Crystalizing the Intriguing Sound of ‘Sugar’ – with Onnalee Blank

Last week for A Sound Effect, I covered the sound of Netflix’s Ripley – a neo-noir, cat-and-mouse miniseries that follows a con man trying to stay one step ahead of a determined detective. This week, I’m talking about the sound of another detective story – Apple TV+ series Sugar. Though both series are detective stories, the similarities end there. It’s interesting to see (and hear!) how a common story concept can be approached from a wholly different direction.

Sugar tells the tale of a private investigator named John Sugar (played by Colin Farrell) who loves old Hollywood films to the point that they’ve molded his personality and serve as a reference for his experience of reality. Clips from old films play in Sugar’s mind as he goes through his day.

Tying the sound of old films into the sound of modern-day L.A. was one of the big creative challenges that supervising sound editor Onnalee Blank tackled on the show. Blank (working at Warner Bros. Post Production Services in Burbank) tapped sound designer Shaughnessy Hare to help find old sounds that could bridge the two eras without feeling jarring.

The show uses lots of voiceover and music, so the effects are meticulously edited to emphasize emotion or punctuate action scenes. It is a detective show after all, so there are shootouts and fist fights. But with the strong aesthetic of old Hollywood films guiding the choices for sound, Blank had to find a way to make the action moments feel bold yet not cheesy.

Here, Blank talks about finding the sound of Sugar, tying old films into modern-day L.A., designing the sound of Sugar’s mental breakdowns, capturing the sound of Sugar’s convertible in the show, and so much more!

Sugar — Official Trailer | Apple TV+

When did you get started on Sugar, and what were the showrunners’ goals for sound? How did they imagine this series sounding?

Sound supervisor Onnalee Blank

Onnalee Blank (OB): I love to start before they start shooting or right when they start shooting. I was watching dailies as they were shooting, and thinking about a palette for the show – looking at props they’re using and at certain locations. While you can get a lot from the script and can start to develop a sound library based on the script, when you start seeing footage, you realize that it’s going to be more like this. When I started watching the dailies, I knew I wanted to get recordings of Sugar’s car. So I asked the producers if that was possible and they said yes, it was available. So John Fasal and Bryan O. Watkins went out to the airport in California City and did a fantastic job of recording the car. It’s definitely a character in the show and it has such a beautiful purr. They recorded the car with different mics from different angles, and it sounds wonderful.

So, I tried to gather a bunch of material, and I talked to sound designers Shaughnessy Hare and Ben Cook (who helped me cut the show) about our game plan and who was going to cut what. Ben focused on Sugar’s car; he loved doing that. That was his baby and he did a great job.

Shaughnessy cut a lot of the ambiences and effects. I did a lot of insert shots and then did a pre-mix pass to make sure the show was going to work overall. Katie Halliday came on board a bit after we had started to also help with sound effects, foley, and staying on top of all the picture changes.

It’s nice when you have producers that fight for sound. We appreciate that.

We tried to have four or five episodes complete before we started mixing. This way we define the palette for the show. It does evolve and change once you start mixing and picture editorial conforms come in, but at least we were on it for months before we started finaling, which is great. That was a very nice luxury – not every show is like that, especially in the TV world. It’s nice when you have producers that fight for sound. We appreciate that.

The show is mostly set in modern-day L.A., but there are numerous references to old Hollywood films. Those references pop up more as the season goes on, intruding more into Sugar’s reality. How did you bridge his reality of modern-day L.A. with the old films he’s remembering so that the two didn’t feel disjointed?

OB: I really loved how they tied all those old references together. He’s this detective, but his passion is film. We tried to find some good audio that was a little bit lo-fi but not too different from the other sounds you hear. It took a lot of weeding through different libraries to find sounds that were lo-fi, but not bad-sounding recordings.

It took a lot of weeding through different libraries to find sounds that were lo-fi, but not bad-sounding recordings.

Shaughnessy Hare did a great job of that. He found some pretty great material that worked and we tried to sparse some in. We even tried to do it in the present day moments, and not just in these flashbacks or film references. We tried to add in a little nugget here and there of this lo-fi sound.

And at first you’re like, “What is this?” Typically you don’t want to put that stuff in a show these days, those bad sound library recordings, but I think it’s great.

