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2016 CAS Awards

The Cinema Audio Society (CAS) held its 52nd annual Awards ceremony in the Crystal Ballroom at the historic Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown L.A. on February 20, 2016.

Jay Roach (center) received the CAS Filmmaker Award from Bryan Cranston (at left) and John Ross, CAS.

Photo: Ana Gibert

The Cinema Audio Society (CAS) held its 52nd annual Awards ceremony in the Crystal Ballroom at the historic Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown L.A. on February 20, 2016. Winners for the night included Inside Out for achievement in sound mixing for animated feature; The Revenant for achievement in sound mixing for film; and Game of Thrones and Modern Family for achievements in television, with Fargo picking up the award for TV movies and mini-series.

Technical achievement awards went to Sound Devices for the company’s SL-6 Powering and Wireless System, which works in tandem with its 688 Field Mixer/Recorder, and to iZotope for its popular RX5 Advanced audio editor, known for its advanced audio restoration abilities.

Guests were also treated to an “Art of Sound” exhibition, featuring operating historic audio devices, including the only surviving Edison Kinetiscope from 1894 and an original Bermann Edison tinfoil phonograph.

Filmmaker Jay Roach was given the organization’s Filmmaker Award, presented to him by re-recording mixer John Ross and actor Bryan Cranston, who collaborated with the director on Trumbo.

“A good movie without great sound can sort of work, but a good movie with great sound can connect people in the deepest levels,” Roach says. “It’s visceral.”

Roach said that his earliest awareness of the importance of sound in movies came by watching David Lynch’s Eraserhead, whose sound design he described as “the most disturbing, dystopian, industrial I’ve ever heard, coming from the character’s brain. Lynch was telling the story from the mind’s ear.”

For his many comedies, Roach said he’s learned to pull a mix down after a great gag, “because I know there’s gonna be a laugh, and I want everyone to hear each other, for the laugh to be contagious. That’s the communal experience of comedy.”

ADR Mixer Doc Kane (center) was presented with the CAS Career Achievement Award by Douglas Fluhr, CAS (at left) and Garry Marshall.

Photo: Ana Gibert

Filmmaker Garry Marshall noted something similar in his introduction for longtime Disney ADR mixer Doc Kane, who was given the CAS’s Career Achievement Award, the first ADR mixer so honored. “When everybody in the room says ‘Let’s make the punch line louder,’ you knew there’s no punch unless you can hear the straight line,” says Marshall, who had worked on 12 projects with Kane.

Veteran Disney re-recording mixer David Fluhr noted that it is Kane’s gentle manner that makes clients feel at home, and lets him achieve the best results in his ADR work: “He has a gentle way of making everyone on the stage forget how hard it really is to do, and he gets amazing performances,” Fluhr stated.

The comfort factor is indeed key for a good ADR mixer, Kane told Mix: “You need to have patience, keep your ear open and have good anticipatory skills. But—really important—is keep your finger off the talkback button. If I want to talk to somebody, I’ll walk out onto the stage to make a suggestion. I don’t do it over the talk-back  You don’t have to yell or scream; just have a nice conversation.”

The winners of the 52nd CAS Awards are as follows:

Outstanding Achievement In Sound Mixing

Motion Picture—Live Action

The Revenant

Production Mixer: Chris Duesterdiek

Re-recording Mixer: Jon Taylor, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Frank Montaño

Re-recording Mixer: Randy Thom, CAS

Scoring Mixer: Conrad Hensel

ADR Mixer: Michael Miller, CAS

Foley Mixer: Geordy Sincavage

Motion Picture—Animated

Inside Out

Original Dialog Mixer: Doc Kane

Re-recording Mixer: Tom Johnson

Re-recording Mixer: Michael Semanick

Scoring Mixer: Joel Iwataki

Foley Mixer: Mary Jo Lang, CAS

Television Movie or Mini-Series 

Fargo: Season 2 Episode 5

Production Mixer: Michael Playfair, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Kirk Lynds

Re-recording Mixer: Martin Lee

TelevisionSeries—1 Hour

Game of Thrones: Hardhome

Production Mixer: Ronan Hill, CAS

Production Mixer: Richard Dyer, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Onnalee Blank, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Mathew Waters, CAS

Foley Mixer: Brett Voss, CAS

TelevisionSeries—Half-Hour

Modern Family: Connection Lost

Production Mixer: Stephen A. Tibbo, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Dean Okrand, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: Brian R. Harman, CAS

Re-recording Mixer: David Michael Torres

Television Non-Fiction, Variety or Music Series or Specials

Live from Lincoln Center: Danny Elfman’s Music from the Films of Tim Burton

Re-Recording Mixer: Ken Hahn, CAS

Production Mixer/House Sound: Paul Bevan

CAS Technical Achievement Award

Production

Sound Devices SL-6 

Post-Production

iZotope RX5-Advanced

CAS Student Recognition Award

Matt Yocum, Savannah College of Art & Design

Visit the Cinema Audio Society at cinemaaudiosociety.org.

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