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9-1-1 Editor Charles Little II on How Franchise Changed His Game

Editor Charles Little II (Welcome to Wrexham) spoke with Bleeding Cool about the challenges from intense procedurals 9-1-1 & 9-1-1 Lone Star.

Charles Little II has come a long way as editor since his start on Oxygen's 25iest: Bad Girls Gone Good in 2008. He's worked his way up from some of reality television's biggest programming from MTV's RuPaul's Drag Race, NatGeo's Alaska's Grizzly Gauntlet, TLC's Dr. Pimple Popper to making his transition to the 9-1-1 franchise with the original 2018 series (originally on Fox before its recent move to ABC) and its 2020 spinoff 9-1-1: Lone Star on Fox. While promoting his work on the FX sports docudrama Welcome to Wrexham, Little spoke to Bleeding Cool about how working in an episodic procedural challenged him in ways he never imagined as the original series finds its new home for its upcoming seventh season.

9-1-1: Charles Little II Breaks Down the Meticulous Process of Both Shows

One of the things Little noticed was how much of a well-oiled machine the show had been since joining the original series in season five. "Working in the '9-1-1' universe as an editor completely leveled up my game. It changed my entire career and life. It changed my approach and vision. Working in concert with the creatives in the '9-1-1' universe, the writers, and showrunner, Tim Minear is one of the most brilliant minds I've ever been in a room with," he said. "The other editors I work with are also brilliant, and we have high standards. I learned in the '9-1-1' universe to finish the thought, finish the act, not cut corners or overthink it, and get out of its way. Always ask yourself, 'Is this right? Is this best?' I learned so much, and on top of that, you're a department head as an editor and on a drama of that size, a procedural that's still beholden to the traditional airdate schedule."

There are also timelines to consider given the format of the series. "There was a lot of pressure on that show where you have a huge ensemble cast. We have imaginative and ambitious writing. We have a challenging schedule, so you must, as an editor and department head, be fully responsible for your entire department, working in concert with the VFX supervisors and working with your assistant editors," Little said. "You're also cross-cutting working across timelines with different editors because there are often when the hour-episode is too dense, and the timeline is too short to turn it around as one human being.

Little developed an intriguing metaphor for how viewers digest the series. "We help each other a lot, the team of editors that work on that material, and the actors are involved. I've multiple times received notes from different actors in the cast with suggestions, praise, or questions about how we've executed a scenario or a different line or situation. '9-1-1' and '9-1-1: Lone Star' have been powerful for me because they're in the same space, but different, which can be quite nuanced and subtle," he said. "You've got to settle in, and you've got to clean your palate a bit. It's like eating sushi, and you've got all these different flavors. You might have to clean your palate a little bit in midstream, and there's a language there. It's not a first-season show. It's heading into its seventh season now."

There's a degree of personalization and stylistic choices to consider when conveying the messages from both 9-1-1 shows. "The show does have a vernacular you want to that you want to honor and serve, but at the same time, we want to broach new ground with our experiences, and it's a fun experience and a lucky one to work on because, in a single episode, I'm cutting action sequences, intimate dramatic scenes," Little said. "We have political and social statements that we're making between the lines. We have music budgets and we're using everything from popular music to obscure older tracks to also help enhance that storytelling process and the viewer's experience. At the same time, while not taking ourselves too seriously, having a little leaving enough room for the fun in there." Little credits the series' cast and crew's dedication across the board for its success. "It's a TV show. It's not a serious talking head documentary that's got something to say. We have a lot to say and a lot of ways to say it, and it's a concert of artists from the audio mixers, VFX designers, cinematographers, set designers, and the special effects artists. The production crews are humongous, and the budgets are big. The expectations are high, and so are the standards of myself as editor and the producers at Ryan Murphy Television.

9-1-1, which stars Angela Bassett, Peter Krause, Oliver Stark, Aisha Hinds, Kenneth Choi, Corinne Massiah, Jennifer Love Hewitt, and Gavin McHugh, returns on March 14th on ABC. 9-1-1: Lone Star, which stars Rob Lowe, Liv Tyler, Ronen Rubinstein, Sierra McClain, Jim Parrack, Natacha Karam, Brian Michael Smith, Rafael L. Silva, Julian Works, Gina Torres, Brianna Baker, Kelsey Yates, and Skyler Yates will return for a fifth season on Fox.

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