Hello everybody, it's Michael Hollands once again for Sound of the Movies. Today I have the pleasure to be joined by Oscar-winning composer Elliot Goldenthal. For more than three decades Elliot Goldenthal has written absolutely stunning music for film, ballet, theatre, and also opera. His highly-innovative and fascinating style has made him one of the very best and most beloved composers of all time. His massive list of credits includes films such as “Pet Sematary”, “Alien 3”, “Demolition Man”, “Interview with the Vampire”, “Batman Forever”, “Heat”, “SWAT”, “Public Enemies”, “Titus” and many more. In addition to his film credits Elliot has made invaluable contributions to the world of concert music, ballet and Broadway theatre. Welcome Elliot.
Hi, nice to speak to you Michael.
Great to have you, thank you so much for your time; it's an absolute honor for me and a privilege. Elliot, at first I would like to get into your musical education. As I understand, you had studied music at the Manhattan School of Music. At which point exactly did you know you wanted to write music for concert and films?
Well I think I was, like, six or seven years old. I discovered that writing or improvising works that were more than two minutes or three minutes long, or more than song form, five-minute, eight-minute pieces, was more natural for me than to write tunes, for example, or song form applications. So in a very early age I was looking for something more expansive to work on.
In terms of film, I think when I was in my late teens, between 16 and 18 I became very interested in world cinema, including works from Europe, Japan, South America, classic films from the United States, etc. So I look at that more as world cinema than commercial cinema.
You had written your first score I believe in 1979 called “Cocaine Cowboys”.
Actually that was a job that entailed two movies I did at once: one called “Blank Generation” with Carol Bouquet, Andy Warhol and also Richard Hell and the Voidoids, an early punk band. Both of those movies I did simultaneously in 1979. They got me for two-for-one-price at that time. I think my salary was $4,000 for two movies. They didn't pay me in the end.
They didn't?
No. You know, I was very very happy to be involved where I could conduct, compose, orchestrate, and learn about the studio. It was a great learning experience. However, the movies weren't very good. But at least I started to learn the craft.
And your musical style is very distinct and also incredibly innovative. And some might describe your style, pardon the words, as somewhat inaccessible. Do you feel that you had to struggle a bit in a way, especially in your early Hollywood days?
Oh, absolutely. But there was a gap in my writing between 1988 and 1978, 1979, in movies. For all these ten years when I didn't do anything with the film, I concentrated my personal concert career, chamber music and theater. And as a result of theater, other directors attended my performances in the theater. They became more interested in my more personal serious theater work. For example, Gus Van Sant came to hear my work in Juan Darien; it was theater work. And I was fortunate enough to do “Drugstore Cowboy” and “Pet Sematary” in the same year. Very different type of films. “Pet Sematary” was a string orchestra, so it was a good introduction to working with a classical European orchestra ensemble. And the other one, “Drugstore Cowboy”, featured home-made sounds and synthesizer sounds and jazz, and more of an experimental American type of approach. So it was very fortunate to have both films in the same year as the second manifestation of my film career.
“Pet Sematary” – as far as I am concerned, the score that set you apart from everybody else working in this business up until this point was “Pet Sematary”. It's one of the best horror films and best Stephen King adaptations of all time as far as I am concerned. And your score worked so brilliantly with the images. What are your recollections of working with director Mary Lambert on this film?
Oh, I did two movies with her and she was very, very lovely and a very caring director about every aspect of the movie. And she was very open to my ideas and a very, very fine collaborator as far as that is concerned. After that we did another movie which required a very gentle score called “Grand Isle” like a year later. But she was a wonderful person to work with.
Great. May I ask why you didn't return for “Pet Sematary 2”?
No one asked. Yeah.
That totally came as a surprise to me because, like I just mentioned, your score for Pat's Cemetery is not just an ordinary horror score. I mean just the opening of the movie when you hear the off-commentaries of the children and the camera moves along, the headstones. It's so brilliant. And you added so much depth to this film. I was totally surprised that nobody didn't return for the second part.
