Lost Issue: Cinemusic 1997 - Part One of Three

As far as film festivals go, Switzerland's Cinemusic has the potential to become one of the finest in the world. But "potential" is the operative word here, as this year's International Music and Film Festival was marred by many last-second delays and cancellations.

Held from March 7 to 15 in Gstaad, 1997 was Cinemusic's third and most crucial year. It marked the end of a three-year financial commitment by Swissair and American Express, the festival's two principal sponsors. While they will remain on as contributors, their donations will be significantly decreased, which leaves festival organizers scurrying for cash. This year also marks the departure of artistic director Peter Reichenbach, who was largely responsible for getting big-name talent to come to the festival. As of this writing, his successor(s) have not been announced.

Although cancellations are the norm at any major event, it seemed that this year's Cinemusic will be equally remembered by the guests who didn't show as the ones who did. Singer Al Jarreau was replaced at the last-minute by a look-alike named Sunny Band, and British rocker Chris Rea -- who was supposed to come with his first film "La Passione" -- sent a rough cut of the film instead. Rea remained in England working on the final touches of "La Passione," and couldn't come.

One of the biggest disappointments was the announcement that famed director Blake Edwards (Victor/Victoria, The Pink Panther series) would not be attending the festival. Scheduled to receive the first Vincente Minnelli award to a director who best uses music in his films, Edwards was unable to attend due to a sinus infection. Liza Minnelli, presenter of the award, accepted it in his place, and even she was not exempt from problems; a sore throat prevented her from singing on the closing Gala Night. Since a number of guests were unable to attend, several round-table discussions had to be scrapped. Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet was accepted into Cannes, and therefore could not be premiered at Cinemusic as planned (a pity for anyone not familiar with Patrick Doyle's wonderful music from the film). Frenzied organizers did their best to appease everyone, although there were moments when frayed nerves got the best of all. At one point, an overheated Leslie Bricusse was overheard directing four-letter words at outgoing festival director Peter Reichenbach. At the Video Clips round table later in the week, director Roman Polanski was justifiably upset during the premiere of his first music video "Gli Angeli" for Italian pop star Vasco Rossi, which was shown on a half-dozen small television sets with poor quality sound and color, instead of on a big screen (to make it up to Polanski, the video was show on a large screen during the gala).

On the positive side, Cinemusic-goers were treated to not one, but two outstanding concerts by the legendary Quincy Jones, who is remarkable not only for his many talents as a composer, conductor and musical visionary, but his kindness. Some of the performers joining Jones included his daughter Jollie Jones, Monica Mancini, Patti Austin, Belgian harmonica legend Toots Thielemans, Greg Phillinganes (keyboardist for Michael Jackson), and the London Metropolitan Orchestra. Both shows were nothing short of spectacular, and literally had the audience dancing in the aisles.

Another highlight of Cinemusic 1997 was a terrific show by Liz McComb, The Great Lady of Gospel. At one point, McComb was so sure of herself that she sang a rendition of "Go Down, Moses" a cappella and without a microphone!

To maintain interest and attract new sponsors, Cinemusic 1998 needs an influx of major talent. This year was blessed with events like the intensive, five-hour workshop with Patrick Doyle and Regis Wargnier, entitled "The Composer and His Director," and I'd love to see this theme explored further. Jon Burlingame did a great job moderating this and other round table discussions. Is it really too much to ask for composer/director teams like John Williams and Stephen Spielberg, Jodie Foster and Mark Isham, or a host of other talented, contemporary artists? How about a concert featuring Maurice Jarre and son Jean-Michel? With any luck, organizers of the festival will do everything possible to make Cinemusic compete globally, not only as a festival of film music, but as a film festival period. Next year's Cinemusic is scheduled to take place March 7 to 14. During the Gala, a video of Julie Andrews was screened. One of the event's organizers, Andrews was in New York, where she is doing the Broadway version of Victor/Victoria. She promised that both she and Edwards would attend Cinemusic 1998.

