{"id":9639,"date":"2023-11-28T10:18:44","date_gmt":"2023-11-28T10:18:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/?p=9639"},"modified":"2024-01-09T11:48:46","modified_gmt":"2024-01-09T11:48:46","slug":"randy-newman-at-75-part-two-film-composer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/?p=9639","title":{"rendered":"Randy Newman at 80: Part Two \u2013 Film composer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

By Ray Bennett<\/p>\n

LONDON \u2013 Randy Newman, who turns 80 today, \u00a0has Academy Awards, Grammy Awards and Emmy Awards and he is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He\u2019s also a very funny man. He told me that he thought once of being a television comedy writer and he would make a great one \u2013 his work on \u2018The Three Amigos\u2019 with Steve Martin and Lorne Michaels is proof of that \u2013 but TV\u2019s loss is music\u2019s gain.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>He has been one of my favourite singer-songwriters since I bought his album \u2018Sail Away\u2019 in 1970 and he deserved Oscar\u2019s attention for scores such as \u2018Ragtime\u2019, \u2018The Natural\u2019 and \u2018Avalon\u2019 long before his 16th nomination led to a win in 2002 for best original song for \u2018If I Didn\u2019t Have You\u2019 from \u2018Monsters, Inc.\u2019 (He won a second in 2011 for \u2018We Belong Together\u2019 from \u2018Toy Story 3\u2019). I own nearly all his recorded work; I\u2019ve seen him in concert several times; I\u2019ve interviewed him a few times and hung out with him at the Festival de Cannes.<\/p>\n

Hanging out with Randy Newman is as interesting and as much fun as you might expect it would be. His humour can be as caustic as some of his songs but he is self-deprecating and droll and a keen observer of life in general and music in particular.<\/p>\n

Part Two: Randy Newman, film composer<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Newman\u2019s first film assignment was with Jack Nietzsche and Ry Cooder on the 1970 film \u2018Performance\u2019 directed by Donald Cammell (who died in 1996) and the late Nicolas Roeg starring Mick Jagger and James Fox. He said the transition from rock star to film composer was different from most because scoring pictures was \u201cthe family business\u201d. One uncle, Alfred Newman, had 43 Oscar nominations and nine wins and another, Lionel Newman, had 11 nominations and one win. He told me, \u201cWhen I was 8, my vague thought was that I\u2019d be a film composer someday but I went in a different direction. The first picture scared the hell out of me. I had a perhaps exaggerated respect for it. I\u2019d seen it done by experts and I thought if my family had been scared then I should be in the hospital.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

His family legacy was daunting, he said. \u201cI found it so. I think my cousins Tom and David [Oscar-nominated Thomas Newman (\u2018Bridge of Spies\u2019, \u2018Spectre\u2019) and David Newman (\u2018Anastasia\u2019, \u2018The Nutty Professor\u2019)], who are both really good film composers, might feel the same way. They were strict, you know. My uncle Lionel would have lunch at the commissary and unless you were Jerry Goldsmith or John Williams or a relative it was hard to get a seat. Yes, I felt the weight of my family. My uncle Alfred wouldn\u2019t have cared but I felt Lionel and Johnny Williams \u2026 it would have meant a lot to me if, after I did \u2018The Natural\u2019, one of them had said \u2018Oh, nice job son\u2019 but we had the kind of family \u2026 other people would tell me, \u2018Oh, your father loves you.\u2019 I\u2019d say, \u2018Really? When did you see him?\u2019 It was a rough family.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Expectations for him were high, he said, \u201cOnly in my own mind. For the first few years, I was looking over my shoulder. It took longer for traditional composers to take me seriously, longer than it should have. It wasn\u2019t too bad. It wasn\u2019t as if I was denied Academy Award nominations. I sat next to Alan Menken three times at the Oscars. You\u2019re always sitting next to the guy who beats you.\u201d His composing credits are impressive, however, starting in film with \u2018Cold Turkey\u2019 in 1971 and including Oscar nominations for \u2018Parenthood\u2019 (1989), \u2018The Paper\u2019 (1994), \u2018Toy Story\u2019 (1995), \u2019James and the Giant Peach\u2019 (1996), \u2018Pleasantville\u2019 (1998), \u2018A Bug\u2019s Life\u2019 (1998), \u2018Babe, Pig in the City\u2019 (1999), \u2018Toy Story 2\u2019 (1999), \u2018Meet the Parents\u2019 (2000), \u2018Cars\u2019 (2006), and \u2018The Princess and the Frog\u2019 (2009). His latest picture was \u2018Cars 3\u2019 (2017) and he\u2019s doing \u2018Toy Story 4\u2019 for next year.<\/p>\n

