Lorne Balfe (Mission: Impossible – Fallout & Dead Reckoning, His Dark Materials, Black Widow, The Wheel of Time, Black Adam, Bad Boys for Life, Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F, Top Gun: Maverick) has taken over scoring duties on the upcoming action comedy The Naked Gun. The reboot of the 1988 classic (scored by Ira Newborn) is directed by Akiva Schaffer (Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers, Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping) and stars Liam Neeson, Pamela Anderson, Paul Walter Hauser, Kevin Durand, CCH Pounder, Liza Koshy, Cody Rhodes, Eddie Yu and Danny Huston. The film follows Lt. Frank Drebin Jr. as he follows in the footsteps of his father. Schaffer also co-wrote the screenplay with Dan Gregor & Doug Mand (Dolittle, Magic Camp). Seth MacFarlane (Family Guy, Ted) is producing the project with Erica Huggins (Under the Banner of Heaven, The Dark Tower). Paramount Pictures has previously announced Joel McNeely as the movie’s original composer. The Naked Gun will be released in theaters nationwide on August 1.
Balfe’s other recent feature projects include Matt Tyrnauer’s documentary Nobu, which premiered at last year’s Telluride Film Festival and will be released in select theaters on June 27 by Vertical, Michael Bay’s We Are Storror , which premiered at this year’s SXSW Film Festival and is currently awaiting a release date, Babak Anvari’s Hallow Road (co-scored with Peter Adams) which opened in UK theaters last month and will be released in the U.S. this fall by XYZ Films, as well Sean Ellis’ The Cut (co-scored with Stuart Michael Thomas), which premiered at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival and is currently awaiting a distribution deal.
So, what happened to Joel McNeely? Wasn´t he the original composer?
Basically, Joel might be scoring for more episodes of American Dad. Joel McNeely should ask Seth if there are any films/TV shows that he’d like to score on.