Well, it's very important to have a children's point of view and a children's sound in the movie. And I thought the children's voices against somewhat reflective and often scary string writing was a very, very good combination to portray Stephen King's horror.
There's even been an extended release of “Pet Sematary” by La-La Land, luckily. And also “Alien 3” was given a deluxe treatment.
Alien 3 was a different situation where I had over four or five months in preparation. And David Fincher gave me a lot of time to work on that. All my experimentation that I was doing in classical music as well as electronic music had culmination in “Alien 3”. It's still one of my favorite collaborations, with David Fincher.
The score is also very popular and very recently they released an expanded album. And I've heard multiple times that the production of “Alien 3” was very tough. And I even heard that it was so hard that David Fincher reportedly wasn't even sure if he was going to make or shoot another film. Did this kind of atmosphere or did those circumstances also affect you score-wise?
Yes, because I wanted more of David Fincher in the post-production. Unfortunately, there was a lot of disagreement between David and the producers. So I kind of lost his input at the end. But the editor was a very, very respectful Terry Rawlings. And he carried on what he thought was David Fincher's wishes, but it was not enough. At the same time, at the same period of time, there was upheaval. Los Angeles riots happened at the same time. So it was a lot of violence in the streets, a lot of police, a lot of National Guard, and the whole city of Los Angeles was almost in a war zone during the dubbing of the music.
Sounds absolutely crazy. Those circumstances must have taken a toll on the entire production, so I totally understand. Elliot, what are your thoughts generally on expanded releases? Do you feel they are a benefit or what are your thoughts?
Oh, definitely it’s a benefit. Although I might not have thought everything was perfect on the expanded releases in terms of mixing and editing, still it gives you the opportunity to people who are really, really interested in that field to hear a more complete representation of what I was trying to achieve. And I think it's a great thing.
One of the scores I loved when I was a teenager was “Demolition Man”. And I recently, a couple of days ago, I rewatched it.
Why? Why did you like it?
[laughs] The film or the score?
I don't know! I don't think the film was very good. But when it comes to each movie, I do my best. So I can't choose what movie – I can’t direct the movie I'm composing.
I must admit, I'm a Stallone fan, I must admit. And I think it's a relatively nice action movie.
Yeah, the script was very good. It was very funny. You know, a futuristic-comedy kind of thing. So in that way it was a lot of fun to work on.
It had a lot of good moments. I mean, there were also dull moments or moments when I think, hey, it's a bit too much here or there. But as a whole, I think it's a very cool early ’90s action movie.
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
But I must admit, your score, I loved the album. But, when I watch the movie, I can't help but notice that your score in many places is rather subdued. Was this intended to be or did you feel there was a struggle on the dub stage? Did you have different things in mind? What was it like?
Subdued in terms of what, volume?
Yeah, I mean, it's sometimes barely noticeable.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a problem for me, too. I complained a lot. I was really upset by the level of the music in terms of balance with the sound effects and everything else. Of course, on the dialogue, the music has to be low enough to hear the dialogue. But I think the mixers on that film, no matter how talented they were, they didn't feature the music enough.
Yeah, exactly. I mean, there are of course, sometimes the music is totally buried in sound effects or – it happens. But I just felt that in certain scenes, the volume, they could have pumped up the volume of the...
No, I was very upset. I walked into rooms and complained. I did everything I could at the time, but I had no success.
Another great film and a very lovely and innovative score was “Interview with the Vampire”, which marks a great highlight in your filmography. Could you please describe your work process on this picture and how you figured out which sounds and musical style would work best for this film?
Yes, I had a very short time to work on it, because the previous composer was released because he couldn't continue to work on the movie. George Fenton, who was a really, really good composer, but he was on to another project and so he couldn't continue to work with Neil Jordan. So they asked me at the last minute, and the last minute was the last minute, because I only had like three and a half weeks to do two hours of music.