Newman said he always records his film scores in Los Angeles because he goes back a long way with the orchestra there: \u201cWhen I was a boy, my uncle [Alfred] was doing pictures like \u2018All About Eve\u2019 and \u2018How Green Was My Valley\u2019. There are families in the orchestra. They are a great orchestra. Certainly, they read better than any orchestra in the world, I\u2019m fairly confident in saying that. They can play anything you put in front of them. There are other orchestras that can do it \u2026 more than I might think, I know. But I see no reason to go elsewhere. If someone suggests going elsewhere, I say I\u2019d rather record in L.A. With directors, there will be problems in every area of your life, including respiration, but not that one. They haven\u2019t tried to move me yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>His composing technique is simple: \u201cI sit at the piano and sometimes I\u2019ll cheat and use the trumpet but my trumpet sounds like it\u2019s coming out of my nose. I\u2019m not really computer literate but they do have good samplers.\u201d Dealing with directors is more complicated: \u201cYou have to learn to subdue your ego. Everything you do is designed to make the picture look better, to make a love scene work better. I\u2019ve seen love scenes without music and they don\u2019t appear to even like each other. Music can trick people. You see \u2018Star Wars\u2019 without the music and you see the cardboard. With Johnny\u2019s music there, it\u2019s something else.\u201d<\/p>\n

The problem in writing music for films, he said, is that composers do not get enough time to do the job: \u201cNever. There are guys who\u2019ll take the movie and do it in three weeks. I won\u2019t. I take time over money. Did I say that aloud? I\u2019d rather have another two weeks than another $20. But, I wouldn\u2019t want to come in too early. I don\u2019t want to hang around the set and be pals with everybody. You don\u2019t learn a thing from what you think when they\u2019re shooting. You don\u2019t know what the movie\u2019s going to need until it\u2019s up there on the screen. What you think the movie might require and what the director might think he\u2019s got on the screen sometimes will be different from what\u2019s actually up there.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he does not expect directors to be articulate about music and so he speaks to them in a non-musical way: \u201cI think the scene should have more edge, say. Music can communicate much information but it does emotional things very well. You must not to be intimidated by them not having musical knowledge. They\u2019re not supposed to. I try to do what the director wants unless I have a better idea or what he\u2019s got on the screen is not what he thinks he\u2019s got on the screen. You always have a temp track and I almost don\u2019t mind it now. I\u2019d rather not have one but that\u2019s never going to happen. They want to show the picture so they want a temp but you should hire a composer who will do better than your temp. The conversations with directors \u2026 if you think they\u2019re wrong, you try to reason with them but it\u2019s their picture. We work for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>He quoted the late film composer James Horner (\u2018Titanic\u2019) who noted that directors tend to come from rock and roll and listening to the radio and watching TV. \u201cIt\u2019s all little short things, songs that you can beat around but film doesn\u2019t go that way. After \u2018The Graduate\u2019, they all wanted songs like that and they stuck them in everywhere. Sometimes they were hit songs, like in \u2018Beverly Hills Cop\u2019 they had a truck running through the streets and they put its a song but it didn\u2019t fit. It was wrong. The song was a hit so maybe it was the right thing do. I saw a Woody Allen movie and it had this great music in it, great old songs from the Thirties and Forties by the best composers America has produced in the medium. Gershwin\u2019s in there. It didn\u2019t work at all. It comes in, it comes out. It\u2019s like a porn movie. You expect to see someone in one sock. Music can be great but not fit a movie. I\u2019m not saying it\u2019s a great art form but it is a very complex thing and not very many people know much about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

