Nickel Boys brings to the screen the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about two friends surviving together in a Florida reform school. Director RaMell Ross hired Scott Alario And Alex Somers to create the music, and the composers found inspiration locally in New Orleans that Ross encouraged them to explore.

“Some (of the sounds) were coming from a broken fan that was in a bathroom,” Alario said during a conversation and performance at Deadline’s Sound & Screen Film music showcase Friday. “Alex heard it and was like, ‘You need to go out there and record this fan.’ This looks so interesting. I said, ‘Yes, you’re right, I’ll do it,’ and we did it. We weren’t sure if it would be in the movie, but it’s there.

Alario met Ross while they were students at the Rhode Island School of Design. Alario and Somers have collaborated for 20 years and composed for Ross’ documentary Hale County this morning, tonight. Ross encouraged composers to explore whatever sounds they wanted, even if they didn’t match the images on screen. For example, Alario recorded frogs – and there are no frogs in the film, but for Somers, that wasn’t the point.

“We don’t really care about reality,” Somers said. “It was just our inner reality. It doesn’t have to make sense. This seems fair. It evokes some kind of spark and we have to do it. This makes sense to us, but does not necessarily have to reflect reality.

The story of Nickel Boys makes sense in a stark, tragic way. The boys suffer abuse at the reform school and Ross is not shy about describing it. The score worked hand in hand to convey the boys’ experiences.

“A lot of the film is shot in the first person, so you’re in there,” Alario said. “A lot of the sounds we included in the score echoed that feeling of being in your head and experiencing the world, overwhelmed by an incredibly traumatic experience.”

Check back Monday for the panel video.