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McDonald's Announcer
Once you have made your first rough cut of a film, you have the first rough cut, what are you hoping to accomplish? What are some of the aims for the very first pass through?
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McDonald's Employee
I think for me it's just getting to know the footage and working it and learning all the performances. And in this particular film, there was just an insane amount of amazing performances from all the way from Obviously Robert Downey Jr. Killian, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Matt Damon, and then you have all the scientists and they're all incredible actors. And it was. The ensemble in this cast was incredible. So for me, it's just really getting to know each character and each performer and, and all the takes and the different stuff they've given me and then just structurally starting to put it together. But yeah, it's kind of like baby steps. It's like, you know, you can't. You can't think about the big picture right away. You have to take baby steps and just, you know, get to know each character and slowly start piecing it together and learn all the footage. It's kind of my first step. So the assembly is really just getting to know the movie. I'm not trying to put together a great film. That's impossible. It's just. And Chris is really great with about that. Like when I went to go, whenever I do my assemblies, he's like, you know, just know the footage and work it and experiment but obviously, it's gonna take a while to edit the film.
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McDonald's Announcer
You know, is there a particular scene or a moment in the film that went. That looks very different from how it first was presented, how you first assembled it?
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McDonald's Employee
Mm. That's interesting. Yeah. I mean, there was that. There was a scene when Killian and Emily are kind of having a confrontation after he finds out about Jean's death. And he kind of goes into the woods and she finds him. Really early on in my assembly, I'd put this incredible performance by Killian where he's staring right at her and he's sobbing, and it's this. It's this beautiful performance. But as. As we kept refining the film, we kind of started to realize that it didn't make sense. And we found this another. I mean, Killian gave so many performances where he's kind of looking down and he's not even crying so hard. He's just in shock. And we played more of the scene on Emily, Kitty's character, and it really made their relationship more interesting. And you really felt this kind of care they had for each other. So. And the scene always worked, but it didn't. It didn't. We. It didn't get to the next level till really late when we kind of replaced that take and played more of it on Kitty and messed with the gene cut. So that was a really fun scene to keep kind of tweaking because it's. It's a. It feels like a small scene, but it comes at such a huge turning point. And the two female characters in that scene are just so important to his journey. You know, when you're working on a.
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McDonald's Announcer
Film like this, how many different types of media were you working with?
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McDonald's Employee
I just work on the computer in the Avid. But then I have an amazing team of people, a lot of them New Yorkers, actually transplant New Yorkers that come and they. I have a editorial team that helps me with the. You know, the Avid material not to get too in the weeds. And then there's a whole film department that's cutting film as I'm cutting. So that's some thing I'm very conscious of. You know, every cut I make, there's a person named Tom FNO who's cutting the film. And we show the. The director's cut on film, on film, with pieces of tape. So at any point it could break. And it's terrifying, but it's terrifying in a great way. You know, it's like this adrenaline rush of watching this. Like, you can see your cuts. You can see Your splices. It's very. It's incredible.
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McDonald's Announcer
We actually got someone who sent us a text or a call who is very into the segment right now and said he wanted to ask Jennifer her approach to using the music of Ludwig Goransson, the composer.
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McDonald's Employee
Oh, my God, he's fantastic. I've been lucky enough to work with Ludwig now three times. And, yeah, him and Chris, they start working on the music really early on, like right before the shoot and during the shoot. And Ludwig is constantly doing. So Chris doesn't use temp music. So I cut my assembly with no music. And then pretty early on, as Chris and I start working, he'll start playing me stuff that Ludwig has sent and we lay it in. So the Trinity sequence, we had that piece of music basically when we started cutting it, and it's an incredible piece of music. And, yeah, I feel so lucky to work with Ludwig. And he's constantly experimenting. He's constantly popping over the edit room and watching scenes, and then he'll try something new. It's a really amazing process working with him.
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McDonald's Announcer
Let's talk about the Trinity scene since we're there. The Trinity test, when the team finally tests to see if the bomb works, there are so many different cuts to characters there building tensions. There's shaking hands and buttons. There's sound that goes on for a moment, you know, goes out. It's just quiet. Let's start with all the different perspectives. How does using all the different perspectives build tension?
