Andrew Feltenstein and John Nau are composing the music for the IFC comedy mini-series The Spoils of Babylon. The six part-series is created by Matt Piedmont and Andrew Steele and stars Will Ferrell, Jessica Alba, Val Kilmer, Tobey Maguire, Haley Joel Osment, Michael Sheen, Tim Robbins and Kristen Wiig. The Funny or Die production is a parody of an “epic” mini-series about a war-torn oil dynasty, in the vein of The Thorn Birds and Winds of War. Piedmont and Steele are also executive producing the project with Ferrell, Adam McKay (Talladega Nights, The Other Guys) and Nate Young. Feltenstein and Nau have previously written the music for Piedmont’s Casa de mi Padre and McKay’s Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, which just opened in theaters this weekend. Read the rest of this entry »
Andrew Feltenstein & John Nau Scoring IFC’s ‘The Spoils of Babylon’
Posted: December 22, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in TV Scoring AssignmentsTags: Andrew Feltenstein, IFC, John Nau, Matt Piedmont, The Spoils of Babylon
Weekly TV Music Roundup (December 22, 2013)
Posted: December 22, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in TV Scoring AssignmentsTags: Marvin Hamlisch, Marvin Hamlisch: What He Did For Love, Matthew Sklar
Premiering on Friday, December 27 as the season finale of American Masters on PBS is the documentary Marvin Hamlisch: What He Did For Love written, directed and produced by Dori Berinstein. The episode explores the prolific life and career of the Academy Award-, Grammy-, Tony- and Pulitzer Price-winning composer whose best known songs include The Way We Were, Nobody Does It Better and who written the scores for such movies as The Sting and Sophie’s Choice. The special features interviews with Hamlisch’s family, friends and collaborators including wife Terre Blair Hamlisch, Barbra Streisand, Carly Simon, Steven Soderbergh, Quincy Jones and Woody Allen. The documentary features music by Hamlisch, which was arranged and adapted by Matthew Sklar. To find out more about the American Masters episode, visit PBS’ official website.
Gabriel Mann to Score ‘Friends With Better Lives’
Posted: December 21, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in TV Scoring AssignmentsTags: CBS, Friends With Better Lives, Gabriel Mann
Gabriel Mann has been hired to score the upcoming CBS comedy Friends With Better Lives. The show is created by Dana Klein (Friends, Becker) and stars Kevin Connolly, Majandra Delfino, James Van Der Beek, Zoe Lister-Jones, Brooklyn Decker and Rick Donald. The series follows six friends at different stages in their lives – married, divorced, newly engaged and single – who are outwardly happy, but secretly questioning if their friends have it better. Klein is also executive producing the 20th Century Fox Television production with Aaron Kaplan (Terra Nova, The Neighbors, Back in the Game). James Burrows (Will & Grace, Friends) has directed the pilot episode. Friends With a Better Lives is set to premiere on March 31, 2014 and will air every Monday night on CBS. Read the rest of this entry »
Weekly Film Music Roundup (December 20, 2013)
Posted: December 20, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in Film Music NewsTags: Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, Andrew Feltenstein, Arcade Fire, Ben Sollee, Evgueni Galperine, Her, John Nau, Maidentrip, Owen Pallett, Paul Leonard Morgan, Sacha Galperine, The Past, Walking with Dinosaurs
Two new movies are opening wide this week:
Expected to top the weekend box office is the comedy sequel Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues directed by Adam McKay and starring Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner, Christina Applegate, Paul Rudd, James Marsden and Kristen Wiig. The film’s original score is composed by Andrew Feltenstein and John Nau (Casa De Mi Padre, Bachelorette). The duo has also composed the film’s original songs, including Doby (co-written with Ferrell and McKay), which is up for an Academy Award nomination in the Best Song category (click here to listen to the track). Republic Records has released a soundtrack album featuring the songs from the film. For the full album details, check out our soundtrack announcement.