So I had to decide for myself, What's the best course of action? And I decided that vampires live a long time, you know, and they take in a lot of chronological development of different musical styles, including liturgical styles of sacred music in the 13th century, 12th century, as well as early orchestral instruments like viola de gamba. So many of the early sounds took in a lot of those elements, including the opening titles of the movie where you see contemporary San Francisco, but the instruments that you're hearing is viola de gamba and a choir singing a 13th-century text. And it creates, created at the time, a very uneasy, I thought, wonderful counterpoint to contemporary life in San Francisco, where you feel the ghosts emerging from the alleys behind you, seeping through the buildings, so to speak, of something extra than contemporary life.
Absolutely, the opening of the film and the piece ‘Libera Me’, it totally sets the tone for the...
I changed the words in ‘Libera Me’ to ‘eternal life’, ‘vita eternum’. ‘Morte eternum’ to ‘vita eternum’. So it was like, save me from everlasting, vita eternum, from everlasting life, as opposed to morte eternum, which was the original text. So I changed the text as a joke, but the words I changed basically says, ‘Save me from everlasting life’. That's what a good vampire would say.
It's a really great score, a great movie directed by Neil Jordan; and you had worked with him four more times, if I'm correct.
That's right, one of my favorite collaborations.
You had done “Michael Collins”, great film, great performance by Liam Neeson, very emotional project. You had done “The Butcher Boy” –
One of my favorite films of all time.
– “In Dreams”, and “The Good Thief”. Did you generally talk about sounds or composition or simply textures? How did you communicate?
Well, each movie, we had ample time to discuss before the movie was shot, other than the “Interview with the Vampire”, about how the texture of the score, the sonority of the score. We had a plan for each one. “Michael Collins”, after reading the script, I felt that the presence of women in terms of the importance of the Irish Revolution cause – I insisted that the beginning of the movie and throughout the movie there was a women's chorus and solo woman singing poetry from the Easter Rebellion in Ireland in 1916. So Sinéad O'Connor sings the solo and the whole chorus is singing in the Irish, indigenous Irish language. So it's not in English, it's in Irish.
Great film, important film to boot, very important. You got an Oscar nomination back then.
That would have been the second one. The first one was...
“Interview”.
“Interview”, you're right.
Yeah, 1994 and then 1996, 1997 for “Michael Collins”, I believe. Another great director, whom I really love, you've worked with a couple of times, is Joel Schumacher. You had worked on “Batman Forever”, “A Time to Kill”, and then “Batman and Robin”. The Batman movies Joel Schumacher directed, many people dislike them, but you get a lot of praise for your score, especially for the Batman theme on the opening of the movie, “Batman Forever”, which sounds fantastic. May I ask why you and Joel Schumacher parted ways after “Batman and Robin”?
I don't know. I saw him recently and I don't think there was any reason. “A Time to Kill” was a very successful movie, both dramatically and the score.
Fantastic film.
And “Batman Forever” was very successful financially. The thing was, people fell in love with Burton's style. They had a great deal of difficulty adjusting to Joel Schumacher's style. However, “Batman Forever was very successful. “Batman and Robin” was not successful. It was a horrible script, horrible casting for the most part, and really bad movie. I know what he was after, but I think everyone involved with movies felt that we were working on something that wasn't right. “Batman Forever” felt really good because it felt like the original disposable culture kind of comic book kind of thing, more comic book-come-alive feeling. That was a good feeling, but “Batman and Robin” didn't feel right. All of us gave it our best, but we were beating a dead horse, so to speak.
Elliot, have there been any talks of releasing your “Batman and Robin” score?
No, I'd love to, but that's Warner Bros. That's their business and I don't have any sway or influence over their marketing decisions.
I was going to ask you about Warner Bros. and I hope it's not a sore subject. If it is, please let me know immediately.
You had scored “Titus” and Warner Bros. had used one of the pieces for the film “300”, which as I understand caused some discord because you weren't properly credited. Is it a fact that the lawsuit was filed against Warner Bros. because of that?
