Disney’s Cruella, now available for digital download, is a live-action origin story based on Cruella de Vil’s character and her rise to wickedness. Set in 1970s London, Estella Miller (Emma Stone) is an aspiring fashion designer and goth who admires yet seeks to destroy her eventual nemesis, the Baroness von Hellman (Emma Thompson).
Editor Tatiana Riegel
Cutting on the film began in December of 2020, stalling briefly in March due to Covid and forcing the editing team to work remotely. According to editor Tatiana S. Riegel, ACE, while working remotely, they collaborated in real time, with heightened security to protect the studio’s content.
While all of this was happening, Riegel and Cruella director Craig Gillespie needed a certain level of nimbleness in order to keep things moving in the right direction. As a result, Disney provided them with Evercast, which allowed them to work as if they were in the same room, safely in an encrypted environment yet with negligible latency.
We reached out to Riegel to talk about the process and her workflow.
How long was the editing process?
I was on Cruella for approximately 18 to19 months. I went to London at the end of August 2019 and headed home to LA in early December when the shoot ended. We started on the director’s cut at Hula Post’s West LA location and stayed there for about 10 weeks before everyone in Los Angeles was sent home due to COVID-19. Once we began working from home, I think I finished almost to the day a year later.
Can you talk about your editing team?
I was the editor, and I had a first assistant editor, Dan Boccoli, who was with me on the whole show. We had two assistants in London and two in LA. Then, of course, we had the visual effects team, a visual effects editor and a visual effects assistant.
Tatiana Riegel (forefront) with her editing team.
What about the transition from working in an office to a home environment?
Our systems were rented through Hula Post, so they set everyone up at home and had us up and running relatively quickly, with the editors dialing into remote Avid Media Composers. At first, I was also working on those remote systems, but because there was a little bit of a lag in sync — which didn’t work well with the pace that Craig and I work at — Hula brought over a complete Avid system and set it up. From that point, I worked using an independent hard drive and Dan sent me media daily through Aspera, and Craig and I used Evercast.
I would do a little bit of assistant work myself and put it in all the right places with the wonderful handholding of my assistant. I really missed my crew, though. I missed them coming into the room and having them watch scenes and give feedback. Watching scenes with other people in a room, you tend to watch through their eyes, so you end up being wonderfully critical of the work. When you don’t have that or test screenings, you have to rely on your gut.
How did you handle the VFX?
We did a combination of things. We had some previz that went in during the shoot until we began to have elements and themes. We had a visual effects editor (Tom Reagan) who helped me whenever necessary to temp in some stuff, and when we got back to LA, we had in-house compositors doing some of the more elaborate temp shots. Then we began doing some postviz too — anything they could do in-house or that didn’t exist yet until we had all the bits and pieces that we needed. (MPC did the VFX with Max Wood as VFX supervisor and inhouse compositors Matt Mullarky and Suzette Barnett. Check out our interview with Craig Gillespie talking about the VFX here.)
Which scene are you most proud of?
Probably the scene where Estella and the Baroness have lunch, because it is a very delicate one. A lot is happening in that scene, more than just the dialogue. There are a lot of nuances in their performance.
Estella still wants some praise and recognition from the Baroness, who she respects, although she’s trying to destroy her. The Baroness has some of the same issues because she’s finally got competition. She doesn’t want to admit it but has to acknowledge it’s there. So, there’s a lot going on, even in what appears to be minimal sentences.
Which scene was the most challenging?
Wow, that’s tough! I guess the most challenging scene would probably be the black and white ball where Estella shows up in the red dress. It’s a very big scene, a very long one with a lot of moving parts. There’s a lot of parallel action going on. There are people in different places doing different things, and they all have timeouts. There is a lot of performance, and character information is delivered. There are some emotional discoveries during it as well as suspense.
