All the Pieces Matter: The Inside Story of The Wire

by Jonathan Abrams

ERNEST DICKERSON (DIRECTOR): I found out later that the editorial staff freaked out when it saw the dailies because the camera was laying down on the ground beside him. First, we started off with the actor as he’s down on the ground, and then, as Chris’s foot starts to come down on him, we cut. Then we moved the real actor out and moved the dummy in. The editorial staff, they didn’t see the change, because the dummy looked that much like the real actor. All of a sudden, the foot is stomping him in the face and the mouth, and the head is jerking. They were freaking out because it looked like we were actually stomping the poor guy. It was a beautiful special effect. That articulated dummy that we made of him, it worked. Even they admitted that they had to cut down what I did. My cut was a little bit too much. I think it was longer with the stomping of the head. They shortened it. It was hard to watch.