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Sorry if there is a similar thread (it probably has), but I'm very interested in interesting assignments that, for one reason or another, didn't happen. That doesn't include rejected scores.
According to Christopher Young interview at the excelent book Scored to death, George A. Romero wanted Henry Mancini to score The Dark Half (1993), and the studio executives didn't let that happen. As much as I like C.Y. music, would love to see what that score would sound like, and if I remember well the alter ego scenes indeed had some jazzy music.
The most famous example is, of course, Basil Poledouris and Dances with wolves (1990), but I do remember others like Ennio Morricone turning Inglourius Basterds and Million Dollar Baby down.
Do you guys know other confirmed stories like that?
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According to the liner notes for the Kritzerland release, Fox tried to get Igor Stravinsky to write the score for Jane Eyre before Bernard Herrmann came on board. While I love Herrmann's music, I would have been really interested to hear how Stravinsky would have handled the score. Stravinsky was also supposed to score Song of Bernadette before Newman took over. Unlike Jane Eyre, Stravinsky actually did write some music for the film before bowing out, which he recycled into his Symphony in Three Movements.
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Benjamin Britten, Malcolm Arnold, William Walton, and Aram Kachachurian all had the pecking order of Lawrence of Arabia before Jarre landed it.
Miklos Rozsa declined Star Wars, but he did score Green Berets when first choice Elmer Bernstein said no. He replaced Oscar Strauss on Thief of Baghdad. Dimi Tiomkin was first choice on Sodom and Gomorrah until he saw the thing. Rozsa was slated for The Night Porter but it didn't happen for whatever reason.
Victor Young missed out on Ten Commandments because of illness.
It's incredibly common in all branches of performing arts. You count no chickens until they're in the oven.
And Arthur Bliss's Caesar and Cleopatra before Auric. That was actually recorded.
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There's a whole John Williams chapter in that, with The Sentinel (1976), Meteor (1979), Bicentennial man (2000), Bridge of spies (2015) and Ready Player One (2018).
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My biggest disappointment was John Williams not scoring the final Harry Potter movie, despite his hopes and intention to do so.
Howard Blake was Kenneth Branagh's first choice to score Henry V. Blake was all set to do it, but then Brannagh got cold feet and decided since his film was a production of his own company and Blake had a relationship with the Royal Shakespeare Company it was somehow "impolitic" for Blake to score the film.
Blake was also Ridley Scott's first choice to score Alien, but Fox insisted on Williams or Goldsmith.
Brian May was supposed to score Psycho II, but when Universal decided to pump more money into the production, it was determined a "bigger" composer should get the job.
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Where's our resident expert on this!? Hey JUSTINO! 
Also... Paul... wasn't Doyle a member OF the Royal Shakespeare Company?
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There is a universe out there that has The King's version of Judge Dredd. By Grabthar's Hammer, it will be mine.
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I absolutely adore the scores to Live and Let Die and The Spy Who Loved Me, but at the same time I cannot help but mourn that we missed out on two additional John Barry James Bond scores from a time when his music was more zesty and he was still on a creative high.
I also absolutely adore the scores we got for Carrie and The Fury, but at the same time I'm so sorry we didn't get to hear two more renaissance Bernard Herrmann scores. Okay, Sisters wasn't brilliant but Obsession and Taxi Driver were. Herrmann was a composer rekindling his brilliance.
I also wish John Williams had scored Superman II—and in the same thought I wish Richard Donner had been able to complete his original vision of Superman and Superman II.
I know Donner retrospectively managed to construct and release a rough cut of his original vision of Superman II but it's really only a rough cut and we still have the problem that Superman's ending was changed to lose the cliffhanger and use Superman II's original ending.
I absolutely adore the film The Exorcist and it would be ridiculous to go back and strip out Friedkin's music choices which are no so inseparably part of the film text. However, I think it's a great pity that Lalo Schifrin's score was suppressed. I wish I could see an alternative version with Schifrin's score intact.
Cheers
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Posted: |
Mar 12, 2018 - 4:34 AM
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By: |
Thor
(Member)
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According to the liner notes for the Kritzerland release, Fox tried to get Igor Stravinsky to write the score for Jane Eyre before Bernard Herrmann came on board. While I love Herrmann's music, I would have been really interested to hear how Stravinsky would have handled the score. Stravinsky was also supposed to score Song of Bernadette before Newman took over. Unlike Jane Eyre, Stravinsky actually did write some music for the film before bowing out, which he recycled into his Symphony in Three Movements.
Wasn't Stravinsky also supposed to have done a Disney score? I have some vague recollection of reading that. That he was slated, but then had these outlandish demands, like having a YEAR to compose? It couldn't have been FANTASIA, because they only used existing music, including -- of course -- Stravinsky's RITE OF SPRING.
There are many such stories out there -- but one would need to separate between 'rejected scores' and situations where the composer was forced out or had to back out before the composition process.
I'm not sure, but I think Patrick Doyle had to back out of STEPMOM before composing anything (due to leukemia issues). I'm sure he would have delivered, but I'm glad we got the wonderful Williams score instead.
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The DePalma movies with Bernard. Carrie was a classic anyway, The Fury, Dressed to Kill, Body Double.
That said, I'm definitely liking William's Fury and Dinaggio sure had his moments.
Iirc those composers were told to emulate to some degree Bernard's style.
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