The show was a lot of fun in that regard, blending different genres that we had to establish and carry through the show. I think it works.

The sound of the show is meticulously edited, and the effects work so well with the music – did you have the music to work against during editorial?

OB: No, actually the music came a bit later than everyone was expecting. So we just cut it as if no music is there, and then on the mix stage, re-recording mixers Brian Tarlecki and Richard Kitting decided what was working and what wasn’t working. The scenes always change a bit once music comes in. They did a good job of choosing what to hear moment by moment, whether it’s music or effects. It was a dance. The first time we heard the music was day one of the mix – except for the songs, of course.

Based on your conversations with the showrunners, and discerning their tastes for how the show should sound, did you know the effects would be in a more supportive role with music taking the lead?

OB: Once the picture edit started to become final, it became clear what they wanted. It was fun just having very percussive moments, with the effects (like the guns) dotting the tracks.

It was fun just having very percussive moments, with the effects (like the guns) dotting the tracks.

The challenge was how to be big and bold and not cheesy. We had a lot of material, a lot of Foley, a lot of design, and we tried to do some cool stuff with the typewriter – just making certain moments a little different without it being over the top or giving any bit of the story away.

Can you tell me more about your foley team on Sugar?

OB: They are amazing. It was foley artist Gadou Naudin, foley mixer Louis Naudin, foley supervisor Srdjan Kurpjel, and foley mixer Laurent Chassaigne. They are in France – a company called Cercle Rouge Productions. They have two rooms: a big room just for interiors, and another room just for exteriors, with grass and a car, etc.

They record everything through an analog console, then do a pre-mix editing pass, which they call their Pro Tools pass…

They record everything through an analog console, then do a pre-mix editing pass, which they call their Pro Tools pass, before delivering the show. They are very thorough with all their props and their feet. They really care. It was a lot of material to go through, but they did a fantastic job.

Sugar seemed like a pretty buttoned-up character at first but as the story is unfolding, we’re learning much more about his dark side. Ep. 5 is the most unhinged episode so far. Melanie gets a visit from Stalling’s goon, who tries to cut through the door with a cordless drill and Sugar shows up and kicks his butt. Can you talk about the sound for this episode?

OB: That scene of him drilling through the door was scary. The show started taking a turn and it’s evolved a lot as we started working on it. It became less linear and more noir, with a lot of cuts. And so it changed the dynamic of how we had to approach cutting the material.

It became less linear and more noir, with a lot of cuts. And so it changed the dynamic of how we had to approach cutting the material.

It had to be so precise and there’s so much dialogue and voiceover on top of all these shots, too. So the challenge was how can we solidify the moment yet hear the clarity of what Colin Farrell was trying to say. It was a dance, especially with the music which is pretty big.

What’s been the biggest creative challenge on this show so far?

OB: The biggest creative challenge was the through line with all the old-timey footage – trying to hit all these shots of him and the drink and also selling that he has these episodes where his body starts breaking down and what that sounds like.

There are certain sound elements in those mental breakdowns that we wanted to build through the series and have them pay off at the end.

There are certain sound elements in those mental breakdowns that we wanted to build through the series and have them pay off at the end. So you hear some weird, otherworldly sound design we made from processing particular sounds (I don’t want to give it away), but at the end it’ll all make sense.

What has been unique about your experience of working on the sound of Sugar?

OB: We often had to work alone; we weren’t all in a room together. Getting the material in front of the client and getting feedback was a bit challenging. They’re hearing it over their Zoom laptop or on headphones or whatever they were using because of the situation that was going on in our industry at that moment.

…the show is a little different; it’s not a straightforward-sounding show. There’s a lot of interpretation.

Hitting our deadlines and having everybody happy with the show’s outcome was a little different and challenging because there was less overall communication, I think. Also, the show is a little different; it’s not a straightforward-sounding show. There’s a lot of interpretation. There are a lot of ideas that my team and I presented that the showrunners could have not loved. Fortunately, they really were accepting and appreciated all of the creative ideas we had, which was great. It created some good back-and-forth.

A big thanks to Onnalee Blank for giving us a behind-the-scenes look at the sound of Sugar and to Jennifer Walden for the interview!

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