Dear Mike: I read your excellent ("Whiplash") review and went to see it yesterday. ... Do you know how that terrific drumming solo was actually done? It certainly looked like Miles Teller was playing his little heart out.

-- S.E.

Hollywood has become so good at grand-scale fakery, it's easy to understand your uncertainty as to whether Teller is really banging the drums in writer-director Damien Chazelle's fantastic jazz drama. After all, we're talking about an industry that, thanks to computer effects, can convince audiences that apes can talk and ride horses ("Dawn of the Planet of the Apes") and that George Clooney and Sandra Bullock are astronauts ("Gravity"). Faking a drum solo? Child's play, right?

Well, not so fast.

Hollywood is littered with instances of botched efforts by actors to fool audiences into thinking they can really play music. On the other hand, there are at least as many actors who learn to play well enough to trick the cameras. They include Forrest Whitaker, who took saxophone lessons to portray Charlie Parker in Clint Eastwood's "Bird," and Robert De Niro, who did the same for his sax performance in Martin Scorsese's "New York, New York."

Even Dooley Wilson, who so memorably played Sam in "Casablanca" was faking it -- albeit with a little effort. Wilson was a musician in real life, but he was a drummer, not a pianist. So when he "plays" the iconic "As Time Goes By" on-screen at Humphrey Bogart's request, we're really hearing pianist Elliot Carpenter, who -- as legend has it -- tickled the ivories just off-screen, close enough so that Wilson could see and imitate his fingering.

By the time they were done, they were throwing down on advanced songs like "Whiplash" and "Caravan," both of which figure prominently in the film. ("Whiplash" is the song that Teller's character is playing when he's almost decapitated by a chair thrown at him.

"Caravan" is the song with the extended drum solo in the film's wonderful third act.) That's not to say what you see in the film was Teller playing those songs straight through, though. Chazelle broke the songs into chunks, and shot them piece by piece. Remember that "Caravan" solo? It took two days to shoot.

Then it was editor Tom Cross' job to make it look as if Teller "was playing his little heart out." As you saw, he did a great job. In fact, Cross' editing work in "Whiplash" is already earning awards, including one at last month's New Orleans Film Festival, where the film made its local debut.

So, long answer short, that is, indeed, Teller playing the drums -- but with help from some great editing and no small amount of hard work. The end result, as I'm sure you'll agree, is some beautiful music, indeed.