Click here to hear the full audio interview with Debbie Berman, ACE.
Matt Feury
Welcome, Debbie. Thank you for joining us today.
Debbie Berman
Happy to be here. Thanks for coming out everyone.
Matt
The movie’s doing quite well.
Debbie
Yeah, it’s amazing.
Matt
So, it’s not your first turn of the crank for a Marvel movie. You’ve actually done these for a little while now. Tell us a little bit about how you joined up with Marvel and the films that you’ve worked on with them.
Debbie
Sure. So the first film I worked on for Marvel was Spider-Man Homecoming. And that was the toughest film to get on because I hadn’t really had any big credits at that stage. It’s really a competitive industry. One of my mentors, Dan Lebental, was working on Spider-Man and he put my name forward. And it was tough. I mean, there were a lot of “no’s”. A LOT of “no’s”. And the way I just sort of had it in my head is, “no”, is just an annoying part of the conversation. And while everyone was saying “no” to me, I was saying, “this is so great! We’re talking about me working on Spider-Man.” And yeah, you’re saying “no”, but that’s just one part of the conversation. The bigger picture here is we’re talking about me working on Spider-Man. So, I Googled everything I could about Spider-Man, and I took that data and turned it into reasons as to why I would be perfect for the job, even if it was the most obscure connection possible. But I think they felt my passion and they decided to give me a break. So that was how I got on Spidey.
Matt
And so meeting Dan Lebental and getting to know him and working with him…I know that you had plenty of confidence, but what do you think Dan saw in you as an editor tat he felt you could do this?
Debbie
You’d probably have to ask him that. But he had been mentoring me for quite a few years, so he knew I was passionate. He knew that my whole life had been dedicated to making movies. I have a rule that I don’t ever ask for jobs. I find, especially when you work with people who are higher up in the industry, that people are constantly asking them for things. And I didn’t want to put myself in that category. So one tool I always use is, I always state what I want and let the people who can help me know what I want. And then it’s their decision if they want to help me. So I let him (Lebental) know that I’d like to work at Marvel one day with him and let him know that was my big dream. We spent many hours discussing story. And when he felt the opportunity was correct, I think he put my name forward. But I also worked on a smaller indie film with him. He’d been working on a film that Paul Schrader wrote and he had to leave it to go help out at Marvel with something. And so he gave me a break. He’s like, “why don’t you take over this indie film, just do the director’s cut while I’m at Marvel”? And when I stepped in I decided to do some, you know, daring things and I just decided to really lean into it. And I was terrified that maybe I’d been too assertive. But he was excited to see that I was trying to tell a story. And I guess he liked my work. And we also get on well, and I think that’s really crucial in the industry. You know, you’re going to be spending like a year of your life with these people. You’re going to be exhausted. You’re going to be stressed. Is this someone who’s going to bring your energy up or is it someone who’s going to bring your energy down? And I think having a friendship and a fun dynamic as a basis was very helpful.
Matt
So, joining Spider-Man, did they have you do specific elements of the story or were there specific things that you said, “I want to work on this part of it”?
Debbie
So what was important for me about Spider-Man is there’s basically a stigma in the industry that women can’t cut big action sequences of big action films. And it really was important to me to try to break that. So, I was pretty much the action editor on Spidey. I did most of the action scenes. And I felt that it was important to try and sort of break that perception as much as I could.
Matt
As we mentioned, the next film you did was Black Panther, with Michael Shawver. That film obviously was directed by Ryan Coogler. Michael and Ryan had a long-standing relationship dating back to film school. They met in film school, worked on Fruitvale Station and worked on Creed. Before coming into Black Panther, they already had a very familiar relationship and had a sort of shorthand that you can only develop when working with a director over many films. How did you approach that? And how did you integrate yourself into their world without going crazy?
