Skip Lievsay has worked on EVERY single Coen brothers movie. Now, as if that wasn’t impressive enough, he’s also worked with Martin Scorsese, Joe Carnahan, Cameron Crowe, Spike Lee and John Sayles. Much like longtime Coen cinematographer, Roger Deakins, he is very much at the top of his game. Indeed Lievsay received Academy Award nominations for Best Achievement in Sound and Best Achievement in Sound Editing for No Country for Old Men. FilmInFocus, the official Focus Features site, has interviewed him about his work in general and particularly on A Serious Man.

Of working with the Coen brothers he says;

“The Coens are precise — they have very specific ideas and they are very articulate in their scripts about the sound.  And they shoot their films in a way that lends itself to a more abstract sound [design].”

No Country For Old Men has been nominated for 9 BATFAs! And this one being a British award ceremony, will be unaffected by the WGA strike and will actually happen. The film’s nominations were; Best Film, Best Cinematography (Roger Deakins), Editing (amusingly Roderick Jaynes), Best Director (Joel and Ethan Coen), Adapted Screenplay (again Joel and Ethan), two for Supporting Actor (Javier Bardem and Tommy Lee Jones), Supporting Actress (Kelly MacDonald) and Sound (Peter Kurland/Skip Lievsay/Craig Berkey/Greg Orloff). Good luck to all.

The New York Times is carrying an interesting article about the sound design of No Country For Old Men. Sound Editor Skip Lievsay, a Coen stalwart since Blood Simple is quoted along with Composor Carter Burwell and, of course, Joel and Ethan. You can read it by following the link.

Thanks to William for the link.