THE DIRECTOR AND HIS COMPOSER(Cinemusic Round-table, Palace Hotel, 12 March 1997)

No matter how successful a film music composer becomes, he ultimately has to satisfy not only his own artistic desires, but those of the director. History is full of examples of good relationships turned sour, such as that between Bernard Herrmann and Alfred Hitchcock on Torn Curtain, but what keeps today's director/composer partnerships afloat?

The focus of a key round-table discussion at this year's Cinemusic, "The Director and His Composer" was moderated by Jon Burlingame, and participants included directors Baz Luhrmann (Strictly Ballroom, Romeo + Juliet), Regis Wargnier (Indochine) and composer Patrick Doyle. Quincy Jones, who had just arrived in Gstaad mere hours before the round-table, could not attend. Wargnier and Doyle, who have worked together on two films, consider each other's character as important as talent. "It's the personalities," said Doyle, taking a drag of his Silk Cut cigarette. "When I first met Regis, he had a twinkle in the eye, and sparkled as a person. You've got to like the person. Hopefully after that, you get into a way of working that keeps you and the director artistically satisfied."

Doyle is best-known for his work with renowned British director Kenneth Branagh; their most recent film together was the epic, four-hour Hamlet. And although the two have worked on many projects over the years, Doyle maintains great admiration for Branagh's musical intuition.

"He has a very strong and exact gut feeling about how the score works," said Doyle. "After all, he has thought about it a lot longer than I have. Kenneth has stopped me being too fancy all the time, saying 'You'll have your moment here,' or 'You'll have your moment there.'"

Doyle reminisced about his early days with Branagh, when they created a series of Shakespearean productions for the radio, with practically no budget for music. Since he was unable to hire a full orchestra, Doyle "worked on one of the machines a lot of these composers have for television," and was amazed at the quality of some of the samples. To take the edge off the synthesized strings, he would, when permitted, employ a quartet. "You can make beautiful music cheap," he said. "Miracles happen, but you get tired of miracles. It's double the work, trying to make David sound like Goliath. It's really hard." But even when a composer's career takes off and the productions he works on become more financially stable, embarrassing -- if not potentially disastrous -- moments still happen. Doyle talked about the time Wargnier dropped by his London office to discuss the music for a big-budget French film project. Doyle's tape recorder broke just before the meeting, and since there was no time to buy a new one, he borrowed his kids' Fisher-Price tape recorder. "It didn't have a door on it, so when you'd press the eject button the tape flew out and you caught it."

When Wargnier arrived for the meeting, all was ready -- except Doyle forgot to hide the toy recorder in his desk drawer. "What is this?" asked Wargnier. "Are you telling me that the music for the biggest budget movie in the history of French movies was recorded on a Fisher-Price?"

"It was the most embarrassing moment of my life," said Doyle. "Regis said, 'Just play it.' And it came out sounding '"oooo-wwwooooo". And he said he wants to go back to the producers with the tape, and I said I'll get a new recorder, and he said, "No, I want it recorded...on the Fisher-Price." So he took it back, and the producers were saying, "It's very nice."

Working with limited resources is nothing new to Australian director Baz Luhrmann, who is best-known for his endearing 1993 film Strictly Ballroom.

"I come from a country where, because of resources, a huge orchestral score has just never been an option," said Luhrmann. "Just now, some of the biggest films are using them. When we did Strictly Ballroom, we created the score for that out of a few session musicians and a lot of illusion, because we didn't have an orchestra. You have to use the resources at hand. If we all had endless resources and endless budgets, we'd all keep going until we got it right. Actually, the constraints in which you work define just how creative a person you are, because that factor is the one that is probably least discussed: making something of nothing."

The director/composer relationship on Luhrmann's second film, Romeo + Juliet, was more that of director and music producer. For the movie, Luhrmann got involved with the people responsible for the alternative/pop soundtracks of Pulp Fiction and Trainspotting.

