Sweet Sounds: Charlie And The Chocolate Factory on location

Audio Media September 2005. Reproduced with the kind permission of Audio Media

STROTHER BULLINS talks to leading Production Sound Mixer Tony Dawe about chocolate waterfalls, location technique, and his first outing with the HHB PortaDrive.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Director Tim Burton’s big-screen adaptation of the classic book by Roald Dahl — is not the first film based on the story of poor Charlie Bucket and his adventures at Willy Wonka’s mystical candy manufacturing plant, but it is most like the original story upon which is was modelled. Starring Johnny Depp as the endearingly strange and slightly neurotic Willy Wonka, the film is filled with wonderful, book-accurate castings and offers a literary and simultaneously fun atmosphere. As a result, it is clever, dark, quirky, and completely enjoyable.

Burton’s notable ability to translate stories such as Charlie from text to a compelling audio/visual event is no surprise to collaborators such as Tony Dawe, the film’s production sound mixer. Dawe, who worked with Burton for the fourth time on Charlie, cites Burton as both an affable boss and an amazing talent. “It is exactly as we made it, which is what I like so much
about it,” Dawe explains. “That doesn’t always happen. Sometimes you may shoot a movie, you’ll see it later, and think, ‘That wasn’t how I thought it was going to be.’ But with Tim and Chris Lebenzon editing, it’s fantastic and true to itself.”

Loud Sets And Louder Chocolate

Shot almost entirely on Pinewood Shepperton’s 007 Stage, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory offered plenty of aural challenges to Dawe, who set out to capture as much usable production audio as possible. “All the interiors of the chocolate factory, such as the chocolate waterfall and chocolate river, were at 007, and it was very, very noisy,”

Dawe explains. “As soon as they turned on the waterfall, you couldn’t hear anything.” The waterfall, which Dawe describes as “an enormous undertaking,” circulated approximately a half-ton of chocolate-coloured liquid over its top every second, creating a constant and permeating roar that immediately
ruled out the use of standard set microphone techniques. “There were other things that I wasn’t sure would work. For instance, the factory floor was very noisy, and the ‘Inventing Room’ was incredibly noisy. I decided when reading the script and seeing what the sets entailed that this particular film was going to be a radio mic movie.”

Dawe’s Charlie Rig

For all production dialogue, Dawe utilised eight of his favourite wireless microphones, Audio Developments’ 2020 diversity UHF/VHF systems. “I’ve always used the 2020s,” he says. “They’re quite spectacular. There’s no question that if I used open mics on Charlie, I wouldn’t have half the stuff that I wanted. Isolating everyone on a separate track was why I used the HHB PortaDrive eight-track recorder, too.” Dawe used his new PortaDrive hard-disk recorder for the first time on the set of Charlie and cited nothing

but successful experiences with his newest bit of kit. “Since it’s hard disk, not DVD, it’s very quick, indeed,” he offers. “It’s also completely transparent; I can’t tell any difference between the ins or outs, nor should you ever be able to. It’s also uncompressed audio, which is nice.” It also allowed Dawe to maximise his time. “One day on Charlie, we did 96 minutes of rushes, multitrack throughout,” Dawe recalls. “It wasn’t all eight-track, but certainly a great deal of it was. Afterwards, I took it over to the Avid station and was asked if I wanted to wait for the transfer. I said yes and that it would take about a half-hour. It took five-and-a-half minutes!”

Clearly, the PortaDrive made it easier for Dawe’s deliveries to post, but no less stressful, he insists.“My heart still leaps every time I give away one of my disk drives for transfers, even though it comes back the next morning,” he chuckles. “I have these nice Peli cases to put them in, but it’s just a strange feeling to give away your hard drive — your audio. But it’s the best way.” Also included in Dawe’s lightweight tracker trolley was an HHB PortaDAT, “basically used as a safety,” he explains, which receives timecode from the PortaDrive. Along with a massive battery for system-wide power, Dawe’s rig was effectively rounded out with a Cooper Sound 108 + 1 audio mixer. “I love that machine,” gushes Dawe over his favourite mixer. “It’s easy to use, it sounds great, and it’s totally unbreakable. It’s never gone wrong once. While working on Troy in Mexico, I got sand down in the faders. One night back at the hotel, I took the faders out, washed them with soap and water – the Cooper Sound website instructions were to do that – and when I put them back in, it worked perfectly and has ever since. And I’ve never, ever once got it to distort.”