Absolutely. Too many people came up to me and told me that it was plagiarism, and I didn't believe it until I heard the score. We hired musicologists in part of the suit and everything. It was resolved with money settlement from Warner Bros., but they basically admitted that it was a plagiarism situation. I don't know who was to blame for it, but it happened. All that could have been avoided if they'd just licensed the music from the very beginning. License the music and give the composer credit and everything would be just fine. But they didn't do that. They didn't go the legal way. For whatever reason – I can't talk about the details. I don't know why or where. But at this time, they settled without going to trial because they didn't have a good feeling about winning the case, so they settled. That's the way it is. Was it good for my career? I don't know. Still and all, I think it's good for all the composers and everyone, including corporations like Warner Bros. and everyone, to realize that it's not too costly, it's not too expensive, to just license these pieces legally and have done with it.
I couldn't agree more. Warner Bros. doesn't strike me as a poor enterprise, you know?
They were very good with me at the time I was working with Warner Bros. I didn't have any complaints whatsoever with my relationship with them. I'm sorry for both of us that the situation of “300” came up.
Very unfortunate. They should have gone the other way in this case. Sometimes it's hard to figure out who makes the decisions and why they make a decision. It's just very unfortunate for you personally.
I don't think people at the top didn't know what was happening. There’s people – often producers on “300” and the director on “300” pushed it through. I don't think people at Warner was trying to get away with anything, but they weren't minding the store, so to speak. They didn't have their eye completely focused. They took their eye off the wheel and something got not taken care of as far as licensing was concerned.
Yeah, I totally understand. Speaking of “Titus” and the whole issue, “Titus” was directed by your long-time partner, Julie Taymor, a great theater and film director. You've worked together on a number of projects, “Titus”, “Frida” – which you won the Oscar for – you had worked on the Midsummer Night's Dream, “Tempest”, and “Across the Universe”. What do you think makes your collaboration so successful and special?
Well, let me preface it by saying any long-term relationship is very miraculous and very special. For any composer, you can go back to Hitchcock and Bernard Herrmann, and Fellini and Nino Rota, Coen Brothers and Carter Burwell, myself with Neil Jordan and Michael Mann even. So when you do more than two or five or seven projects, there's a lot of trust involved.
In terms of Julie and I, we did Titus on the stage before it was filmed. We had all this experience of working with Shakespeare's text. We did also Tempest on the stage. We did Midsummer on the stage.
Correct.
These things developed in a very organic fashion. “Frida” was something that came late in the process. But by then we had so much experience working with each other. There's an element of trust that goes into especially the director that a composer would have to – their ideas have to be heard. In the end, a lot of things were changed, a lot of things were altered, but at least the director gives the composer a modicum of trust, and that's very important.
Elliot, as you have this incredible body of work which ranges from film to ballet to theatre, is there any medium you prefer?
One thing about my personality – I enjoy going from one medium to the next because it refreshes the last one. It recharges the batteries. I just finished a trumpet concerto. It was very demanding and took a lot of thought and refining. Right before it, I did a theatre work on Broadway. One thing cleans the palate of the next thing, so I don't feel exhausted in one medium.
If you go back to the great 18th- and 19th-century composers, especially 18th-century composers like Mozart – he's the best example of all. His work in the theatre, his song-spiel, opera, gave him a lot of balance in his work, even to the point where his operatic work influenced his symphonic work. I think it's a very healthy thing for any composer to be involved with anything that the composer is really inspired by any medium that they're inspired to do.
How do you write for, let's say, ballet? Are you commissioned to write music and as a result ballet is choreographed? Or, how does it – ?
Well, my only classical ballet was Othello. Othello was in three acts – the only three-act opera I think was ever commissioned in the United States.And it was a narrative ballet. So myself and the choreographer, Lar Lubovitch, went over very in detail every scene, every second, almost a flow-chart of every moment, practically every step of choreography for over a period of an hour-and-a-half, three acts. It was a wonderful collaboration. You're dealing with, in ballet, flesh and blood, just like opera. You can't sustain a duet over 25 minutes, 30 minutes. It's too exhausting. So the human element, the athletic element, has to be considered as you're composing.
I mean your concert music is very acclaimed, and I recently came across a statement of someone praising, especially praising your work for ‘Fire, Paper, Water’, which is the...
The oratorio.