Debbie
I was kind of intimidated by that because they went all the way back to film school and had sort of broken through together. Fruitvale was phenomenal. Creed was amazing. I mean, I “ugly” cried through most of Creed. And, you know, I didn’t know what that dynamic would be like and I was concerned I’d feel like an outsider. But Ryan is the greatest human being in the world and Mike was absolutely phenomenal. And we met for lunch, basically, and I felt an instant kinship with them. And we were all from such different places and such different people. But we had a shared love of film and a shared love of that film in particular. I’m from South Africa, so it was really important to me. And that really united us and we all had the same sort of goal. And Michael came to me on day one and he just addressed it directly and said, “Listen, I want you to know you’re an equal collaborator, we want you on the film. We respect your opinion”. And I think it was helpful to them because I wasn’t someone who’d been working on big films for like a decade and was out of touch with where they were in their filmmaking careers. I had just come from sort of the Sundance world. So, I understood what the gaps in their knowledge would be because I had just been through it on Spider-Man and I knew what my own huge learning curves had been doing a $200 million movie. So, I was able to anticipate what data would be helpful to them.
Matt
You mentioned Spide-Man and focusing on action sequences. How about Black Panther? How did you and Mike work together? And were there different elements that you took charge of?
Debbie
For Black Panther I actually joined the film a couple of months into the making of it. And what was phenomenal is that I had fresh perspective. So, everyone else had been living with the script for a few months or years and they’d seen all the footage. They had information from older cuts. I just saw the film as a film with no prior knowledge. So, I could immediately see what was confusing or what felt long or what felt like repeat information. On Black Panther, my main role was sort of “bigger picture streamlining” things. Make things show that there was clarity, making sure that things moved. I mean, there are a lot of characters in that film. So, how do you spend enough time with each of those multitude of characters so that they have depth and you get to know them, but not too much time that you veer off on tangents and you lose the momentum of the entire film. So I did some of the action but I’d say a larger portion of that was in Mike’s court.
Matt
Ryan is still a relatively young director, although accomplishing a great deal already. Were there things that you took away from working with him, lessons you learned from him?
Debbie
He is incredible. Honestly, as amazing as a filmmaker as he is, he’s even a better human being. Just a genuine warm person. And the one thing that Ryan does is, he makes it feel like it’s just you and him making the film and he’s so open to all of your thoughts and all of your input and wants you to have total ownership over every second of every frame. And he does that with like 100 people. I thought it was just me. But, he has this magic skill. And you can see that every department in that film has gone the extra mile because everyone has personally put their whole heart and soul into it because the door was open for brutal honesty. He insists on brutal honesty. He wants to know everything you think, everything you feel and he’s a really intuitive filmmaker, so he’ll listen to everyone and then have a good instinct of like when to lean into things. And the whole crew is welcome to talk, to give input into the film. The production assistants, which are sort of a lower tier in the hierarchy, he wanted to know what they thought because they have a unique perspective on the film. They’re seeing it from a different angle and we have some great ideas in Black Panther that came from the production assistants because the door was open and there was room to contribute.
Matt
Do you think working with Ryan Coogler and that experience you talked about where he made you feel empowered to just tell him what you thought, do you think that paid off here in Captain Marvel? Where you have the confidence to say, “Listen, I know we’re gonna have to put the brakes on this, but it’s going to be a better movie”.
Debbie
Well, Ryan and I were the worst together because we just don’t know when to stop. We’ll be proofing the 2D DCP, which is basically like you’re just proofing the actual file that they’re going to play in theaters, and Ryan and I would have sound notes. And we each had like a page of sound notes and they were like, “Okay, but could we do that for the IMAX version, because you’ve just proved the final film”. We’re like, “Oh”. So there are little things, you know, but you just keep going, just keep trying to make it better until they rip it away from you.
Matt
So, with Spider-Man and Black Panther under your belt was it like, now you’re firmly part of the Marvel family and it was just a natural thing to move on to Captain Marvel or did anything specific happen to get that job?
