Alexandra Amick - Editor
Job title - Editor
Experience - 10+ years
“Editors guide the film and the director through the final rewrite, so to speak. There are deep conversations, varying opinions, problems both anticipated and unforeseen. You manage the footage but also the emotions of the edit room.”
Describe your job role and the kinds of projects/clients you work with.
I’m a feature and TV editor, so I edit feature length or long form scripted projects for clients ranging from major studios to indie productions.
What does an average day look like in your post production working world?
When beginning a feature assembly, I pretty much work by my own schedule. I create a project calendar from my start date to when I need to show the assembly to the director. About a week before that assembly date, I set my own deadline of a full watch down just for me. Then I take the number of scenes in the film, divide that by the number of days until that watch down, and know about how many scenes I need to get through each day to meet that deadline. Now, I do have to give a scene however much time it needs, so some days I’ll have to focus on just one scene. But other days I will blow past my scene quota and even the scene count out. Working this way allows me the freedom to take it easy on myself. “Oh, I hit my scene goal by 3pm, and I’m happy with how they’re looking? Great, then my day ends at 3pm.” There’s no reason to burn out early. Features are marathons not sprints, and pacing yourself physically and creatively helps to prevent decision fatigue and maintain objectivity for longer. So if I’m in this assembly stage, I’m checking out dailies: making sure coverage looks good, performances are where they should be, etc. And then I’m hammering away as quickly as possible so I can get to my first watch down and appreciate the film as a whole. It’s the only real way to know what decisions I’ve made are working and which ones aren’t. Once that phase is over and I’ve shown the film to the director, I work with them every day. We’re combing through performances, rearranging scenes, adjusting tone, reeling in pacing. All the while refining, refining, refining. But again, I try to set very healthy hours and deadlines for us within the bigger post production schedule I receive from producers. When I worked with Teresa Sutherland on Lovely, Dark, & Deep, we worked 9am until 2 or 3pm. It gave us plenty of time together each day and if there was additional work that I needed to do after she left, I had plenty of time to do it and finish the work day at a healthy hour. I worked with Alexis Jacknow on Clock similarly. We hit our deadlines without having to put in ten, twelve, fourteen hour days. As I said, features are marathons; they are grueling creative gauntlets, and following sensible schedules benefits the health of the creatives and of the film itself. Everyone does better work when they aren’t burnt out.
How did your career in post production begin?
After I graduated from the Florida State Film School, I got a few assistant editor jobs at start up companies working on web series. It was a weird transition time in the industry when Google had given select companies grants to explore “what web content could be.” This was obviously pre-streaming-platform-times. Thinking back, we were basically making what would now be considered an over-produced TikTok video. After that I moved to a trailer house as an ingest assistant editor and later worked in the finish/online department. This is where I learned the importance of healthy work hours, because this company had anything but. It was truly a toxic work environment. People would sometimes sleep at the office, we were often yelled at, and at one point people had to ask for permission to use the bathroom. I would cry in my car before and after work, and I know I was not alone. It nearly forced me out of post-production. I thought that every job would be like that, that creativity came at the price of being abused, and I didn’t know what to do with my life. But then I quit. With nothing lined up, I gave my two-weeks, instantly felt better and knew what I would demand out of my next job. I eventually landed at the marketing and production company Soapbox Films and with them I worked my way up to editor and edited my first feature film, The Wind, with Emma Tammi. Before that point I had wondered if long-form and features was where I would like to land, and that confirmed it. I’ve been working in that space ever since.
What has been your career highlight?
When I was working on Muppets Haunted Mansion, I had a very surreal moment that to fully understand you have to really know Muppet Treasure Island. And it would take a lot to fully explain it, so just pretend you know it. In Haunted Mansion there are two puppets- a mummy and a skeleton- that were an absolute blast to edit. I said as much to the director, Kirk Thatcher while we were in the mix. And I added that they reminded me of Real Old Tom and Dead Tom from Treasure Island. He told me that they were the same puppets. I then fan-girled about how much I loved the joke, “But Dead Tom’s always been dead, that’s why he’s called ‘Dead Tom’.” Kirk looked at me and said “I wrote that joke!” It was a real “made it” moment for me, working with the person who wrote my favorite joke in one of my favorite movies as a child. I didn’t tell him that I would make my parents reenact the scene with me as Dead Tom; I had to preserve some semblance of cool.
Who are your role models in post?
Whenever I work on a project I do a lot of research. Even if I’ve done something similar before, there’s always something new to learn. So I end up admiring a wide array of people’s work. I learned from Louise Ford and how she creates tension in dialogue in The Witch. I learned from Tom Cross and how he made the wide frontier so isolating and punishing in Hostiles. Simon Nijoo taught me how to better reveal a monster in The Babadook. Just to name a few. And I’m constantly adding to that roster.
What advice do you have for others wanting to start a career in post?
One thing people don’t think about when they envision a career in post, specifically editing, is how much of a people person you need to be. You often think that editors are pale gremlins of the edit bay cave never talking to anyone and only surfacing to grumble on the way to the coffeemaker. Only partly true; you really don’t get a lot of sun exposure. But in reality, you’ll be constantly communicating with people. You’re a creative department head, so behind the scenes, you’re coordinating with your assistants, supervisors, and other departments to ensure everything runs smoothly. And then, every day, you’re doing intense creative collaboration with the director and/or producer. Editors guide the film and the director through the final rewrite, so to speak. There are deep conversations, varying opinions, problems both anticipated and unforeseen. You manage the footage but also the emotions of the edit room. So if you’re considering offline editing, know that you’ll have to share your edit cave, but also know that the relationships you foster can be extremely rewarding both for you and for the film.