"They are absolutely passionate about these things called 'inspired by' albums," said Luhrmann. "There are 10 tracks that aren't in the film, you know, but hey, it's going to help sell tickets. So every piece of music in the film was specifically selected because of its story-telling value. Essentially, we have an album of set pieces of music, pop tracks, which is now triple platinum in the United States. It's the biggest record that Capitol had this year. It's bigger than the Beatles reissue." Luhrmann said a second, orchestral score from the film will be coming out soon, which he calls the "spine" of the story. "I like to think that in the work I do I'm the captain of the collaboration," said Luhrmann. "I like to work with everyone on a one-on-one level. It's never a case of me saying, 'Well, I told you to do that, so you go and do it.' I've never had to do that, and wouldn't enjoy being in that position. But I particularly enjoy working with a composer. I just love watching composers work. To me it's absolute collaboration, and if anything, it's about helping the composer getting to where the story needs to go. I love that part."

PATRICK DOYLE

Although he did not win an Academy Award for his score to Kenneth Branagh's four-hour epic Hamlet, composer Patrick Doyle is grateful for having been nominated. "It's a great honor and not to be taken lightly, but I honestly don't think about it," said Doyle, 43.

While Doyle's name might not be as well-known to North American audiences as that of Shakespearean bad-boy Branagh, his music made a big impression when he scored Henry V for the actor/director back in 1989. The soundtrack received not only critical acclaim, but Britain's coveted Ivor Novello Award for Best Film Theme. Doyle was pleased. It was the first time he ever wrote music for a film. Soon after, an impressed Prince Charles asked Doyle to compose a song cycle built around four famous English poems in honor of the Queen Mother's 90th birthday. Since then, Doyle has gone on to score four more films for Branagh, and worked with directors Brian De Palma, Regis Wargnier, Richard Benjamin and actress/writer Emma Thompson on Sense and Sensibility, his first Academy Award nomination. "I'm very fortunate, and appreciate of the directors I've worked with," said Doyle. "I never expect a director to come back a second time, because each project is totally different." A small, bespeckled man with short greying hair, Doyle was in Gstaad, Switzerland for Cinemusic, The International Music and Film Festival. Sitting on the balcony of the famed Palace Hotel, Doyle's face was still swollen from a tooth abscess which was removed only an hour before by a female dentist "with the hands of King Kong."

Despite the pain, Doyle still laughs at his good fortune. After studying at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, Doyle taught piano for a few years, and became an actor and composer for British television. He met Branagh a decade ago, and joined his Renaissance Theatre Company as an actor, composer and musical director. Their partnership has already been compared to that of another famous team, actor/director Orson Welles and composer Bernard Herrmann, whose most famous collaboration was Citizen Kane.

"Kenneth had a very strong and exact gut feeling about the score to Hamlet," said Doyle. "His objective was that the film shouldn't be 'doomy' -- it should have thriller and dark elements -- but keep this veneer that everything is fine. This is why you want the main theme to be noble, to be full of hope, and to have a melancholy in its soul."

To this day, Doyle continues to have maintain great friendships with Branagh and ex-wife Emma Thompson, despite their well-publicized and hostile split. At one point, Thompson said Branagh's sperm was on crutches; he replied by making an insinuating remark about Thompson taking her Oscar to bed. Doyle regards the remarks by shaking his head.

"I knew Emma long before I met Ken, two or three years," said Doyle. "They're both adults, very discreet people. They're both professionals -- you can see it in their work." Even though he didn't win for his Original Dramatic Score, Doyle said he was eager to meet with director Richard Benjamin immediately after the Oscars to discuss a new project. Doyle has a special affinity for Benjamin: the two worked together on Mrs. Winterbourne, and Benjamin used to act, like Doyle. "I choose the job on my instincts," said Doyle. "Do I like the people? Do I like the script? My first priority is: will this be fun? Richard Benjamin directed, in my opinion, one of the funniest comedies ever, My Favorite Year."

Although he is best known today as a composer, Doyle has also appeared on-screen in most of Branagh's films. He was a singing soldier in Henry V, an obnoxious guest and cop in Dead Again, and Balthasar in Much Ado About Nothing. He appeared as Osric in the stage production of Hamlet, but wasn't in the new screen version of Hamlet.

"Kenneth never asked," said Doyle, laughing.

To be Continued in the next Lost Issue...

MailBag@filmscoremonthly.com