Also opening wide is the 3D family action adventure Walking With Dinosaurs directed by Neil Nightingale & Barry Cook and which follows two brothers looking to follow in their father’s footsteps, which leads them to a showdown with dinosaurs in the Arctic. Paul Leonard-Morgan (Limitless, Dredd) has composed the film’s original music. A soundtrack album featuring the composer’s score is in the works and expected to be released in 2014. Check back on this page for the album details. To learn more about the movie, check out our previous news article. Read the rest of this entry »
Scoring ‘The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug’ Production Diary
Posted: December 20, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in Composer InterviewsTags: Conrad Pope, Howard Shore, Peter Jackson, The Hobbit, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Peter Jackson has published his final production diary of the year for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug focusing on the music for the fantasy epic. The video features interviews with composer Howard Shore who is joined at his writing studio by Doug Adams, author of the book The Music of The Lord of the Rings Films. Also interviewed are Jackson himself, conductor/orchestrator Conrad Pope and a number of musicians who performed on the score. The video also features footage from the score’s recording sessions, which fully took place at the Wellington Town Hall in New Zealand for the first time. Check out the full production diary after the jump. The soundtrack for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is now available on WaterTower Music and the movie is playing in theaters nationwide. Read the rest of this entry »
Clinton Shorter Scoring CBS’ ‘Intelligence’
Posted: December 20, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in TV Scoring AssignmentsTags: CBS, Clinton Shorter, Intelligence
Clinton Shorter is composing the music for the upcoming CBS drama Intelligence. The show stars is created by Michael Seitzman (North Country, Here on Earth) and stars Josh Holloway, Meghan Ory, John Billingsley, PJ Byrne, Michael Rady and Marg Helgenberger. The series centers on a high-tech intelligence operative enhanced with a super-computer microchip in his brain who is the first human ever to be connected directly into the global information grid and have complete access to Internet, WiFi, telephone and satellite data. Seitzman is also executive producing the ABC Television Studios and CBS Television Studios production with Tripp Vinson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose, The Number 23) and David Semel (Person of Interest, No Ordinary Family) who also directed the pilot episode. Read the rest of this entry »
‘The Thirteenth Tale’ Soundtrack Details
Posted: December 20, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in TV Music AlbumsTags: BBC, Benjamin Wallfisch, score, Soundtrack, The Thirteenth Tale
MovieScore Media and Kronos Records will release a soundtrack album for the BBC drama The Thirteenth Tale. The album features the film’s original music composed by Benjamin Wallfisch (The Escapist, The Hours, Dear Wendy). The soundtrack will be released digitally on December 30, 2013 and is now available for pre-order on Amazon. Check out audio clips after the jump. The Thirteenth Tale is directed by James Kent and stars Vanessa Redgrave, Olivia Colman and Alexandra Roach. The movie based on Diane Setterfield’s novel and adapted by Oscar winner Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons) follows a famous novelist with failing health who enlists an amateur biographer to hear her story and ghostwrite her autobiography. Read the rest of this entry »
Mychael Danna to Score Wally Pfister’s ‘Transcendence’
Posted: December 19, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in Film Scoring AssignmentsTags: Mychael Danna, Transcendence, Wally Pfister
Mychael Danna has been tapped to score the upcoming sci-fi thriller Transcendence. The film marks the directorial debut of Academy Award-winning cinematographer Wally Pfister (The Dark Knight, Inception) and stars Johnny Depp, Paul Bettany, Rebecca Hall, Kate Mara, Cillian Murphy, Clifton Collins, Jr. and Morgan Freeman. The movie follows a foremost researcher in the field of Artificial Intelligence, working to create a sentient machine that combines the collective intelligence of everything ever known with the full range of human emotions. Jack Paglen has written the screenplay. Andrew A. Kosove & Broderick Johnson (The Blind Side, Prisoners, Insomnia) the Alcon Entertainment production with Kate Cohen, Marisa Polvino, Annie Marter, David Valdes (Mud, The Prestige) and Aaron Ryder (The Green Mile, The Book of Eli). Read the rest of this entry »
A.R. Rahman to Score ‘The Hundred-Foot Journey’
Posted: December 19, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in Film Scoring AssignmentsTags: A.R. Rahman, Lasse Hallstrom, The Hundred-Foot Journey
A.R. Rahman has been hired to score the upcoming drama The Hundred-Foot Journey. The film is directed by Lasse Hallstrom and stars Helen Mirren and Manish Dayal. The movie follows an Indian family who moves to Southern France and opens an Indian restaurant a hundred feet across the street from a Michelin starred French restaurant. Steven Knight (Dirty Pretty Things, Eastern Promises) has written the screenplay based based on the bestselling book by Richard Morais. Steven Spielberg is producing the DreamWorks Studios and Participant Media production with Oprah Winfrey and Juliet Blake. Rahman who is best known for his Academy Award-winning music for Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire, as well as as numerous Bollywood movies has previously scored the drama People Like Us for DreamWorks. Read the rest of this entry »
BMI to Present Composer/Director Roundtable at 2014 Sundance Film Festival
Posted: December 19, 2013 by filmmusicreporter in Film Music EventsTags: BMI, Sundance Film Festival
Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) has announced the 16th annual Composer/Director Roundtable and 12th annual Snowball during the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, on January 22, in Park City, Utah. BMI’s roundtable entitled Music & Film: The Creative Process will take place from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Sundance House. The conversation will be moderated by Doreen Ringer Ross, Vice President, Film/TV Relations and focus on the relationship between composer and director. The participants will discuss what goes into creating a successful film score, the ingredients of an effective composer/director relationship, the Sundance Film Festival experience and more. Panelists include composer Craig Wedren and director David Wain of the comedy They Came Together; composer Blake Neely and directors Ryan White and Ben Cotner of the documentary The Case Against 8; Read the rest of this entry »
