When did you realize you’d be working with Joel Schumacher on this film?
On the set of “Batman Forever” when we were talking about “A Time To Kill”.
This film was an emotional roller coaster ride if there ever was one. Boy, you really have gotten involved in some major projects.
Luck is the residue of design.
How do you slip into the intense emotions of the moment to score this film?
It’s extremely hard because you can’t fake it. You actually have to be there; you have to experience the fear of the little child being raped, you have to feel the anger of the father whose daughter was raped, you have to feel the hatred that the Klan has towards other fellow Americans, and you have to feel the pride that a Klansman feels when he puts his racist outfit on. An example: In the scene where they say, “Welcome to the Klan”, many composers would record evil music under this. I said to Joe, “I want to record heroic music under the Klan because that’s the way they feel; they feel heroic.” And that’s the truth; they feel like big heroes. We know that they’re evil, but wouldn’t it more interesting to show them as how they feel themselves? Those are the types of things where I really tried to show the awful, ugly sense of conflict in the race riot and how really ugly it is.
You just said you had to put yourself inside the characters and situations of this film. Did scoring this affect your life outside of work?
When you’re scoring and working with these characters, there’s a tremendous emotional commitment that you have to it; make no mistake about it. This reminded you that throughout the world there is all of this hatred that goes around and it’s pretty pitiful. It goes back to all of that as being an American and seeing, even in this country, a continued sense of inequity and racism. I think there are still golf courses that restrict Jews. You say, “Wait a second. What’s all that about?” You start to think about how deep the sense of hatred and racism is, and it’s very lamentable.
At what point in the scoring process did you find the emotional tone of this film?
Immediately. The first time I watched the movie it was extremely emotional. I started thinking in a technical manner, saying, “What are the obvious pitfalls and clichés you can fall into here? What are the clichés that would make this seem like any other southern racist movie?”
When it was from the Klan’s point of view I wanted it to always be very beautiful; but when it was from the victim’s point of view the music was ugly. It’s a cliché when they’re going to a Klan meeting and the music is ugly. I wanted to break that cliché; that was strong. You start thinking about where you can do the job, but not do it in a usual way. Your first impression of a film is usually the best. Quite often composers like Ennio Morricone bring music paper and a pencil in while they’re seeing a movie in a screening room for the first time. They just jot some musical ideas down so that their first impression of the film stats with them in the composing process. I jot down ideas in my brain and remember; I don’t have to put it on paper until I’m ready.
Which of your films gave you the strongest impression on how to score it the first time you saw it?
“Interview with the Vampire” is the closest one. I knew exactly what I wanted to do pretty much right on.
On the cue ‘Verdict Fanfare’ I noticed this was dedicated to Aaron Copland. This has some of your finest brass work ever.
There was this scene where the verdict came down and a celebration broke out for Carl Lee Hailey who had actually won. I thought of Aaron Copland and I wasn’t trying to work within his style, but there was an Americana feeling and I was just giving him a little homage, tipping my hat to the memory of him.
How did Joel deal with you this time since “Batman Forever” was a completely different type of scoring project?
It was, “Hey, he knows how to score a film.” The trust in the first project came into play with this project. He let me run with it, but he made specific changes here and there. Even after the score was written he moved some of the cues around in different scenes here and there; one of them worked extremely well. It’s not like he just got what he got from me; we tailored this together.