CAS Screening and Panel – THE ABYSS

Digging into the Depths of THE ABYSS screening and panel!

On Sunday May 26th, CAS offered members and guests an opportunity to gather at the Dolby Vine Screening Room for a screening of
THE ABYSS (2023).

Attendees enjoyed a lively hour of drinks, appetizers and networking followed by a panel discussion featuring many members of the original crew prior to the screening of the 2023 Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos Remastered version.
The Panel Moderated by former president and current CAS board member Karol Urban CAS MPSE, discussed the technical and creative challenges of working underwater with Production Mixers, CAS Treasurer Lee Orloff CAS and CAS President Peter Kurland CAS and Cable Man (now Boom Op) Knox White. Along with the challenges and triumphs of the post production process, and combining the musical elements with the water sounds, with supervising Sound editor Dody Dorn (now Film Editor) and Additional FX Editor Blake Leah (now Composer).

The Panel

Blake Leyh is a composer, music supervisor, music producer, and sound designer who lives in New York City. Born in New York but raised in England until age fifteen, Leyh has worked in film post-production sound and music for forty years. His credits include films by James Cameron, The Coen Brothers, Spike Lee, Ang Lee, John Waters, Jonathan Demme, Julie Taymor, Mira Nair, Kasi Lemmons, and Saul Williams. Leyh was the music supervisor and composer for all five seasons of HBO’s acclaimed series The Wire, for which he also composed the end theme music, and has been the music supervisor for all of David Simon’s subsequent television shows. Leyh has written film scores for over twenty feature films and contributed memorable sound work to over fifty movies.

A native of Santa Monica, California, Dorn graduated from Hollywood High School. At the outset of her career, she worked mainly as a sound editor, before moving into film editing in the 1990s. She has collaborated on projects with James Cameron (THE ABYSS – as Supervising Sound Editor) and as Film Editor for Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia) Ridley Scott (Kingdom of Heaven, Matchstick Men) Baz Luhrmann (Australia) Mike White (Enlightened) and David Ayer (End of Watch, Fury). Since 2019, Dorn has been working with Zack Snyder (Army of the Dead, Zack Snyder’s Justice League) and is currently finishing up on Snyder’s feature project for Netflix, Rebel Moon. Dorn resides with her husband, retired prop master Kevin Hughes and their adorable dog Oscar in Echo Park.

Member: Motion Picture Editors Guild, American Cinema Editors, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

Knox White is a boom operator, grip, electrician, actor, writer, and director. After attending Beloit College, he began working in motion picture production for the past thirty-five plus years. White has contributed to eight projects nominated for the Oscars in Sound Achievement, and won once. He has worked as boom operator on many films directed by Jon Watts (II), Gore Verbinski, M. Night Shyamalan, Al Pacino, and with a wide variety of other creations. White has a deep passion for his work in all capacities, as well as for providing his employers with the highest quality. In other phases of his life, White was working as a Production Manager, in construction, DC lobbying, and creating Award-winning events.

Since 1984, production sound mixer Lee Orloff, CAS has collaborated on over 75 feature films with many of the industry’s most acclaimed filmmakers, with the most enduring of these working relationships spanning decades. He has been a member of sound teams nominated for seven Academy Awards and four BAFTAs, winning each for his work on Terminator 2: Judgment Day. In 2019, Orloff was the recipient of the Cinema Audio Society Career Achievement Award. After serving for a dozen years on the AMPAS Sound Branch Executive Committee, he is currently a member of the Academy Museum Sound Branch Subcommittee. Orloff is the Treasurer of Cinema Audio Society. His recent work includes James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, as well as the upcoming release of Michael Mann’s Ferrari.

Peter Kurland was raised in Nashville and has been in production sound for 36 years including all Coen Brothers films, booming on ‘Blood Simple’ then mixing ‘O Brother’ through “Ballad of Buster Scruggs”. He also mixed “Walk The Line” and many Barry Sonnenfeld films including “Men in Black” I, II. and III. He has won two Grammys, four Oscar nominations, a BAFTA and three CAS Awards. He lives in Nashville where he is Business Agent for IATSE Local 492 when otherwise unemployed.

Karol Urban CAS MPSE is a re-recording mixer serving directors and producers for over 25 years. She is an involved member of her community, having served on the Television Academy’s Governor’s Peer Group for Sound Mixing, been an organizer for The LA Sound Group, and served as a blue-ribbon panel judge for the Motion Picture Sound Editors Golden Reels. Karol acted as content editor of the CAS Quarterly and served as a board member for the Cinema Audio Society and President of the organization from 2019-2023. She enjoys performing educational outreach and advocacy for sound in the entertainment industry as well as moderation, creating podcasts, and writing articles highlighting our members and exploring new technologies. She has appeared on panels for Mix’s Sound for Film Event, EIPMA, MPSE, Soundgirls, and AMPAS.

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