Craft leaders: Adam Gough, Editor

IBC

Roma editor Adam Gough on his route into the industry and what it was like working with Alfonso Cuarón on the Oscar-nominated film.

https://www.ibc.org/production/craft-leaders-adam-gough-editor-/3603.article

Fifteen years ago, 22-year old media student Adam Gough landed his first professional work as part of the IBC TV team in Amsterdam. Two years later he was making tea for Alfonso Cuarón. Next week, the film he crafted in the edit room with the director is odds on to win the Best Picture Oscar. He shares his extraordinary story and the making of Roma with IBC365.

“It’s incredibly exciting to experience the reaction to what is a very personal story told in Spanish about an indigenous domestic worker,” Gough says of Cuarón’s acclaimed picture. “When we won [Best Film] at the Bafta’s and before we all went on stage there was a moment when we couldn’t believe it. It’s been a lot of hard work.”

All roads lead to Roma
Like many kids, Gough fell in love with the movies watching Star Wars and Mary Poppins but it wasn’t until he was a teenager in Cornwall where he began making short videos [on tape] that he got the bug.

At Southampton [now Solent] University he studied film and video, a technical degree that gave him a solid grounding in everything from waveform to workflow.

“I could wire a cinema for sound and this technical knowledge was a massive advantage to me as an assistant editor and helped me get my foot in the door.”

Through the University he was one of a handful of students selected to intern with Shooting Partners to produce daily news as part of IBC TV at IBC 2004. Gough was a boom operator.

“I remember going over to the Avid and Final Cut Pro stands and just being in awe o

Long takes
“Alfonso wouldn’t let anyone have the script, either me or the cast or crew,” Gough reveals.

“The actors would get their pages on the day and I didn’t get my hands on it until after the shoot, so I didn’t know what I was going to see in dailies. I’d be in London just watching dailies each day but I could tell what he wanted from watching it.

“He shot incredible long handles on each shot so the camera would start rolling 30 seconds before any action occurred and continue rolling 30 seconds after the scene had notionally finished. The decision of when to enter a scene and when to cut from it was driven by finding the most natural flow for the edit, one which kept alive its emotional intent. We’d normally cut 10 or 12 seconds after the end of the last line of dialogue. It’s not about forcing the audience into the scene but making sure they experience it.

A scene in which Cleo, the maid, tells Sofia, her employer that she is pregnant and it begins to hail outside is three and half minutes long.

“Alfonso shot that 60 times. We put them all on a timeline and watched every single one in order to make the right selection.”

Since almost 90% of each take contains some visual effects - from basic clean-up to sky and entire building replacements – Gough had to be sure.

“When you select a three-minute long take and turn it over to VFX you don’t want to change that down the line because the amount of prep work and design that goes into the making the shot will be wasted.”

Some scenes, such as the opening credits of a floor being mopped and the dramatic seaside rescue sequence, were composite shots carefully masked in the edit to appear as one but Gough has been asked not to comment on this. The mystique needs to be preserved.

“Roma has definitely taken me to a new level in my career,” says Gough, who is heading to Thailand on his next project.

“I want to work with more filmmakers of Alfonso’s calibre. I’ve been incredibly lucky to work with some exceptional artists who make special movies. That’s why I got into the industry - to make films that affect people. Now I am allowed to call myself a professional in this particular field, hopefully I’ll continue working.”