Debbie
Well it didn’t really happen in that order? So what happened is, I was on Spider-Man and I was living my dream and my dream had come true. It’s amazing to work there. I was having a lot of fun. And I knew that Captain Marvel was happening and, as Marvel’s first female lead film I was very excited by it. And then they announced the directors and I thought, okay, I’ve got to find a way to get on Captain Marvel. But I hadn’t been at Marvel long enough to really have formulated the relationships where I felt comfortable sort of pitching myself for another project. I was still trying to prove myself on Spider-Man. So I bought a Captain Marvel t-shirt. And I wore that t-shirt every time when…you know, you have editorial sessions with executives, with Kevin Feige and the rest of the executives. So every single time I knew Kevin Feige was coming in, I would wear my Captain Marvel t-shirt. To the point where it became like a running joke with the crew. Like, I’d be wearing my Captain Marvel t-shirt, and they’d be like, “Oh, is Kevin Feige coming in today?”. And so in my mind, I’m like, I’m going to create a subliminal association between myself and Captain Marvel. And one day, they’re all going to be sitting in a room together, and they’re going to be like, “Who should we get to edit Captain Marvel” and someone will be like, “I don’t know why, but whenever I think of Captain Marvel, I think of Debbie ” and someone else would be like, “That’s so weird. Me too”. And then they’re like, “Oh, it must be a sign”. So I wore that shirt and the shirt became a little…ratty. So I got into Captain Marvel and I met the directors. And then the first day after they wrapped the shoot, we moved to the Marvel offices, and everyone was there and the directors came in and I’m like, you know what, this is a good day to wear that Captain Marvel shirt, like just sort of a “circle”. So, I was wearing it and one of the directors noticed it and they’re like, “Wow, that shirt looks really old. Is it vintage”? And I was like, “No, no, it’s just really well worn”. And then Kevin Feige was like, “Oh, yeah, she wore that shirt on Spider-Man all the time”. So, I wasn’t as subtle as I thought it was. But it did the trick. It worked. It goes back to what I was saying earlier with Dan, is that I never said to them, “Can I please work on Captain Marvel”? I just completely let them know that this is what I wanted. It was very clear. And then they made the decision that it would be the right thing to do.
Matt
So the film just came out. How long ago did you wrap before the film actually released? Because I know sometimes it goes right up to the wire.
Debbie
Yeah, this one really went right up to the finish line. The very, very last edit on the film was something that I came to as late in the game as you can get. We basically delivered the film, you know there’s a whole complicated distribution, international distribution element that I don’t completely understand, but it was at the point where you cannot change anything. And we’re doing the print master where you’re laying down the final sound to the picture and you’re shipping it off. And while we’re watching it through, I suddenly got an idea for the final tag. And I won’t give any spoilers but I’ll just say, “a cat jumps on a desk”. And as I was watching it, I realized this would be so much funnier if you’re just staring at an empty desk for like six seconds before the cat jumps on it. It’s the tag. Everyone knows Marvel tags. It’s something cool to build anticipation. And when whatever happens happens, it will play a lot funnier…but the movie was finished. So you know, I pitched my idea my, “Can we do this? It’s the last shot in the film. I know. The film’s finished, I know. But we could redo that right? And I don’t know how many departments and how many people had to approve. It took several hours, but I was basically running from the soundstage back to editorial, adding 6 seconds of just staring at a desk. And, you know, for about two hours everyone hated me, because they had to redeliver the film, but then it made the phone better. So it was right up until the finish line. I will always do whatever I can to just like make the movie better. The audience deserves, the film deserves it.
Matt
For Captain Marvel, you also co-edited this film. Again, was there a division of labor in terms of action versus narrative versus whatever?
Unknown Speaker
So for Captain Marvel, I felt that I’ve hopefully proven my my action chops as a female editor. And because this was Marvel’s first female lead film, I actually kind of leaned in the other direction. And I felt it was more important for me to focus on sort of the heart and the humor of the film. So I did almost none of the action scenes in Captain Marvel, I really put my focus elsewhere.