The Vietnam oratorio. How did this project come about and how did you manage to write about the Vietnam War and three massive and overwhelming pieces of music?
Well the conductor, Carl St. Clair, was given a commission to do the Pacific Symphony Orchestra in California and has the largest Vietnam immigrant population in the United States. And they have a tremendous community of soldiers, people from the armed forces living in the community. So the Vietnam War unofficially was over for 20 years and the wall in Washington, D.C. was just recently constructed. So I think they wanted to create a musical-representative equivalent of the wall. And to me, I was in, I was alive during that situation. I had a draft card but my – I was in the lottery and it never came up. But I had a situation where, during the war, if I was drafted I still had an option of playing my music in the Marines so I didn't really have to go to war. However, I was very morally conflicted myself. So that conflict was I represented in the ‘Fire, Water, Paper’ score by showing the point of view of the Vietnamese in their language, and the poetry of an American poet who was a Vietnamese vet called Youssef Kumanyaka, as well as works in the Bible and Latin literature to tell this giant work. I think it's over an hour of music, three giant movie movements.
Yeah, it's an hour, yes.
And with very large chorus, very large orchestra, soloists and children's chorus singing in Vietnamese. I hope I get to hear that work again in a live situation. But I was very lucky to get that commission and Sejii Ozawa later toured it in Boston, Washington D.C., Kennedy Center. It was a big, big – and also in New York at Carnegie Hall. I had a well-represented in that performance at that time.
Elliot, before we talked about your concert music, you had mentioned Michael Mann. You had worked with on “Heat” and “Public Enemies”. What was your experience like? I have heard multiple times that Michael Mann can be a bit difficult to handle music-wise.
Well, Michael loves music. It's very important to him. He's the type of director – he’s both very prepared and knows what he wants. But at the same time he likes to refine things and change things along the way. And for some people it's extremely frustrating. And you just have to know what you're going up against. It’s just like, many people like the idea of going to Antarctica or something like that as an adventurous vacation. But you have to be prepared. You can't complain when you get to Antarctica that it's too cold, I want to go home because it’s cold. You have to realize what you're getting into before it. And Michael was very generous with me on “Heat” in giving me the time of working on experimentation in the studio before the movie was even filmed. He provided a healthy budget for it. The experimentation really paid off in the sense that there were a lot of fresh ideas through the experimentation that was prepared with when we started to do the movie. But it was very frustrating for a lot of people because things change and things fly around every day. And stuff is reworked and reworked until the end of the last second. And even then he changed things because, in his mind – it is his film. In the final analysis, it's his film. So he's refining it the way he sees it.
Was the situation the same on “Public Enemies”, or – ?
Yeah, absolutely the same. No difference. Absolutely. The only difference was, I'm working with a historical situation where the music didn't lend itself to a lecture on the guitars and things like that. Because it was taking place during the early part of the 20th century. A period piece, so to speak.
Right, absolutely. Elliot, I've got a question about the general state of film music. Many people voiced concerns about the current state of film music, as there's a lack of themes or lack of innovation or the quality has declined. What is your take on that? How do you perceive that?
I think the quality goes with the project, and so many projects are on the negative side. Big, big comic book-oriented, games-oriented action movies that often ask for cookie-cutter kind of manufactured almost type of scores. And also at the same time, there's independent movies, smaller movies for example, that require beautiful little well chiseled-out gorgeous scores. “Moonlight”, for example, two years ago. It was a gorgeous score and a beautiful movie. And also from time to time on big movies it's a wonderful scoring. The problem is this proliferation of these big comic book-oriented film scores. I ought to know, because I did “Batman” and “Demolition Man” and I know how difficult it is for a composer to maintain their own integrity and personality. And you can imagine if 10 of these movies are produced every year, so much money has to be made on these movies just to break even. They don't take any chances with experimental composers that much.
And the sound effects is just as important as anything else. And they're thinking about ancillary monies like games etc., etc. So the personality aspect is much less than it used to be. However in smaller movies there's wonderful scores being written, as always, you know?
