Rudy Mancuso: Música, Creativity & Synesthesia
The multi-talented Rudy Mancuso visits the Filmmakers Academy studio to discuss his directorial debut, Música. Premiering at the esteemed South by Southwest Film Festival and now available for audiences to experience on Amazon Prime Video, Música marks a significant landmark in Rudy’s creative journey.
This episode is co-chaired by Lydia Hurlbut, Brendan Sweeney, and, of course, Director of Photography Shane Hurlbut, ASC, who created the visual language of Rudy’s musically driven film, guided by his unique condition of ‘synesthesia.’
The conversation navigates through the rich tapestry of themes woven into Música, including self-expression and authenticity. Rudy and Shane explore the fascinating intersection of filmmaking, music, and synesthesia, offering listeners a unique insight into the creative process behind a musical film.
Rudy and Shane share candid insights into the development and execution of Musica, shedding light on the collaborative effort that brought Rudy’s vision to life. From discussing the creative decisions involved in filmmaking to highlighting specific techniques employed during production, they provide valuable ‘nuggets of wisdom’ for aspiring filmmakers.
Gear choices and technical aspects of the filmmaking process are also on the agenda, as Rudy and Shane offer glimpses into their respective approaches to crafting a cinematic experience. Moreover, Rudy opens up about his personal journey as a creative navigating the unique landscape of synesthesia, offering a peek into how this condition influences his creative process.
MÚSICA ON THE TODAY SHOW
Rudy Mancuso sits down with NBC’s Joe Fryer to talk about Música on the Today Show.
Watch the interview below!
ADAPTING DIY TO CINEMATIC FILMMAKING
Música began as a short film that was to be adapted into a feature-length film. Rudy’s directorial vision was clear throughout.
“What Shane helped me do is just elevate everything and reimagine a lot of pieces to fit in a more cinematic world,” explains Mancuso. “All of my material beforehand was very DIY and very makeshift. And it’s part of I think the charm of a lot of content on the internet, from a lot of creators, is the fact that they are so limited in their resources. And that’s something I’m so glad I had the experience of doing.”
Música Storyboard | Amazon Prime Video
The low-budget, DIY world is what Mancuso first mastered, making a name on the social media app, Vine.
“There was a time when I was making videos that were six seconds long and had to be shot on a phone,” recalls Mancuso. “You couldn’t edit them, you couldn’t add music, you couldn’t do anything. It was all done in real-time in this six-second looping video app. If the tape wasn’t good, you’d have to start again from scratch. It was a great education. So, imagine I come up with this one sequence in my head and then I meet with somebody who’s used to doing it in a much grander way. It was really just taking these makeshift ideas and elevating them in ways that I didn’t know were possible. A lot of times they weren’t but we still somehow figured it out.”
THE COLLABORATION BETWEEN RUDY MANCUSO AND SHANE HURLBUT, ASC
Shane describes working with Rudy Mancuso as a creative spontaneity, where he is constantly looking at filmmaking in new and innovative ways. While they were filming at Rutgers, Mancuso was struck by an idea. He wanted all the lights to shut off and for a lone spotlight to shine down on him.
Now, Shane had a spotlight on hand because they had previously talked about it, but there was no talk of shutting the lights off. So, they stationed someone at the light switch to turn it off.
“Why don’t you just turn them off?” Mancuso recalls asking, “And Shane’s like, that’s not how this works. It’s not just turn it off and on. It’s a little more complicated than that.”
They found themselves educating each other. Where Mancuso would educate Shane to take a simpler approach, Shane would educate Rudy on accomplishing what was possible.
“I don’t think I ever actually heard the words, ‘That’s not possible’ or ‘No, I don’t think so’ from Shane. It was always, ‘Yes.’ It was always, ‘Yes, and…’ instead of ‘No, but…’ Other peoples’ job was to say ‘No,’ and there were some radical ideas that were being pitched. And considering the fact that we had five weeks and this much money and these parameters and these locations, it was a tall order. And there were a lot of unrealistic asks, but it was always, ‘Yes.’ Shane was always saying, ‘Hell yeah! I love that idea! Let’s do it. Let’s figure it out. And if we can’t do it, let’s do it anyway.’ And that was exactly the approach. We had to fight for certain pieces that if it were not for that attitude, it would have never been pulled off.” —Rudy Mancuso
ADAPTING SOCIAL MEDIA CONCEPTS FOR THE BIG SCREEN
Together, the two creative minds merged to create something truly special. On one end, there are years of traditional Hollywood filmmaking, and on the other is a newer generation entering the industry from social media platforms.
There were a variety of methods that the duo used to get across their ideas. Mancuso did what he did best by creating concept ideas and sharing them with Shane.
“I’ve never seen a move done like this,” says Shane to Mancuso. “I mean, you were able to preconceive, shoot it, put it out there, and see if it struck a chord. And if it did, you’re like, ‘Let’s incorporate this into the movie. And I was able to see how it worked prior, as well. Because you said, ‘Oh, well, I did this… Here’s the video, I did this. And I would sit there and I would just look at it. I’m like, ‘Okay, so I love the DIY element to it. Let’s still keep some of that essence but elevate it, and how can we do that? I’ve already seen it on YouTube, I already see the millions and millions of views so we know this struck a chord. So, how can we keep the soul of that idea and just take it higher cinematically?”
At least half a dozen set pieces are based on pieces Mancuso already made a version of in his prior work. And then the rest of the creatives helped him figure out how to take those concepts and elevate them.
Mancuso grew up with a deep passion for music and film, so the language of the social media format was something he had to himself learn. The format impressed upon him the art of telling a story in just six seconds.
“And then six seconds grew to 15 seconds, grew to a minute, grew to five minutes,” explains Mancuso, “as all these different platforms started imposing video features. And then YouTube was an opportunity to make pretty much anything with very little parameters, which for a creative is a dream come true.”
When he transitioned to feature films, Mancuso learned about the studio, producers, and all of the other cooks in the kitchen.
“That was an education for me,” he continues. “It went from a subconscious thing to a strategy. I realized, what’s my goal in life? It’s to make films and music and ideally do them both simultaneously. That’s why I look up to Charlie Chaplin because he would write, direct, compose, actually edit and choreograph his own material. And I think it is possible to do that if your message is honest to who you are.”
PRE-PRODUCTION
Mancuso had a lot on his plate as the writer, director, actor, and composer of Música. Where Shane knew he could really best support Rudy was through prep and creating the shot lists and lighting and blocking schematics for every scene.
Shot list for the Crossroads Diner scene | Música
They had meetings where they designed the shot lists and finessed them with changing locations and other curveballs. Their efforts in pre-production allowed Mancuso to focus on delivering his best performance, while Shane could capture the coverage they needed.
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Shane also deployed the Insta360 to virtually map and share locations with his team and other department heads. This allowed everyone to return virtually, as well as plan and collaborate much more efficiently and effectively.
Master virtual locations with a 360-degree camera to inform shot lists, blocking and lighting!
CAMERA & LENSES
Música was shot on the RED Gemini which Shane considers the most amazing full-frame multi-format camera, due in part to its Dual ISO. It delivers an amazingly clean feed at 800 and you can push to 1600 to 3200 with its Dual ISO, giving a beautiful grain to the image.
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“Because it’s more of a Super 35 sensor, the photo buckets are much bigger, so it really feels like a filmic grain,” explains Shane. “It’s not a tight sensor like the [RED] Helium where it’s 8K pushed into a Super 35 envelope. It’s a larger format in 4K. So, it’s not trying to put all those 8Ks of pixels in there that are super tight. It’s got room to breathe.”
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Shane felt that combining the Dual ISO of the RED Gemini with Leica Summicron glass was the perfect recipe for Música. According to Shane, the reason the Leicas were ideal was because of their quirks and distortions. They have character and are not just clean and pristine.
THE CINEMATIC LANGUAGE OF THE CHARACTERS
Each of the characters had their own set of rules with different color tones. For example, Camila Mendes’ character, Isabella, is Brazilian so she is more golden with oranges and reds in her space. To help convey her raw characteristics, they chose to go handheld with a grainy texture.
Rudy Mancuso and Camila Mendes on | Música, Amazon Prime Video
They shot at 3200 ISO on the RED Gemini to achieve that beautiful texture for both day and night scenes.
“I knew we were going down a really good road when you saw the Iron Bound backdrop,” reminisces Shane, “and how that grain worked in the fish market, in the park, and all the street scenes. It just brought a texture to it that felt like Isabella.”
Francesca Reale’s character, Haley, was from Montclair and was of the upper crust. So, they chose to convey her character with a hyper-white feel and a super clean and almost clinical texture that differed from Isabella. Haley is the safe ‘love alternative’ direction for Rudy to take.
BAR-RESTAURANT LOCATION
In their bar-restaurant location, the Brasilia, is the location where everything comes to a head, and the love interests collide. Mancuso holds special significance for the location as it was the authentic restaurant he grew up going to.
Shane Hurlbut, ASC lighting the set of Música | Amazon Prime Video
They divided the place into two with the bar they call “the island.” Half of the location was dining and the other half was the bar. While the dining side was lit cold and super white, the bar side was lit really warm with gold and red tones with mica shades.
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“Haley is in this kind of more clinically based restaurant,” says Shane, “which it’s really hard to create that in that kind of space because it’s all color. But I was able to make this really hyper-white environment on one side of the restaurant.”
The sterile white side of the restaurant is also locked very tight in its composition. It’s constricted and they used a series of longer lenses that compressed the background. This helped give the impression that Mancuso was in a box when with her.
Behind the scenes of Música | Amazon Prime Video
When Mancuso walks from the restaurant side toward the barside where he meets Isabella, it’s warm and they are handheld with the camera. They used wider lenses that were pushed in closer to make it more intimate.
“These rules of engagement of how we would tackle it, not only from a lighting standpoint, not only from a color standpoint, not only from a grain standpoint, it was from a focal distance standpoint.” —Shane Hurlbut, ASC
MATCH CUTS CONVEY CHARACTER EMOTION
What Shane appreciated about Mancuso’s approach to filmmaking is how it felt classic because it was done in-camera. However, as Shane notes, you need a plan with classic filmmaking. Even simple techniques like match cuts aren’t often used in movies. They’re stylistic and require intricate planning from beginning to end.
Jason Robbins (far right) operates the camera | Música, Amazon Prime Video
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Mancuso approached Shane about conveying the monotony of daily life. “It’s not something as simple as saying, ‘Oh, yeah, let’s try the match cut thing,’” Shane points out. “And I’m like, ‘Oh, my God, this is going to give the audience the emotional grind of what you’re going through every day. And how can we accent that?’ And he goes, ‘Well, with the match cut.’ It’s like all of a sudden he’s in the kitchen eating breakfast, and then all of a sudden, he’s match cut to the bus, he’s match cut to Rutgers.”
Mancuso adds, “It should all feel like one long piece because the character feels like he’s a victim of the situations that he self-perpetuates. We didn’t do a match cut or a practical transition for the sake of it being cool. It was very much to reflect what the character was going through. So, when he falls onto the train station platform into his bed, this character feels like they’re falling into bed and then it’s morning. It’s like where did the night go? My life is 10 steps ahead of my brain. And that’s something we had to plan for. We never went from A to B without some kind of connective, musical, and visual tissue.”
CAPTURING LIVE SOUND
It was imperative to mix the sound and music of the movie to convey the headspace of someone with synesthesia where senses are intertwined.
“You’re not sure what’s diegetic, what’s non-diegetic music,” explains Mancuso, “what’s in our narrator’s head and what isn’t.”
That meant the diegetic sound was essentially indistinguishable from the non-diegetic sound.
