Amazon’s The Boys is one of the best shows on television and an amazing blend of drama, action, spectacle, and comedy. As we eagerly await Season 3, ComingSoon decided to speak with sound mixer Alexandra Fehrman, who received an Emmy nomination for her work on the show alongside fellow re-recording mixer Rich Weingart and production mixer Thomas Hayek.
Jeff Ames: What drew you to the world of sound mixing?
Alexandra Fehrman: I started as a teenager. I was 16 years old and plateauing in my guitar lessons, which took place at a practice studio. Attached to that practice space was a recording studio and I wandered in there one day and asked the engineer if he needed any help. I think he thought it was funny that I was asking to help him because recording studios are a little daunting, especially when you just wander in from the street. But he put me to work and I fell in love and there wasn’t much I wanted to do other than that as soon as I started working there.
So, then I moved to LA and went to school for recording engineering and then moved back to San Diego and continued working in that studio for a couple of years. After a while, I moved back to LA and started working in bigger recording studios around town, started realizing I had an interest in film and TV as well, so, I found out a way to marry those things. I made my way into postproduction and have been there for over 15 years now.
What would you say is a typical day like for you as a sound mixer?
Well, on a day one, which is our first day of any mix, usually I have already watched the episode so I can pace out our workload; and we’ll start at the beginning of the show and mix scene by scene. Depending on how many days we have for mix, we’ll pace out however many minutes or shows we want to get through, or maybe we need to get through a certain action sequence because we really need to decide where to use our time.
So, in the very beginning of the morning we’ll set up our sessions. We get all of the source material from the editorial team, which, in this case, is headed by Wade Barnett, the supervising sound editor on The Boys; and he hands it over to my partner, Rich Weingart, and I. We have a mix tech who will load our sessions for us, and we will start in the very beginning of the episode, going through — I usually like to put a first pass of music in and then I’ll work on the dialogue, then we’ll work on group and then we’ll start massaging all the sound effects into that and decide where to dip and where to pull when we have everything in a managing space. And we continue doing that throughout the day depending on what our time goal is.
Now, is this your style or is this the preferred style amongst sound mixers in the industry?
That’s a style I adapted. I would say everyone has a different workflow. I know a lot of mixers that will have the sound effects mixer set up the background, so they know what background sounds they have to place the dialogue against. Oftentimes, production dialogue is noisy and we’re trying to match tone to make it sound smooth and make it sound attached to the dialogue in a way that you’re not thinking that it’s production sound. So, a lot of people will have that happen first. Personally, I like to put in the backgrounds after I’ve mixed my dialogue because I’ll try my best to make everything smooth and play without the help of background, so we’ll have more creative license later in how we play the background. But, yeah, everyone has their different methods.
Honestly, I can change my method from scene to scene. If it’s a scene that’s coming up that’s heavily music-driven, I’ll make sure to finesse the music first. Whereas, if it’s not a scene driven by music, I’ll make sure to mix the other elements first and massage the music around it. Really, it just depends on what the sonic star player is in the scene.
So, what was your approach to this TV show?
With The Boys, a lot of the scenes are very complex, which is what makes it such a great show. All of the characters have different objectives and so everyone in the scenes is usually focused on something different. You have to pay attention to the subtlety in the show. Usually, we’ll deconstruct it in a detailed manner. We’ll start making sure the perspectives sound right from cut to cut. With music being such an important player in this show, we want to make sure it’s playing smoothly before I put the music in, because the music has a lot of dynamics, meaning sometimes we mix it low and sometimes we mix it hot and out front. A lot of times we have to guess how that’s going to go until we start working with Eric Kripke because sometimes, he’ll have a suggestion to put it more out front. But everything has to have a home, whether or not the music is or is not out front. Does that make sense?
Right, and I’d imagine what makes this show difficult are the various elements at play – the comedy, the action, the drama all molded into one.
Yes, for sure, the dialogue is really important because it’s really nuanced dialogue; and there’s so many points made. Not just in what the characters are saying, but what the meaning behind the dialogue is. So, we don’t want the audience to miss anything. And meanwhile, there are crazy fights going on and car crashes and whatnot, so it’s important that we get as much clarity out as we can and really massage that and then mix the action around that. Both elements are equally important to have that attitude the show has.
From what I’ve read, Episode 8 in Season 2 was your favorite to work on. Why did that episode stand out to you?
I love that episode because it feels like the culmination of everything, we saw in the season leading up to it — it was exactly what you wanted to see. And also, having the power of all the female lead characters, who really showed their true colors in that moment, was a huge payoff.
What were some of the challenges you faced on this show in relation to other shows you’ve worked on in the past?
I would say the most challenging thing is just how much goes into every scene as far as — almost every scene has everything. It has music, group, sound FX, dialogue … and the challenge is really trading off between the different elements. Also, the perspective, oftentimes there’s someone on a roof and someone down below or vice versa. The challenging part is making all of those moments stand out in a big way.
Am I allowed to ask anything about Season 3?
You’re allowed to ask, but I’m not allowed to answer. It’s going to be really exciting though! [Laughs] It is coming, I can say that!
What was it like to receive an Emmy nomination for your work?
It was very, very exciting, I’m not going to lie. Rich Weingart and I have worked so hard on this show, but we also both genuinely love the show. We were both very excited, and I was surprised — not because I don’t think the show or sound is amazing, but because there’s so much good content. So, it’s great to be nominated alongside so many other shows that sound just as great.