Matt
Well, you did do one of them.
Debbie
I did do one. Carol is trying to escape from the Skrulls.
Matt
And this is towards the beginning of the film. What do you recollect from the time you spent cutting that?
Debbie
I think the main challenge with that scene is it used to be significantly longer. There were a lot more story beats, a lot more action beats. And then when we looked at it in the context of the larger film, this is just before she lands on the Blockbuster going to Earth, we realized the film really sort of finds its groove once we get to Earth. And we wanted to get there as soon as possible and having this big action scene, and there had been action scenes earlier, didn’t really serve the story or the momentum of the film. So a lot of my work was about condensing that section, condensing it but still trying to show that she was cool and she was a kick ass fighter. But not spending too much time there.
Matt
Do you find that those kind of action sequences are more challenging editorially because of the choreographic elements of it or the visual effects or anything?
Debbie
Yeah, they all have different challenges. Like there are a lot of moving parts in the huge action sequences, but sometimes the most challenging thing can be to make someone care or sometimes it’s, you have a humorous moment that isn’t quite, you know, a couple of frames can be the difference between something being hilarious and being a little blah. So they all have different challenges. I mean, with the action scenes, especially in CGI heavy films, there really is a lot of sculpting to do. But you have a lot of options and you know, anything you imagine, l they can make happen. So it’s exciting in that way,
Matt
Thinking about what you said about the pacing of it. And how the film for you, in a lot of ways, starts when she gets to Earth. She starts to really discover who she is. Do you find that it’s difficult to manage these story arcs? In other words, when you’re editing, even the slightest change you make could have a ripple effect on some story element downstream. How do you manage all those things? And are you cognizant of that when you’re cutting?
Debbie
One thing that you generally do is you have what’s called scene cards. So you take a still image from each scene that’s reflective of the scene as an entirety. You have a short description, and it’s basically just a card, and you have sort of your wall filled with all the scenes, so that you can just look at it and sort of instantly have the entire trajectory of the film easily accessible. And then it’s a lot of fun. You’re like, “Wait a minute, if we move that scene there…okay, that’ll be the scene before. That’s what happens there. Okay, that’ll make sense. That’ll be the scene after…no, wait, that doesn’t work. Okay, shift it further”. So it’s a good way to sort of visually see the entire trajectory of the film.
Matt
We’re lucky enough to actually have what’s called a pre-visualization of that “escape” action scene we were talking about earlier, so describe for us what we’re seeing here.
Debbie
Pre-visualization or “pre-viz” is basically like an animated version of bigger action scenes when they’re trying to plot the shoot and see exactly what they need to shoot, because they can be very expensive scenes. And so they’ll do it in this form first. And it’s sort of a roadmap to what they shoot. And then it can be a roadmap editorially. They’ll often have a pre-visualization editor who will work on these sequences. But as we get closer to production, or once you’re in production, the main editor of the film will often take them over or condense them. It’s a collaborative post process. If you think of a beat that will be funny, or something that you think is missing, they’ll (the pre-viz artists) just make those shots. So here you can see kind of what I was talking about where this sequence was initially quite a bit longer. And there are a bunch of extra beats in here that you didn’t see in the final feature. And then there’s some beats that really are the exact same as they planned it here so, some things changed completely and some things just worked as planned. So yeah, I like to use it as a guide, but also at some point, we’ll throw it away. There’s a whole fight that was in the pre-viz that they actually shot, but then realized that it didn’t really add anything. So we painted the Skrulls out and she just went straight out the door. So that’s one of the ways we condensed it.
Matt
So are you often editing on set when you do these movies or are you just back in Hollywood at the studio?
