BELOW THE LINE PODCAST

Makeup and hairstyling are among the most visible crafts in filmmaking — shaping how an audience understands age, history, and identity before a word is spoken.

This week on Below the Line, Skid is joined by Yvonne De Patis-Kupka, Angela Nogaro, and Lynda Armstrong for an in-depth discussion of the nominees for Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling at the 98th Academy Awards. Drawing on a wide range of experience across film and television, they examine how hair and makeup choices shape character, period, genre, and emotional tone — and how those choices are evaluated within a single, highly competitive Oscar category.

As with the rest of this year’s Oscar series, the conversation is available both as an audio podcast and as a full video episode on YouTube, giving listeners the option to watch the discussion or continue enjoying the show in its traditional audio format.

Our discussion ranges across:

The contrast between large-scale prosthetic work and more restrained, character-driven approaches to makeup and hair

How transformation functions differently across genres, from the mythic world of Frankenstein to the grounded period realism of Sinners

The challenges of evaluating culturally specific styles, including the kabuki-influenced work in Kokuho

When subtlety becomes the hardest achievement — and why “natural” work can be the most demanding

The relationship between budget, resources, and creative problem-solving, particularly in films like The Ugly Stepsister

How continuity, aging, and wear are tracked over time to support long-form storytelling

The ongoing difficulty of judging hair, makeup, and prosthetics together within a single Oscar category

What this year’s nominees reveal about the Academy’s evolving expectations for the craft

The conversation highlights makeup and hairstyling as disciplines defined by precision, restraint, and collaboration — crafts that help actors fully inhabit their roles while anchoring the world of the film.

🎧 Press play — or watch the full conversation on YouTube — and join us Below the Line as the 2026 Oscar series continues. For more, visit belowtheline.biz.

This episode begins with a hypothetical question: what would it look like if Property Mastering were its own Oscar category? We explore it as part of Below the Line’s 2026 Oscar series.

This week on Below the Line, Skid is joined by Scott Buckwald and Gregg Bilson, Jr. for a deep dive into the craft of property mastering through the lens of the 98th Academy Awards. Using a fictional Oscar ballot as a framework, they explore how props function as storytelling tools — shaping character, tone, and authenticity across a wide range of films.

As with the rest of this year’s Oscar series, the conversation is available both as an audio podcast and as a full video episode on YouTube, offering listeners and viewers a closer look at how below-the-line crafts are discussed and evaluated from inside the work itself.

Our discussion ranges across:

Why property mastering sits at the intersection of design, performance, and logistics — often unnoticed, but never incidental

How props help define character and period across films like Nuremberg and Song Sung Blue

The heightened demands of genre storytelling, from the mythic scale of Frankenstein to the grounded realism of Sinners

Managing continuity and narrative logic when props evolve over the course of a story

The technical and ethical considerations involved in handling story-critical objects, from weapons to documents and artifacts

How preparation, research, and documentation allow property masters to support performance without drawing attention to the work itself

Why collaboration with actors and other departments is essential to making props feel lived-in rather than ornamental

What this hypothetical exercise reveals about how deeply props are woven into storytelling, even when they’re easy to overlook

The conversation highlights property mastering as a discipline defined by preparation, judgment, and storytelling instincts — a craft that quietly anchors performance and world-building across every genre.

🎧 Press play — or watch the full conversation on YouTube — and join us Below the Line as the 2026 Oscar series continues. For more, visit belowtheline.biz.

Continuing Below the Line’s 2026 Oscar series, the conversation turns to Visual Effects — a category that sits at the intersection of technology, craft, and storytelling.

This week on Below the Line, Skid is joined by Kent Seki and Chris Batty for a focused conversation about the Oscar nominees for Achievement in Visual Effects. Together, they look at how the category has evolved — and what separates technical accomplishment from storytelling impact.

As with the rest of this year’s Oscar series, this episode is available both as an audio podcast and as a full video conversation on YouTube, offering listeners and viewers a closer look at how visual-effects work is discussed, debated, and evaluated from inside the process.