“We had pre-mics, not pre-lights,” laughs Shane.
The executive music producer Jamie Rise found pots and pans in a kitchen supply store in Newark, New Jersey that they could tune to the beat. By using ordinary objects to strike musical notes, they were further able to pull the audience into Mancuso’s world.
Música | Amazon Prime Video
Even at the fish market, they altered the chopping stations. They added a sound dimension so that when you hit the side it responded with the right musical note. Their performers were unique in that they could turn any object into a musical instrument. They were comprised of stompers and Drum Corps International.
“We’d be asked quite often, ‘What’s the point of tuning that pot to a B-flat?’ And it’s because we’re recording it live,” says Mancuso. “And then the next question would be, ‘Why record it live on the day and waste hours?’ The reason for it was to capture on-the-day practical sounds. You can recreate them and you can refine them of course later, but it’s just not the same hearing the room and the swing and the energy. And it was slightly different every take. It was really important that we capture all of this. We were scoring and composing while we were shooting.”
Altogether, their top number of mics totaled a whopping 99. During the pre-mic for the diner scene, Shane and his team were instructed to work outside. So, for the first two days, Shane’s pre-rigging crew did everything outside to give the pre-mic team room to work out the sound. That way, they also wouldn’t have to worry about tripping on cables.
When Shane visited the set to begin finessing the pre-light, he was blown away by the soundboard.
“It was like walking into a master suite at like Warner Brothers,” recalls Shane. “I thought they would lay in four shotgun mics and call it a day, and he’s got the cashier [loaded up] with little mics, and they really hid them well. To the point where we couldn’t see them.”
CHILDHOOD MUSICAL INSPIRATION
It was actually the movie Drumline, which Shane shot earlier in his career, in part inspired Mancuso to join the percussion ensemble when he was in school.
“I saw that film and I was like, ‘Oh, drumming and being in the school band can actually be cool,’” says Mancuso.
Rudy discovered his love of music on the piano, which he describes as foundational for him. He became obsessed with percussion instruments before picking up a guitar and transitioning to other instruments.
While Mancuso took piano lessons, he claims he was a poor student.
“I would never practice and I had a really hard time learning how to read music,” says Mancuso. “I spent a lot of hours playing, but almost no time practicing.”
SYNESTHESIA
Mancuso describes synesthesia as a neurological condition whereby one sense will involuntarily stimulate another sense.
Música | Amazon Prime Video
Música | Amazon Prime Video
“You can almost consider it like an intertwining of the senses,” says Mancuso. While there are many types of synesthesia, many who have the condition can taste 14 and smell Tuesday. “It’s this really interesting cross-wiring of the senses. The type I have identified with based on my research is what I know to be called Rhythmic Association. It’s also another type of linguistic personification, which is apparently very common for people who speak multiple languages that can personify certain inanimate ideas or numbers or objects.”
The most common is chromesthesia, whereby people perceive sound as color and color as sound. Artists from Pharrell to Billy Eilish have a form of chromesthesia.
“They don’t think of C major to B-flat, they think of it as blue to yellow,” says Mancuso.
The reason Mancuso didn’t discover his condition until later is quite simple. It’s not commonly talked about. However, he knew his brain worked in a very interesting way from a very young age.
“I just thought that I was a weirdo,” says Mancuso. “I didn’t know that there was a community of people that shared these symptoms. I didn’t know that there was a name for it. I just figured sounds can be very intense for me.”
At first, Mancuso tried to count everything and turn it all into a metronomic rhythm, and now he’s learned to leverage it for inspiration. But the opening scene of the film where Mancuso struggles to focus on his conversation with Haley was commonplace.
ABOUT MÚSICA
The film unfolds a coming-of-age journey when a synesthetic aspiring creator in Newark, New Jersey grapples with the melodies haunting his mind. Amidst the pressures of love, family, and his Brazilian heritage, he must harmonize his passions to compose a future that resonates with authenticity.
WATCH MÚSICA
