Two members of Game of Thrones’ sound team — the series is Emmy-nominated for both sound editing and mixing — are the guests on a new episode of The Hollywood Reporter’s Behind the Screen podcast.
During the conversation, rerecording mixer Onnalee Blank, who has previously won four Emmys for the series, and sound supervisor Tim Kimmel, who has one prior win, detail their work on the nominated episode “The Long Night” and share stories of working on the hit HBO show.
“The Long Night” features the epic battle at Winterfell, involving the chaos of combat, dragons and giants, which included vocalizations by Kimmel, who demonstrates this sound.
Kimmel and Blank relate that they would sometimes add jokes to play for the producers. D.B. Weiss “is a metalhead like myself. When the bells were ringing in King’s Landing in episode five, we took out the real bells and put in the song “Hell’s Bells” by AC/DC … he enjoyed it,” says Kimmel.
“We only made the mistake once where we actually left a gag in for the HBO playback,” laughs Blank.
Kimmel also recalls the final decision that Weiss and David Benioff made on the series: “You could see they were realizing that 13 years — that chapter was closing.”
Hosted by THR tech editor Carolyn Giardina, Behind the Screen features conversations with the talent behind the making of motion pictures and series, including directors, cinematographers, sound editors and mixers.
Hear it all below on Behind the Screen — and be sure to subscribe to the podcast to never miss an episode.
