Tales From the WB Lot

Working on the Warner Bros. Lot is fun, for no other reason than it's cool to be around soundstages and sets. My normal WB audio suite is across the Valley in the WB Animation building. About once a week, sometimes more, my duties take me to the Lot, but it's infrequent enough that I still think it's a treat when I drive on.

Every once in a while, you see someone famous walking between stages, etc, but for me it happens so rarely, I'm never able to prepare to be looking as cool as possible.

Today I had a session set up to layback audio for a handful of Looney Tunes shorts to new D5 masters. This is the last step I take in restoring the soundtracks for the DVD volumes. Once they're on the D5, the DVD authors take it from there.

I got a call from scheduling just before the session, asking if it's okay with me that they reschedule because a director had an emergency fix to make to a reel in his movie, and they would need the same room and operator I use. I jokingly said

"yeah, it's okay, but no one below the level of Steven Soderbergh."

The woman in scheduling said she didn't know who it was going to be. (I picked his name out of the air because I had recently seen his name on one of the same parking-place signs they put my name on when I come.)

Later on, Rick, who works on the picture side of the Looney Tunes restorations told me that it was Al Pacino that took my slot.

Pacino?

Okay, he qualifies.

So, does this mean that on Monday when I sit in the same chair I have always sat in, will now have the essence of Mr. Corleone? I'm feeling tougher already.

I wonder if he took my parking space too...