‘Twisters,’ ‘Nosferatu’ and ‘Wicked’ Artisans on the Importance of Working With the Right Crew and Finding Your Voice

The artisans behind some of this year's leading award contenders discussed the importance of having the right crew on their projects at the SCAD Savannah Film Festival as part of Variety's 10 Artisans to Watch honors.

Suzanne Stokes Munton, hair department head on Robert Eggers' "Nosferatu," stressed, "It's really important to have an excellent group that works well together and as a team and is willing to work with other departments. You can't have any bad eggs."

She was honored alongside Devendra Cleary, sound mixer on "Twisters," Andrea Datzman, composer on "Inside Out 2," Julie Diaz, supervising dialogue/ADR editor on "Y2K," Jade Healy, production designer on "Wolfs," Danielle Immerman, VFX producer on "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes," Steve Newburn, makeup on "Sasquatch Sunset," Sofia Subercaseaux, editor on "Maria and Paul Tazewell, costume designer on "Wicked."

Asked what was his biggest challenge on "Twisters," Cleary said, "Everything was all about getting the mics in the best position that we could. We had to use a lot of waterproof mic and waterproof materials over the mics. Wind protection was really heavy. The first thing I did was just hire the best crew I could, the best crew that I knew would do a really good job."

Leading from Cleary's remarks about the importance of having the right crew, the panel noted communication and trust was key to functioning as department heads leading a team.

Variety senior artisans editor Jazz Tangcay also discusssed their respective projects.

Pixar's "Inside Out 2" brought joy to the summer box office, and the animated feature is the eighth biggest film in box office history. Datzman was tasked with expanding the music palette of the film, which picks up two years after the original. Teenage Riley heads to hockey camp, along with a new set of emotions, one of which is Anxiety.

In finding Anxiety's motif, Datzman, who contributed to the first film, made the leap and landed her first solo credit, explained how she took cues from the original. "Michael [Giacchino] created this simple reverse piano pluck, and it was perfect, so we repurposed that," Datzman said. "When we first see Anxiety, you'll hear that zing which I layered with a dulcimer [a string instrument]."

Datzman said for later iterations of Anxiety's theme, she enlisted solo violinist Lisa Park so that "it should have this edgy repeated note to it."

Diaz, an alumnus of the university, worked on the forthcoming disaster comedy "Y2K" and shared some insight into the world of post-production sound. Diaz told the audience that director Kyle Mooney wanted to avoid as much ADR as possible outside of creative. "The production sound mixer made our jobs a little easier," Diaz said. "We're a movie that is full of craziness and random things. Some of the creatives include that and getting those reactions. But for ADR, it was fun to bring back the actors, they get to see part of the sound process so they can be like, 'Something I did a year ago has actually come to fruition.'"

Healy discussed working closely with her location manager on "Wolfs" as the duo was tasked with subbing Los Angeles for New York. Her biggest help? "I spent a lot of time on Google Earth." Having lived in New York, Healy said that helped when trying to find those exteriors. "We built. That's the best part of designing. So we built the penthouse, we built a hotel and a lobby."

Immerman oversees visual effects at Weta FX. The 2022 USC Annenberg study showed just 2.9% of all VFX supervisors are women. Immerman said, "I don't look at myself as a female. I look at myself as a VFX producer." She credits her past VFX supervisors who she had worked alongside for believing in her.

The latest "Apes" movie required 1,521 VFX shots and Immerman said the process was a global effort. "We had hundreds of people in New Zealand and around the world working from start to finish."

Newburn joked he didn't have a global team to create the Bigfoot monsters on "Sasquatch Sunset." He collaborated closely with directors Nathan Zellner and David Zellner and said, "It was about bringing the experience to the table, looking at primates and the urban legends, and the truth if you believe it, and picking the best of and from your own experience, and just throwing it all in a mixing pot and just go."

For Subercaseux, editing "Maria's" opening sequence was her most challenging. The film focuses on the last few days of opera superstar Maria Callas' life with Angelina Jolie in the starring role. "We needed to set up the character for whoever didn't know who Maria Callas was," Subercaseux explained. "But we needed to see who she was and the greatness of her career, so you would understand where she was at the end of her life."

The opening is a shot of Jolie's Callas singing straight into the camera. "If that sequence didn't work, then you were starting the movie on the wrong foot, and that was a tragedy. So we just had endless footage, and it was a very hard balance to just capture it." The idea was for the audience to forget they were watching Jolie. Subercaseux said she spent the most time perfecting that sequence and working with director Pablo Larrain to get it right.

Tazewell was asked about navigating honoring the iconic costumes of "Wicked" and the iconic pink dress worn by Glinda. Tazewell admitted despite being friends with Susan Hilferty (costume designer of "Wicked" the musical), he wasn't hugely familiar with all of the costumes — which came as an advantage when approaching his designs. "I tried not to adopt the designs that had already been done," Tazewell said. Although, he still wanted to honor the designs of the 1939 film "The Wizard of Oz. It became my job to capture the spirit of each moment, and develop a look that was somehow original."

Tazewell continued, "I really wanted audiences to embrace Glinda in the same way that Billie Burke in the dress was. The romance and fantasy of that was imbued and comes to life with Ariana Grande as Glinda. That was part of the process for every decision that I was making when I was designing the costumes."

Tangcay then opened the conversation up for discussion to the students where the panel offered advice about what they wish they could have told themselves when starting out. Not being afraid to ask others for help was the most common answer, along with being confident.

Tazewell said, "I spent a good deal the beginning of my career sitting at tables surrounded by people at where I was the only Black person and so I went through a process of making myself smaller and letting my work show for me, speak for me. Once I started to actually vocalize what I needed or what I felt, it was self-empowering. So I was taking more space with that, which put me in positions where I could really soar."

Watch the video above.