I mean, you remain very busy. You have an incredible output still ,and your music keeps fascinating many music lovers. In 2017 alone you had written the music for the Netflix film “Our Souls at Night”. And then your Trumpet Concerto premiered and you had once more written for Broadway Theatre. Will you continue to write for all of these mediums?
Oh, no, absolutely. I have a movie project that I'm doing right now with Julie Taymor which is Gloria Steinem’s On the Road. Her autobiographical account for traveling throughout the world including India and the United States, Africa etc. So I don't know how the score would be, but it's going to be a big challenge. And in terms of my – I'm preparing for the recording of the trumpet concerto. I'm doing some edits on that in terms of expanding some parts and to make it a little easier for the trumpet player to get the trumpet player a little rest between the... but it was a great experience for me in Krakow Poland with Krzysztof Penderewski, who I tremendously admire. So I got to be with him in a personal level as well as share concerts in a few cities in Poland. So it was a tremendous experience and something that I cherish.
Is there going to be a CD release of the Trumpet Concerto which premiered at Krakow?
Yes, it would be. I have to record it again. I'm not going to release the performance. I'm going to release a new recorded version.
If I'm correct, I've noticed that you hardly ever conduct your own scores. Is it because you judge the cues from a recording perspective or do you feel the need to be in the booth to fully feel and observe the final product?
Well, no. I can say yes to that. But the main reason is, I don't have the skill that excellent conductors do. An excellent conductor doesn't have to be a composer. An excellent conductor knows how to manage time. Someone who can manage time in rehearsals, and I would just waste too much time. My music from time to time is very difficult to conduct. It always helps if I have a really, really good conductor that is trusted to conduct. I'm always asked by the musicians as a conductor to explain my notation when it's very difficult or be very clear in terms of time signature changes or challenging passages. The orchestra really relies on the conductor to be extremely clear. Many film composers don't have the skill as conductors. For me, I don't have that skill. I can conduct something very simple in 4/4 and 3/4 but, at the same time, as you suggested, I'm not in the same room with the director at the same time. And the director and everyone is talking behind my back in the booth. They might hate what they're hearing! I like to be in the booth with the director and the editor and the producers to hear their reaction and make changes, and I can run out to the conductor and suggest. But the most important reason is that a great conductor knows how to conduct. It's one thing being an adequate conductor. It's another thing being an excellent conductor. The orchestra conductors that are used to conducting Beethoven and Mahler and Schoenberg and Elliott Carter have much more skill than I can ever imagine having.
Conducting sounds like a difficult job. I mean, you’re right. Many, many of the top film composers don't regularly conduct their own scores.
You know, when you have a click track, it doesn't matter how you move your hands around. The musicians will hear the metronome and just play it. If you're in front of 80, 90 musicians, there's always five musicians that give the conductor a hard time. No matter what. It's human nature. Who needs that extra managerial skill? A great conductor has the ability to manage that element in the orchestra as well.
Say I was a great conductor. I'm still missing the experience of being with the producer or the director when he or she hears it for the first time. They don't like to stay in the orchestra, you know? They like to stay in the booth in the studio situation.
O.K. Many people also said it sounds very different when you're out there with the orchestra as opposed to being in the booth.
Depending on the studio, yes.
When you have a theme, you develop it into a cue and you start to orchestrate. Due to the time constraints of working on a motion picture or a Broadway theatre, at what point do you usually, if necessary, hand the cue to a fellow orchestrator in order to be able to finish writing the score on your own?
Most of my career I worked with one orchestrator, Robert Elhai, who is wonderful. He knows all my moves. He has tremendous stamina and he's a wonderful orchestrator. I don't really trust other orchestrators unless I have the time to go over every bar, every note. So either I do it myself or I do it with Bob, and I'm very happy that at least I know how it's going to sound. Of course you have to make adjustments in the studio in front of an orchestra, but it's a very, very personal thing. Orchestration is very, very, really personal.
Elliot, thank you so much for talking to me today. It was a huge privilege and an honor and thank you again for taking so much time out of your schedule. I hope we get to talk in the future again and it was really great today. Thank you so much and you have a nice day.
You too. Bye.