On \u2018Maverick\u2019 (1994), for instance, director Richard Donner asked Newman what funny instruments there are: \u201cHe wanted everything with the banjo. I said some vulgarisms. A tuba isn\u2019t that funny. You could stick a trumpet up your ass, which is what we ended up doing. No, I ended up on the stand in front of 100 people with three of the best trumpeters in the world, two anyway, having them go \u2018nwak, nwak, nwak\u2019 with a trombone going like that too because he wanted what he wanted. He might have been right because the movie was successful and he\u2019s been successful. He just wanted to make sure that the audience got the joke.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Then there\u2019s the time when a director throws out the score. \u201cIt\u2019s happened to everyone,\u201d Newman said. \u201cIt happened to me on \u2018Air Force One\u2019 and I don\u2019t really know why. He never said anything so there\u2019s nothing I can say about it so I\u2019m sorry for myself but I never heard why. With that director, Wolfgang Petersen, when he described what he wanted, he would \u2018Woof! Woohpah!\u2019. I did it all with synths. One time there was a scene where they were talking in the cockpit. It was in the midst of action but they were still talking so I got the music down for the dialogue as you\u2019re supposed to do. I took out the trumpets and played some woodwinds, still keeping it moving but playing it down. He said, \u2018No, no, the dialogue doesn\u2019t matter. Forget it, don\u2019t worry about the dialogue.\u2019 Don\u2019t worry about the dialogue? I guess we were on different pages. He is an accomplished director but perhaps we didn\u2019t understand each other very well. I bought back the music but unfortunately we\u2019re getting along with the Russians now. If there\u2019s ever a rupture in our relations, I\u2019ve got some good \u2018bad Russians\u2019 music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scoring animation, he said, is different from scoring action or a love story. \u201c\u2018Maverick\u2019 had a love story as well as action. With animated pictures, you can\u2019t do them the same way. Tom Hanks plays Woody in \u2018Toy Story\u2019 and when he falls down you have to fall with him. There’s almost no way out of it. Disney has tried scoring them like real pictures but it just doesn\u2019t work. If Tom Hanks falls down in \u2018Saving Colonel Ryan\u2019 \u2026 \u2018Saving Sergeant Ryan\u2019 \u2026 \u2018Private\u2019, really? .. and they save him, you don’t do that. Animation is more strenuous to do. \u2018A Bug\u2019s Life\u2019 was very difficult because it\u2019s fast music with a lot of notes. They\u2019re bugs and they\u2019re really moving. They\u2019re not little ants to us. To them, a crevice is the Grand Canyon so I played the Grand Canyon. In \u2018Toy Story\u2019, they were indoors, this was outdoors. It was \u2018The Big Country\u2019 to some degree. Visually, it had an epic quality. Love scenes are different. In \u2018Toy Story\u2019, in their world those characters are adults and when they have emotions you play them seriously. When Buzz thinks he\u2019s a spaceman, I write him a spaceman. I write him spaceman music. I think he\u2019s a spaceman. You can\u2019t condescend or treat them as if they were children. You take it seriously. There wasn\u2019t a love scene in \u2018Toy Story\u2019, unfortunately. Woody and Buzz never \u2026 well, they did fall in love but they cut that part, so it\u2019s very different.\u201d<\/p>\n

As with his songs, he prefers not to name his favourite film scores. \u201cThey are like children. Some of my children, I don\u2019t like. No, I love them all. I think I helped fool people that a movie was better than it was sometimes, like \u2018Awakenings\u2019. A good score will not make a movie great but it can improve its IQ by a couple points. \u2018James and the Giant Peach\u2019 made a bundle and maybe I was responsible for $340,000 of it. It wasn\u2019t a successful movie but I helped it. \u2018A Bug\u2019s Life\u2019, maybe, \u2018Monsters, Inc.\u2019 The way I choose what I\u2019m going to do, of the offers that I get, is how much music matters. There are great movies where it doesn\u2019t matter what the music is \u2026 I was going to say \u2018Beautiful Mind\u2019, but in that case James Horner did a good score for it. He fooled you a little bit into thinking that movie was a little classier than it was. It does happen.\u2019<\/p>\n

Coming from a legendary film music family, Newman reveres the masters of his craft: \u201cJerry Goldsmith, John Williams, my uncle Alfred. Alex North was one of the great film composers of all time. \u2018Cleopatra\u2019 was not a good picture but it\u2019s a great score. Morricone. Nino Rota was one of the Top Five of all time, certainly. The guy who did Truffaut\u2019s movies, Georges Delerue. Prokofiev was a great film composer. Copeland became a great film composer.\u201d<\/p>\n

When we in Cannes film in 2002, there was a memorable concert, a rarity at the film festival, which featured top composers conducting an orchestra performing their most famous scores. The late Francis Lai (\u2018A Man and a Woman\u2019), Frederic Devreese (\u2018Louvre au noir\u2019), \u2018Antoine Duhamel (\u2018Ridicule\u2019), Ennio Morricone (\u201cCinema Paradiso\u2019) and Jean-Claud Petit (\u2018Cyrano de Bergerac\u2019) were there along with Randy Newman, who presented his score for \u2018Avalon\u2019. Newman told me afterwards that being there had meant more to him than winning the Oscar. \u2018It was kind of fantastic. I\u2019d like to go again. It was unforgettable seeing Francis Lai playing his accordion.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ray Bennett LONDON \u2013 Randy Newman, who turns 80 today, \u00a0has Academy Awards, Grammy Awards and Emmy Awards and he is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He\u2019s also a very funny man. He told me that … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,1263,8,2257],"tags":[4949,4950,4951,4170,1000],"class_list":["post-9639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-interviews","category-memory-lane","category-music","category-recalling","tag-ragtime","tag-the-natural","tag-toy-story","tag-festival-de-cannes","tag-randy-newman"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9639"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9639\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11125,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9639\/revisions\/11125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}