Striving To Be Noise Free

According to Dawe, the days of bad transmissions, lost signals, and questionable audio quality are over for wireless microphone users capturing production sound. The remaining issue – a regular and continual problem – is recording without rustles of clothing. “You have to put them under actors’ clothes, and that’s the biggest problem for using radio mics in movies, especially when you’re doing a period piece and the costumes are intricate. For Charlie, Johnny’s costume was especially high-necked, and there was only one place to put the radio. He was pretty free of rustle, but it was one hell of a job to get it right.” Working with Depp was a pleasure for Dawe, who found the actor willing to exert the necessary effort to get the best dialogue audio while on set. “I told everyone that they all had radio mics on, and that I would use them all of the time,” Dawe explains. “And Johnny Depp is marvellous because if you say something like that to him once, he knows for the rest of the movie that if he’s on set and in front of the camera, I’m going to use it. Even if he’s behind the camera, I’ll still use it. And particularly with using eight tracks, it’s great. We made up a lot of Johnny’s stuff that we couldn’t get while he’s in front of noisy machinery on set; when he turned around and the machinery wasn’t there, he was still giving his off-lines, which were very usable and worth putting into the picture. Those are what the sound editor said he was going to use, and I guess that he did.”

More Production Audio Than Ever

Thanks to a combination of improved audio recording technology and the rising cost of doing extensive ADR work, more production audio is finding its way into the final mix than ever before. For Dawe, this is a major paradigm shift in filmmaking that he has been an integral part of. “When I was a film mixer on Return of the Jedi, there was a lot of noise on set, but I thought that I did quite well with it,” he reminisces. “I asked the sound editor at the time, ‘How much of this are you going to be able to use?’ He replied, ‘A great deal more than normal. I reckon we’ll use about 12 percent.’ Twelve percent! On Charlie, we set out to use 100 percent. And when I saw the movie recently in my local cinema, I couldn’t spot much post at all.Obviously, the stuff in front of the waterfall was, and whether it was some of my wild tracks or ADR, I couldn’t tell because it was very well done.”

Knowing the editing capabilities of digital audio workstations also helps a tremendous bit, says Dawe. “It’s helped me immensely to learn Pro Tools. People are always surprised when they ask if we can use something that was dodgy and I reply, ‘Oh, yeah.’ It’s great because you can often use the take that the director likes that has something on it that you don’t want.” Dawe has also noticed that the recording of wild tracks is becoming much more acceptable to directors than in the past. “I think that because it costs so much to do ADR, if the soundman wants a wild track these days, then they give him one,” Dawe cheerfully explains. “In previous years, you’d ask for a wild track on a big movie, and they would say, ‘No, sorry.’ You would wait all day for the sun to come out, but they wouldn’t give you 20 seconds for a wild track. It’s got a lot better, and it’s surely because of the cost of things.”

Leaving It To Dawe

In retrospect, Dawe explains that Burton is one of the better examples of directorial inclusiveness and the fair management of the professionals he hires. With four film productions shared by the duo, the feeling is obviously mutual. “Tim is great,” Dawe says. “This is the truth. He says, ‘Yes, I’d like for you to do the sound,’ and that’s it. I then read the script and he leaves it to me. As I said to him halfway through the film, ‘How’s the directing going?’ ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘How’s the sound going?’ he asked. ‘Fine,’ I said. And that’s it. If he trusts you, he will let you get on with your job. It’s really cool. If he’s satisfied when he watches the rushes, then we’re all satisfied.”