Mr. Goldenthal, thank you for making the time to talk to me. Now, how does it feel for you to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the World Soundtrack Academy here in Ghent? I'm not ready. You're not ready! I'm not ready! Because it does feel like the end, a lifetime, or…? Well, usually if they – it feels like a final act. But in the same time, I love the fact that – and I'm very honored by the fact that – that the festival here in Ghent. I think this is my sixth time here. And through the ’90s and a few times in the ’10s and ’20s and, you know, and the work with Dirk, and that you notice the important work of composers in our field, which is often forgotten about or as soon as the film is disposed of in, you know, in popular culture, you know. It's very, very, very heartwarming to know that you find value in that work. But instead of saying that this is the final act, let's say this is a retrospect on what you already did for film because they also recorded an album with your music. Retrospect. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can live with that. And they recorded an album with your music this summer. You were also present there in Ghent at Brussels Philharmonic. They played it, conducted by Dirk Brosse. Now, were you also there when they made the selections of which of your pieces of music they were going to record? Yeah, yes. It's the most difficult part because some of the selections had to be shortened and excerpted to be presented, because we wanted to do so much more. You know, we had big ideas to do maybe, you know, four or five additional scores than that. So we managed to do probably 10 scores on that. And that was big enough. We managed to just record until the last second, you know. And, talking about big scores, there is a big suite on this album, the ‘Gothic Suite’, which has, I think... That's a complete – that's not excerpted or shortened. No. That's the complete suite. It's almost 20 minutes’ music from “Batman Forever” and “Batman and Robin”. I think it was once performed live in Krakow, I think, and now it's recorded for the first time. It was performed live first in Tenerife and then maybe in Prague and Krakow and Ireland. It was, it's a very good recording in Ireland, a live radio broadcast. But this is the first, the premier album of this, this first time it was ever recorded officially. Yeah, now it's here to stay and to be enjoyed by everyone. Yes, yes. And, you know, Dirk is a master. He did great. And as a composer, you work with many directors, but one of those is Julie Taymor, and who's also your wife. You work together on “Titus”, on the glorious “Frida”, “Across the Universe”, and a few others. Now, how is it to work with your spouse? So as a composer, to have a professional relationship next to then the one you have at home? Well, it's like every director. Once the work begins where you have to finish with a deadline; you have to. It's the same obstacles and the same negotiations you have to have between collaborators and any director. There's no difference than Julie or Neil Jordan or Gus Van Sant. It's the same. As a matter of fact, every project is different. Every film is different. But before the project starts, it's very romantic because you're discovering things. You don't have the pressure of finishing it today or tomorrow. So you have the romance of discovery. And would it be great if you just try this or try that? And once you start to do it, it's very, very serious work. It's always very difficult with every director. But next to that, you have the opportunity to discover it together. Yes. Yes. But it's not so easy to communicate what's in one person's mind until the next word person. You have a period of – you might verbally understand something and agree. I like this music to sound like the color red or the color blue. And you're like, Oh yeah, that's a great idea, that's a great idea. When you start to do it, you have to demonstrate it. And that's where it becomes difficult with any collaborators. And also, you worked on film, but you also worked for theater and for ballet. And also together with Julie. It's a different medium, but does that mean that it also needs for a different approach for music? Sometimes. “Titus”, that work was a much different approach because you're looking at the performers, you're looking at the rhythm editing, you're looking at the locations. So all of these things inform a composer or myself. The flow and the nature of the music, it constantly changes. It's much different than the theater experience. But the theater experience, because of Shakespeare in this situation, provided an element of understanding the text. Because Shakespeare is not easy in English. For English speaking, it's very difficult because the language has changed in the last four or five hundred years. The language has changed. So you have to learn English almost as a different language. So it takes time to ingest what Shakespeare is referring to as subtleties. And it's great when you have ten weeks of rehearsal in the theater to hear everyone learning the text for the first time. And does it have an impact on the way you write music for theater? I think so. The more you understand what the text will means, especially if you're writing a song, it informs you, it gives you a deeper understanding. And because the language is difficult, you don't want to intrude. You have to compose something where the words are clear and audible to the audience. You don't want to make the music too dominant, too loud, to cover the dialogue. And based on the styles? Because you're also known for using a lot of different styles and different musical influences. Yes, and “Titus” especially, because it's in different time periods. But it's also true when