Debbie
During the main shoots you go on location so that you have easy access to the directors. I’ll pop on set, but try not to spend too much time there so I can maintain objectivity, and then what most studios will do is they’ll just shoot the film, and that’s the film. And then if something goes horribly wrong, they’ll schedule additional photography to try to fix those flaws. What Marvel does, which is incredible, is they know that once you’ve done a pass of the film, you’ll understand more about the movie and more about the story and more about the characters. So they schedule additional photography right in the beginning. They know at some point we’re going to pick up a bunch of shots. So when they do the additional photography, and I did this for all three films, I would go on set and I’d have my Avid on a laptop set up, and they would literally shoot a shot…someone would run over, bring it to the table, we’d bring it into the system and I would cut it in and often it was on green screen, but I’d have the background plate to do a quick comp. And by the time the director walked over, I inserted it into the scene. Because often additional photography is just picking up a line for clarity or emotional humor. And so it has to fit really specifically into things that are locked down. So yeah, I have a lot of fun going on set during that stage of the process.
Matt
And do they also trust you or rely upon you to let them know if they got the coverage they needed? Because I know there’s a lot of money that goes into these sets and, almost without your say so they can’t really break camp.
Debbie
Yeah, so when they shoot a big sequence like the one we just watched, at some point, I get a terrifying phone call, “can we wrap the sets?” and they spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for the set, so I’ve got to make sure that we have the footage that we need. So, that’s something that also lands in the editor’s plate. But the pre-viz is helpful. It’s a helpful roadmap to understand the beats that they were looking for. You’re basically the guardian of the film. I mean, everything essentially comes through editorial; while they’re shooting, the sound, the score, the visual effects, so you’re the guardian of all of it and you have to deliver the best film possible…so you’re…dipping your toe…on all the pedals. (Laughs) I’ll have to think of a better metaphor for that later.
Matt
When you were cutting Spider-Man and you wanted to get on Captain Marvel, you were obviously aware ahead of time about Captain Marvel, even before you were doing Black Panther. When you do a Marvel film you know that you’re not just doing that film, you’re part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and a storyline that weaves through all these different films. When you’re cutting Captain Marvel or Black anther are you aware of these other story elements, beyond what’s in the script? Are you thinking, “Okay, well, I have to be careful of this because when we get to Avengers End Game” or because of something that happened in a previous Marvel film?
Debbie
I’m not fully aware of what happens in the other films. So suddenly, they’ll sometimes casually start talking about Avengers in front of me and I would freak out because I’m a fan and I’m like, “this is not how I want to find out what happens, through you half-heartedly talking about major plot points”! And I’ve literally reprimanded Kevin Feige for spoilers, so you don’t really know what’s going to happen. What’s important to me is that if you’ve never seen a Marvel film and you don’t know anything about the character, I think it’s crucial that the films work as a standalone film that services both the story and the character. And once that foundation is working, then yes, it’s amazing to give it texture with the Easter eggs and the references to the other films and I love that stuff as much as everyone else does. But it’s got to add to the film. It can’t subtract from it. If it subtracts from it, then it doesn’t have a place in the movie.
Matt
Throughout our discussion, I think you’ve given a lot of information, some good advice on on how to get into this business. If somebody comes up to you that is looking to break in to the business, just like you were at the time with Dan, what advice would you have for them?
Debbie
(Laughs) You’ve got to buy the t-shirts of the movie you want to work on! Honestly, I think finding people to champion you, that’s what’s been helpful to me. Finding mentors. Not necessarily expecting them to get you a job, but just hearing their words of wisdom and hearing their war stories is helpful. And if you can build a friendship and a mentorship, they can certainly open doors for you. And not taking a “no” personally, if someone says “no” it’s not about you. Just keep fighting through the, “no’s”. If you feel a movie is your movie, fight for it. If you’re passionate about filmmaking and you surround yourself with positive people who are succeeding at the thing you want to do, I think those doors will open eventually.
Matt
That’s great advice and it’s been terrific to watch you evolve from somebody looking for advice to being somebody that now can mentor other people. And I can’t thank you enough for all the time you spent with us for this presentation today.