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McDonald's Employee
Yeah, I think, like I said about the ensemble cast, like, leading up to Trinity, I feel like all the scientists and their faces and kind of their slight, you know, like, they don't get too much screen time, but their personalities really shine. And I feel like when we leave, when we get to the Trinity sequence, their faces become so important and their nervousness and when they're in that room and they're doing the measurements and they kind of make jokes to each other. And I think, for me, what's so amazing about that sequence is how young these guys are and how scared they are, and you kind of feel like you're there. So I really wanted to create that kind of environment, as did Chris, obviously, and. Yeah, just really showing all the little machinations to build to this moment that's terrifying for these guys. And so that was really important, playing it on these faces and showing these guys and. And how hard they worked and how nervous they are and. Yeah. And then obviously, all the amazing stuff that Ruth, the production designer, did with the bomb and the tent and all the little and you know, the mattress rolling under the. Like, crazy that they were just rolling mattresses in case it fell. And just. We wanted to just highlight all these details to really make. Show you how, you know, kind of rough it all was and experimental and. Yeah.
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McDonald's Announcer
What was a tough decision to make in that particular season scene for you.
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McDonald's Employee
In the Trinity sequence?
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McDonald's Announcer
Yeah, because that's the one you got to get right.
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McDonald's Employee
Yeah. It's so funny because that one, to me, was kind of the most fun to cut. Chris and I had that music. I think the hardest scene in that whole section was the part when Kistakowski comes in the tent and he says kind of that thing failed. And there's just a lot going on in that tent and it's raining and the phone rings and the guys are making bets about whether they're gonna ignite the atmosphere. And so that tent sequence, kind of. That sets it all off. Kind of the second half of the Trinity section, like the night half when it starts raining. That sequence, that particular scene we cut many, many different versions of, and there's just a lot going on. But once you. Once we kind of lift off after that tent scene, I feel like the rest. It was kind of just putting in the pieces and tinkering around, and it was more just fun, you know, it was a really. That sequence was really kind of like the machinations of it all and getting all the little pieces right, and we were constantly tweaking it, but it was. It was really just. Yeah. Kind of just putting it together. Whereas other sections of the film I find, like, were more challenging, editorially speaking, than that one. Like. Yeah, I think, like the first 20 minutes of the film and kind of after the bomb goes off. For me, that, especially when I was reading the script, that section of the movie, I find the most interesting, but kind of like as an editor, the most challenging of, like, how do you keep an audience absorbed after the bomb goes off? Right. Because that's what everyone's waiting for and then the bomb goes off. And how do you keep everyone. Keep everyone's attention all the way to the end? Because that's some of my favorite stuff. So I think that was. That was a challenge in a good way, because I loved all this stuff. But, you know, it's a challenge. And the pacing of that last third of the film was con. Was a constant kind of stress and challenge of making sure everybody was locked in because it's a three hour film and, you know, that's. As an editor, you gotta keep people's attention.
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McDonald's Announcer
Yeah. Pacing is so interesting. Because pacing doesn't necessarily mean quick. It's actually almost musical in that way. It's a flow, Right?
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McDonald's Employee
Exactly.
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McDonald's Announcer
When you're thinking about pacing, if you think about the flow of the film, the flow of the story, how can you tell when pacing isn't working? Like, what's your Jennifer test?
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McDonald's Employee
Well, luckily, Chris has this great thing he's always done where every Friday, very early on, we kind of have just what we invite, like, one or two people to the edit room and kind of sit with those people and watch the whole. Whatever kind of stage it's in, even if it's pretty rough. And that's the greatest test, right, Is sitting in a room with another person. You can feel whether they're checked out, whether they're bored, whether something's confusing. And I swear, every time the lights go up, Chris and I both kind of know what the person's gonna say before they even say it. Cause you can kind of feel it. So that's a great test. And I think just my own gut instinct of when I'm watching something, I can tell if I feel things. Something's too rushed or something doesn't feel natural or. And I think, particularly with the pacing of this film, it's kind of baked into it of when things need to be rushed and when you need to kind of feel the anxiety for Oppenheimer of things are out of control, or right after the bomb, when he's waiting for the call and he's wondering what's going on, things kind of slow down. Because things are slowing down for him and no one's giving him information. And I think, yeah, you're right. When you say it's musical. It's kind of this gut instinct, musical kind of ebb and flow, of you have to take the audience on the highs and the lows with the character. So they never get off the train, you know, like, they never get off the ride. So you have to keep the ride kind of having the ups and downs. And it can't be up all the time obvious, because that gets boring. So, yeah, it's incredibly difficult to talk about. But it is this constant calibration and tweaking it all the way till the end on the soundstage. I would notice things sitting on the stage with the mixers. You know, I'm like, oh, this isn't good. I can tell these guys are checked out. So, you know, you're just constantly tweaking and shaping it.