Our discussion ranges across:

The different creative demands of large-scale spectacle versus realism-driven effects

How films like Avatar: Fire and Ash and Jurassic World Rebirth approach scale and world-building, compared to the grounded physical environments of F1 and The Lost Bus

The challenge of integrating effects into performances, locations, and production design without overwhelming the story

Why elements like fire, debris, and destruction require as much restraint as technical precision

How visual effects intersect with cinematography, editorial, and sound to maintain continuity and tone

The increasing expectation that effects choices support narrative clarity rather than novelty

What this year’s nominees suggest about how the Academy continues to define excellence in the field

Rather than focusing on predictions, the conversation looks at how visual effects decisions are made — and how those choices shape tone, performance, and story across very different kinds of films.

🎧 Press play — or watch the full conversation on YouTube — and join us Below the Line as the 2026 Oscar series continues. For more, visit belowtheline.biz.

As the 98th Academy Awards approach, Below the Line returns for its seventh annual Oscar series — beginning with Film Editing, a category that quietly shapes every other craft recognized on Oscar night.

This week on Below the Line, Skid is joined by Amy Duddleston and Christopher Angel to open the 2026 Oscar series with a focused conversation about the nominees for Achievement in Film Editing. Together, they examine how editing choices shape performance, tone, and point of view — and why the category can be difficult to evaluate without understanding what the work actually requires.

This episode also marks a first for Below the Line: these Oscar conversations are now available both as an audio podcast and as full video episodes on YouTube, offering listeners the choice to watch the discussion unfold or continue enjoying the show in its traditional audio format.

Our discussion ranges across:

Why Film Editing is often misunderstood as “most editing” rather than best judgment

The distinct editorial challenges behind this year’s nominees, including F1, Marty Supreme, One Battle After Another, Sentimental Value, and Sinners

How performance-driven films ask editors to prioritize restraint over visibility

The editor’s role in shaping character psychology and audience alignment

When cutting calls attention to itself — and when disappearing is the hardest choice

Navigating collaboration with directors whose approaches range from highly controlled to deliberately chaotic

What this year’s nominees reveal about how the Academy continues to define the craft

Grounded in the perspective of two working editors, the conversation focuses less on prediction and more on process — unpacking how editing decisions actually function on screen, and why the craft remains essential even when it goes unnoticed.

🎧 Press play — or watch the full conversation on YouTube — and join us Below the Line as we begin our 2026 Oscar series. For more, visit belowtheline.biz.

Designing for television isn’t just about building sets — it’s about knowing when to preserve them, when to break them, and how to let them evolve over time. On Slow Horses, that long view shapes every creative decision.

This week on Below the Line, Skid is joined by Production Designer Choi Ho Man, with Gianni Damaia returning as co-host, to talk about the fifth season of Slow Horses, the Apple TV+ espionage series starring Gary Oldman. Choi traces her journey on the show from supervising art director to production designer, and how designing across multiple seasons requires long-term thinking, flexibility, and restraint.

We take a deep dive into:

How Slow Horses was designed as a rolling, multi-season project, shooting in pairs of seasons with overlapping crews and compressed turnaround times

The evolution of Slough House itself, including how destruction at the end of Season Four informed the repaired, modernized, and slightly haunted version seen in Season Five

Designing spaces that reflect character psychology, from Lamb’s office to Ho’s flat

Building and rebuilding modular sets — lifts, car parks, corridors, offices — to stretch resources while preserving visual continuity

Developing MI5 Headquarters (“The Park”) as a recurring environment, mapping unseen spaces to make the building feel architecturally complete

Stitching together complex action sequences from multiple locations and stage builds, including chase scenes, stairwells, and exterior-to-interior transitions

How practical construction, visual effects, and stunt coordination intersect on large-scale action sequences involving paint, height, and confined spaces

Why face-to-face collaboration still matters, including sketches, models, and conversations that can’t be replaced by emails or message threads

Across five seasons, Slow Horses proves that production design isn’t just about creating spaces — it’s about letting those spaces absorb history, pressure, and consequence, until the environment itself becomes part of the story.

🎧 Press play and go Below the Line on Slow Horses. For more, visit belowtheline.biz.