you apply different stylistic approaches, you have to constant is you can't intrude in the language. You have to hear the language primarily, unless it's transitions from one scene to another when you have no dialogue. For example, at the beginning of “Titus”, you have the big presentation of the marching soldiers and the tanks coming through. And that, the whole section, I translated the Shakespeare English into Latin. So they're singing the Latin. It's actually hearing Shakespeare in Latin. So you don't have to understand the language. You know that it's about hell, Titus, great, great, great, great, Caesar's king, whatever. You hear, you feel it in the choral writing for that. And in the end, “Titus” is a very brutal story. It's a very brutal, brutal, brutal story. And I don't think the brutality has ever left, if you look at what's happening in in Ukraine or Gaza or, at that time, in the Balkans. And it's just, it's horrible. The human brutality, it just never stops. If I look at your – I've got the internet movie that is one of the last projects you did was “The Glorias”, one with Julie Taymor. But are there any plans for you to go into write for music again? Or is your focus more on the theater nowadays? The theater and the concert stage. Last week I had in Helsinki, I had my second symphony premiere. And if you want the details I can provide you. It was really, really, went really, really well. And next month in Poland, in Gdańsk, they're doing my third symphony with a big concert with Goretsky and myself for the celebration of Lech Walesa. Democracy is very important now. Very, very important. And when you write for concert, because normally when you write for film, you have a script, you have images. When you write for concert, what is your inspiration when you write a symphony, for instance? Well, the symphony in Helsinki was based on a Shakespearean ballet that I did in Othello. So it's the musical material. But the ballet has been recorded many years ago, I think. That's right. So I created a symphonic version of that. And it took some time, but I feel very, very good about this symphonic version. And the Polish piece is based, it's for soprano and chorus, I'm sorry, and full orchestra. It's 45 minutes of a poetry by this woman named Barbara Sadowska, who wrote poems about during the Soviet occupation of Poland in the 1970s. So the poems were your inspiration? Yeah, the poems were the inspiration. And the first symphony, the second movement was based on some of the film work that I really, really wanted to have heard in the proper setting in a concert stage. For example, some motives I wrote for “Final Fantasy” appears in that symphony. And when I heard it performed at the recording studio, I said, my God, there should be a live version of this. So I modified it into a way that reappeared as a symphonic version in the first symphony. Yeah, and to come back to your film work or to the music for film album that has been recorded, also ‘Final Fantasy Suite’ is recorded for that album. Yeah, but none of the material I used for the symphony. Right, because for “Final Fantasy” you also wrote a song or the theme was transformed into a song which was a hard symphony. And that was the first symphony that you recorded. So you transformed into a song which was the heart of the film itself. Yes, yes. Was that the first time that you were working on a song with Final Fantasy or did you write more of those? The song with “Final Fantasy”, no, that was the only song for that. But in many, many, many films of mine maybe 70% of the films involve songs or singing in one way or another. Our time is almost up. I have a few more questions for you. One is out of personal interest. All the Batman movies have been released as a score, but the only one who hasn't been released is “Batman and Robin”. So from that film we have some music on the suite. But do you know if there are plans to ever release from Warner Brothers the “Batman and Robin”? I don't think so. The movie was very unsuccessful financially. “Batman Forever” was very successful. But I don't think they’re very proud of that movie from a business point of view. But the music is excellent. The music might be excellent, but I'm not an executive at Warner Brothers, so… [laughs] Maybe future will tell. Now to end the interview I have three short questions for you. What is your favorite score that you've written? Something that you're proud of that gives you fond memories? Well, many of them. I can't pick one. Different scores for different reasons. I love “Drugstore Cowboy”, “Butcher Boy”. I love “Frida”, “Titus”, “Interview of the Vampire”,“Alien 3”. Every one shows different aspects of my work. Of you as a composer. Yes. And what is your favorite score from another composer? Let's say something that inspires you. It's hard to answer because as a young man, as a teenager I used to see the great movies in history. The great Fellini movies, the great Bergman music, the great Hitchcock movies. So the great scores of Bernard Herrmann, “North by Northwest”, scores of Nina Rota, scores of Morricone for example, “The Mission”. All these great great great scores had a big influence on me. Was there one composer that really gave you inspiration? No. No? No. Okay. No. In film I don't think so. And classical? Yeah, but I have to say that my teacher, John Corigliano, his score for “Altered States” was a big influence on me because I was studying with him at the time. And to see how he used all these wonderful alternative techniques for film in “Altered States” was, something later, “The Red Violin”. But that work was very influenced on me. I have to say John Corigliano is my answer. All right. Thank you very much. Thanks for the interview. I wish you the best. Thank you.