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McDonald's Announcer
You know, what's something that's important for an editor to Keep in mind, when you have a film that has a lot of dialogue, interrogation scenes, there's courtroom drama, there's planning in the labs. What's important to keep in mind when. With dialogue heavy moments in films.
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McDonald's Employee
There's some. They're obviously my favorite stuff I loved, I think, because I came up under the great Noah Baumbach, who's so good at dialogue heavy scenes. And he also shoots a lot of takes, which is great because characters, actors kind of get lost in their characters in these performances. And I think for me, it's all about the footage, right? So if I feel like a scene doesn't isn't popping for me or doesn't have that moment, I just keep watching the dailies. And even if it's like one word or one sentence or one look or someone touching someone, like, it's just. I never give up on making something better. And I always go back to the footage as if it's like. Like I'm an archeologist and I'm excavating, right? And I feel like I find new and interesting things all the way at the end. And I think as an editor, a big thing is to know that you're always going to do so many passes. And again, you have to stay looking at the minutiae of it, not the big picture, because you'll get overwhelmed. Because I know that I can change something all the way till the end. So, you know, we do character passes. So this week we'll do this character and next week we'll do this character. And if you see something bad with, you just have to put it out of mind and you'll get to it, you know, and you just have to kind of compartmentalize that stuff and know that you can always fix something and find something great.
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McDonald's Announcer
Cillian Murphy has a great face. You look at a lot of faces. What is it something that he does as an actor just with his face? I mean, he's born with that face. That's genetics. But actors really use their bodies. What's something that he does that is unique to him? You've looked at him a lot.
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McDonald's Employee
I have looked at him a lot. I mean, I don't know because I don't know what he does because I'm not. I don't know much about acting. I just know what I think is authentic to the characters that I'm creating. But he is brilliant. And the fact that he was able to make. When I was going through the dailies and making my assembly, I couldn't look away from him, and he just brings you in. And even though he's playing this character that no one really knew what they felt or what they thought half the time. I. You just become so locked in and kind of obsessed with who this person is, and you don't want to leave a room with him. And he. He just did. I don't know how he did it, but he had that enigmatic kind of quality that I think Oppenheimer did where people were drawn to him, but you also couldn't totally figure him out, and he just nailed it. And I don't know, maybe that's a little bit part of his personality because he's a little bit like that and. But I think he's just a brilliant actor, and he just. He just nailed that performance. And I was nervous because obviously Oppenheimer, the person, as everyone says, you know, you can't really. No one really kind of knew who he was. So that's a tricky part to play, right? But he really nailed it.
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Kusha Navadar
That was Alison Stewart's conversation with film editor Jennifer Lame, who just took home the award for best editing at the Oscars for her work on Oppenheimer. Up next, another Oscar nominee, documentarian Nisha Pahuja, who was nominated for her film To Kill a Tiger, which focuses on one family's fight for justice in the wake of a brutal sexual assault in rural India. That's after a quick break. Stay with us.
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McDonald's Employee
I'm gonna put you on, nephew. All right.
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McDonald's Announcer
Welcome to McDonald's.
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McDonald's Employee
Can I take your order, miss? I've been hitting up McDonald's for years. Now it's back. We need snack wraps. What's a snack wrap? It's the return of something great. Snack wrap is back. At Capella University, we believe accessible education can make a difference. That's why we offer scholarship opportunities to all eligible students. Un futuro diferente esta mas cerca de lo que cres con Capella University. Learn more at Capella Eduardo.