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Grant Meuers is a sound designer, sound editor, re-recording mixer, and founder of Snow Globe Sound, an LA-based post production sound studio. Grant has a passion for animation, but he has also done extensive work in live action. Most recently, Grant served as the Supervising Sound Editor and Sound Designer for The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster, a feature horror film written and directed by Bomani J. Story. The film is a modern retelling of Frankenstein and centers around a teenage girl who resurrects her brother from the dead, only to discover her “experiment” has dire consequences. The film premiered at SXSW in the Spring of 2023.
Read on to learn more about Grant’s work on The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster, his experience as a Supervising Sound Editor, and his company, Snow Globe Sound.
First off, can you tell me a little bit more about The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster?
Sure! The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster is a horror film, written and directed by my good friend Bomani J. Story. In a twist on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, the protagonist is teenage Vicaria, played by Laya DeLeon Hayes, who is hellbent on finding a cure for death, and attempts to resurrect her recently killed brother. The film uses Shelley’s framework to explore systemic issues facing the Black community, and we premiered the film at the SXSW film festival earlier this year. It’s out now in select theaters and everywhere to buy/rent digitally, and should be coming to Shudder in August!
How did you initially get involved? And what were your collaborations like with the rest of the creative team?
I’ve been working with Bomani for many years now, and we first collaborated on the film Rock Steady Row, which he wrote and I sound designed. That film won the Slamdance Film Festival back in January 2018, and actually, he first told me about his script for Angry Black Girl while we were there for the festival in Park City! It was a long journey for him to get the film produced, but he ultimately found a great partner with CryptTV. I was really lucky to be able to work on it with him once it came time for post-production.
I’ve also been working with This Is Sound Design, the sound studio owned and operated by Nathan Ruyle, for many years as well, and when it came time to build a team for this film, connecting these two long-time collaborators of mine made a ton of sense. Nathan served as our re-recording mixer, and everyone on the team, from dialogue editor and jack-of-all-trades Bobby Howley, foley artist Mike Miller, sound editors Michael Stevenson and Ross Aronow, to studio coordinator Rome Osorio were integral to creating the sound on this film, and I’m incredibly proud of our work.
What was it like being the Supervising Sound Editor for this feature specifically? Were there any inspirations you drew from?
It was really a dream project to work on. The whole sound team, as I mentioned, put in great work and made the whole process really smooth. Bomani and I are huge horror fans, so we definitely drew on our love of the genre for inspiration. A few films that were direct references were The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Black Christmas, two 70s classics. Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Pulse is a big one for me as well that helped define my approach. We tried to stay away from a lot of previous Frankenstein adaptations and tried to do our own thing with the material, but I did throw in an homage to James Whale’s undeniable 1931 version with some classic old-school lightning sound effects layered into our monster resurrection sequence, if astute viewers can catch those! But above all, David Lynch was our north star. As I was working on the film, Bomani would constantly text me to remind me that “David Lynch is our best friend!” or sometimes simply, “David Lynch!” The dream sequence in particular is an homage to his work.
You have a lot of great credits in the thriller/horror space– what are some elements of the genre that you’re drawn to?
I love all kinds of genre films, and I think that in particular, there are a lot of opportunities to lean into expressive and creative sound design with them. I love making the audience squirm, so whether it’s the gorey horror elements of Angry Black Girl, the over-the-top cartoon violence of Harley Quinn and Primal, or the LASIK scenes in The Voyeurs, it’s something that I’m very drawn to. On Angry Black Girl in particular, the more visceral and disgusting I could make things, the more I knew Bomani would respond to them!
I also see that you own your own production company, Snow Globe Sound. What kickstarted this idea, and how did you come up with the name? It’s pretty clever!
As somebody who works freelance in so many different spheres, I thought it was important to have a single banner under which to operate. The name “Snow Globe Sound” just kind of came to me, and really stuck in my brain! It has a nice rhythm to it and the kind of internal rhyme made it catchy and I couldn’t shake it. I loved the imagery it conjured – these kinds of meticulous, stylized little worlds that you can get lost in, which I felt wasn’t too far off from what we create as filmmakers. It just kind of all made sense and I went with it!
You have also done some commercial work in addition to cinema. Is there a different path you take creatively when working on different projects such as these?
Yes and no! Sure, a 30 second commercial is very different from a feature length film, but I always try to serve the material first and foremost. With commercials, the product or service always comes first, and quite often you’re trying to conjure an emotion to associate with it. So it’s my job to serve the story and emotion, not unlike narrative storytelling at all! It’s always important to understand aesthetics, and I feel like one of my strengths is understanding what a certain project is going for in terms of tone. So working with filmmakers and clients to understand and execute their vision and tone is something that transcends the boundary between form, regardless of what type of project I’m working on!
And finally, what is a piece of advice you would give someone looking to be where you are now?
Something I still have to remind myself is that growth and progress is not linear! Especially in the freelance world, as much as sometimes it can feel like you’re spinning your wheels and things in your career are stagnant, something can happen really fast in an instant that can change everything. Or vice versa, just because you’ve had a stretch run of success, a busy period with a bunch of different projects going on, doesn’t guarantee more work in the future. There are down months and busy months, and as I’ve come to realize as my career has gone on, down and busy years, and you just have to ride the waves as they come. Everything tends to happen at once, there are deluges when you’re drowning in work and turning projects down left and right, hoping for a break in the action. Then, the drought comes and you’re stressed about finding the next gig. Not everything is in your control, and I think it’s important to enjoy both periods, find the silver lining in the work and the breaks. Although that’s easier said than done, it’s something I’m constantly working on!
Learn more about Snow Globe Sound via their website.
