Oscar-nominated producer Adam Somner, who was among the many most in-demand first assistant administrators within the enterprise throughout the previous few a long time, died November 27 from anaplastic thyroid most cancers. He was 57.
Somner was the go-to AD for the likes of Steven Spielberg (10 movies), Paul Thomas Anderson (six) and Ridley Scott (six). He additionally labored a number of instances with Scott’s brother Tony, Alejandro G. Iñárritu and James Mangold. His most up-to-date movies embrace Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, Steve McQueen’s Blitz and Anderson’s upcoming untitled Warner Bros. movie starring Leonardo Di Caprio.
Somner and fellow Licorice Pizza producer Sara Murphy have been Oscar-nominated for his or her work on Anderson’s 2022 pic.
“The job title ‘assistant director’ is inadequate to explain what Adam Somner was to me and the contribution he made to my movies—simply as my left arm is extra than simply an assistant to my proper,” mentioned Spielberg in a press release to Deadline. “He labored as AD, and producer and he carried out each of these duties with equal measures of devotion. He liked making motion pictures. He liked being on the set. It was his gridiron. He was a cheerleader and ball provider and at instances I couldn’t inform if he was following my lead or I used to be following his. He made everybody who joined the crew really feel like they have been a part of the household. He was a uniter and when issues weren’t going in line with plan, his English working-class wit and humor, may easy out the issue via his under-the-breath cursing, laughter, and the backup plan he all the time appeared to have standing by. He was an icon in his subject and an inspiration to anybody who desires a profession within the mounting of productions—with the complete recognition that it’s as artistic as it’s organizational. Going again to work with out Adam won’t ever be the identical.”
Somner said throughout an AFI Conservatory Q&A in 2020. “I feel your job pretty much as good AD is to be a barometer to the set. If it’s tense, you attempt to make it much less tense. If possibly it’s too slack, you attempt to snap it up, attempt to get it to the place the chemistry is the correct degree to do good work.”
Amongst Somner’s extra memorable demonstrations of that talent was overseeing the wild airplane orgy scene in The Wolf of Wall Avenue.
“It was all within the preparation,” he told DGA Quarterly. Somner choreographed the scene rigorously, pairing off actors to create managed scenes so everybody felt comfy.
“It might be like, ‘You two are doing this over right here,’ and ‘You two are doing that over there,’ after which typically I’d be with Marty and he’d be like, ‘Can you’ve one thing happening over there?’ We have been working in a safe atmosphere that was preset,” Somner mentioned. “Everybody was prepped. So once we needed them to go nuts, they may go nuts. Everybody was working in set boundaries.”
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Scorsese mentioned he “by no means would have been in a position to make The Wolf of Wall Avenue or Killers of the Flower Moon with out him.
“Adam Somner was credited as an Assistant Director and a Producer on three of my footage, however his presence meant extra to me and to the movies than any credit may actually even point out,” he mentioned in a press release to Deadline. “Adam had a really particular and really specific set of qualities—the organizational skills and the self-discipline of a common on the battlefield; a novel capacity to work as intently with me or with any director as two dancers doing a routine or two musicians bouncing off one another; and a rare artistry when it got here to organizing and orchestrating motion within the body. Adam Somner embodied and practiced all of it. I might by no means have been in a position to make The Wolf of Wall Avenue or Killers of the Flower Moon with out him, and we have been in the course of planning one other challenge. He handed away far too early, and I’ll miss him terribly. He liked “making footage,” as he put it. He was one of many most interesting collaborators I may ask for, and I do know that my fellow administrators would say the identical.”
Licorice Pizza writer-director Anderson additionally paid tribute to Somner: “Adam liked making movies greater than anybody else ever within the historical past of the film enterprise. It was food and drinks to him. He made everybody who labored with him really feel protected,” mentioned Anderson. “He noticed every part from all sides without delay and had a again up plan to the again up plan to the again up plan. He moved mountains and vans and folks like he was transferring a salt shaker throughout a desk. It was wonderful to look at him work.
“He knew find out how to make a movie higher than anybody else. His instinct and expertise was second solely to how deeply humorous and loving he was. Most of all and above every part, he was beneficiant.
“For these of us fortunate sufficient to work with him, we all know going to work won’t ever be the identical or as a lot enjoyable. I might rank him within the Kobe Bryant, Mick Jagger, Winston Churchill class of Legends. And that may be under-selling it.”
Somner additionally was awarded the DGA Award for Excellent Directorial Achievement/Characteristic Movie for his work with Gonzalez Iñárritu on The Revenant. He additionally obtained Producers Guild & BAFTA Award noms for Licorice Pizza.
Somner is survived by his spouse Carmen Ruiz de Huidobro, his kids, Olivia and Bosco and his brother, Mark Somner.
A DGA scholarship in Somner’s identify can be established with donation particulars forthcoming.
Watch Somner and Murphy focus on Licorice Pizza with Deadline’s Anthony D’Alessandro throughout a 2022 Contenders panel under:
