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 embody 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, who had greater than 75 AD credit on options, shorts and music movies, and fellow Licorice Pizza producer Sara Murphy had been Oscar-nominated for his or her work on Anderson’s 2022 pic.
Somner’s dozens of movies as first AD embody Greatest Image Oscar winners Birdman and Gladiator; Spielberg’s West Aspect Story, Lincoln, Munich, Warhorse and two Indiana Jones sequels; Scott’s Black Hawk Down, G.I. Jane and Kingdom of Heaven; and Anderson’s There Will Be Blood, Inherent Vice and The Grasp.
His characteristic credit for different celebrated filmmakers embody James Mangold’s Ford v. Ferrari, Robert Redford’s Lions for Lambs, Tony Scott’s Man of Fireplace and Spy Recreation, Stephen Frears’ Could Reilly, Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V, and Richard Attenborough’s Shadowland. Somner additionally labored on TV collection together with The Starvation, The Governor, Spender and The Wanderer.
“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 service 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 had been a part of the household. He was a uniter and when issues weren’t going based on plan, his English working-class wit and humor, might easy out the issue by way of 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 needs a profession within the mounting of productions—with the complete recognition that it’s as inventive as it’s organizational. Going again to work with out Adam won’t ever be the identical.”
Somner mentioned throughout an AFI Conservatory Q&A in 2020. “I feel your job nearly 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 advised DGA Quarterly. Somner choreographed the scene fastidiously, pairing off actors to create managed scenes so everybody felt snug.
“It could be like, ‘You two are doing this over right here,’ and ‘You two are doing that over there,’ after which generally I’d be with Marty and he’d be like, ‘Can you have got one thing happening over there?’ We had been working in a safe surroundings that was preset,” Somner mentioned. “Everybody was prepped. So once we wished 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 might actually even point out,” he mentioned in a press release to Deadline. “Adam had a really particular and really explicit set of qualities—the organizational talents and the self-discipline of a basic on the battlefield; a novel capability 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 had been in the midst of planning one other mission. 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 might 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 foods and drinks to him. He made everybody who labored with him really feel secure,” 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 other people like he was shifting a salt shaker throughout a desk. It was superb to look at him work.
“He knew the right way 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 will be under-selling it.”
Somner additionally was awarded the DGA Award for Excellent Directorial Achievement/Function 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 youngsters, Olivia and Bosco and his brother, Mark Somner.
A DGA scholarship in Somner’s title shall be established with donation particulars forthcoming.
Watch Somner and Murphy talk about Licorice Pizza with Deadline’s Anthony D’Alessandro throughout a 2022 Contenders panel under:
