Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 1987 - 43

Soun~
Theatre Sound Leads Film Sound?
BY CHARLIE RICHMOND

ome time before the term
"sound designer" was used in the
film industry, I designed the
sound for a production of Private
Lives, directed by Francis Ford
Coppola and produced during a brief
break he had juSt before the release of
The Godfather. This was possibly the
first time he had been exposed to the
concept of a "designer" of sound as
practiced in professional theatre.
Certainly, the film industry had always spent lavishly on scores when it
could, and I was a great admirer of the
major effort Coppola produced with
the assistance of his favorite sound
editor Walter Murch in the film
THXl138. It is most telling that,
when George Lucas finally turned
his efforts to creating a high quality,
standardized, and defined sound system for cinema playback, he named
it "THX" after that early project.
Now, I'm not saying that Private
Lives had a spectacular sound - in
fact, it was simply standard professional theatre. We had a live trio led
by Carmine Coppola providing
period preshow, incidental, scene
break, intermission, curtain call, and
audience exit music. Playing quietly
in an acoustically treated orchestra
box, they were almost inaudible
without sound reinforcement, yet
having them in clear view added a
tasteful touch to the production. The
instruments were carefully miked
with cues and levels carefully noted
throughout the regular technical rehearsal process. No live sound operator sat in the house; nothing was left
to chance as levels accurate to IdB
were set by the sound designer for
every sound the trio made. As usual,
levels were increased with the size of
the audience, but the cue sheets remained the operator's master for the
run of the show. The fact that a
"sound designer" was responsible for
the artistic aspects of sound within
the production and that the production benefitted as a result was not

lost on Coppola, since shortly thereafter he directed the first film to my
knowledge crediting the services of a
sound designer, The Conversation.
In most respects, the film sound
designer performs the function of
both sound reinforcement and sound
score design. The USITT Engineering Subcommittee on Audio &
Acoustics opinion consensus report
states that the basic purpose of reinforcement in the theatre " ... is to

... the term "sound designer"
did not come into general use
in reinforcement (stage or
film) until it became a
generally accepted precept
that all sound within a
production is best integrated
by someone with a good
understanding of artistic
intent, physiology of hearing,
venue and systems . ..

insure that speech and music ... is
heard with sufficient loudness, clarity, intelligibility, naturalness, and
with directional realism by the audience."l From the same report: "The
purpose lof sound effects] we are
most familiar with is the heightening of the illusion of realism. A second purpose is to heighten a particular emotion.... A third purpose is
continuity. Finally, sound may actually become a protagonist.... "2
The most difficult parallel to substantiate is the function of reinforcement. Obviously, since the method of
production and presentation of film
sound is exclusively from prerecorded materials, one could hardly
agree that it exemplifies live reinforcement. Indeed, microphone,
mixing, and vocal alteration techniques are substantially different between live voice reinforcement
onstage and production sound or automatic dialog replacement IADRI
for film, but in both cases the specific

goal is expressly as defined in the
USITT report. In other words, if the
purpose of film sound is specifically
to ensure that speech and music (in
this case meaning realistic humangenerated sounds that precisely
coincide with the visual images
presented, not underscoring) is heard
with sufficient loudness, clarity, intelligibility, naturalness, and
with directional realism by the audience, then should it not be labelled
reinforcement?
Another parallel between stage
and film "reinforcement II that goes
beyond the semantic is its relative
importance. In most cases sound
effects and music scores certainly
perform an illusionary, emotional
and/or continuity function, but usually have only a nominal effect on
communication of the show's meaning to its audience. Reinforcement is
essential in both cases: if it disappears during either stage or film presentations, the show simply stops
and the price of admission is refunded. This aspect has not gone unnoticed, of course, since personnel
have long been employed by both
film and stage productions to ensure
the message gets across. What is intriguing is that the term "sound designer" did not come into general use
in reinforcement (stage or film) until
it became a generally accepted precept that all sound within a production is best integrated by someone
with a good understanding of artistic
intent, physiology of hearing, venue
and systems; plus, according to Dr.
John Bracewell, "Motivation, Music,
Acoustical Reinforcement, Vocal Alteration, Vocal Substitution, Mood
and Extension of Dramatic Time/
Space."3
Film production has consistently
employed some of the most brilliant
sound engineers right from the start
of the "talkies, II and no expense has
been spared in many cases to create
continued on p. 49
TD&T· SUMMER 1987

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