The Composite Score: Indiewood Film Music at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century by Jennifer Lauren Psujek
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Washington University in St. Louis Washington University Open Scholarship Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations Arts & Sciences Spring 5-15-2016 The ompC osite Score: Indiewood Film Music at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century Jennifer Lauren Psujek Washington University in St. Louis Follow this and additional works at: https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/art_sci_etds Part of the Film and Media Studies Commons, and the Music Commons Recommended Citation Psujek, Jennifer Lauren, "The ompositC e Score: Indiewood Film Music at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century" (2016). Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 795. https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/art_sci_etds/795 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Arts & Sciences at Washington University Open Scholarship. It has been accepted for inclusion in Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Washington University Open Scholarship. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS Department of Music Dissertation Examination Committee: Todd Decker, Chair Patrick Burke Claudia Gorbman Paul Steinbeck Gaylyn Studlar The Composite Score: Indiewood Film Music at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century by Jennifer Lauren Psujek A dissertation presented to the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences of Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2016 St. Louis, Missouri © 2016, Jennifer Lauren Psujek All rights reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures iii List of Tables iv Acknowledgements v INTRODUCTION 1 Indiewood, Composite Scores, and the Mélomanes CHAPTER 1 32 Molding the Composite Score in Eyes Wide Shut (1999) CHAPTER 2 93 Collaboration and Quirkiness in Magnolia (1999) CHAPTER 3 144 Blurred Boundaries in Fight Club (1999) CHAPTER 4 191 Moulin Rouge! (2001) and the Blended Composite Score CONCLUSION 245 BIBLIOGRAPHY 251 ii LIST OF FIGURES 1.1 Alex North’s Notes, pg. 2 38 iii LIST OF TABLES 1.1 Eyes Wide Shut cue list 49 1.2 Eyes Wide Shut temp list in sequence from March 15, 1999 54 1.3 List of Eyes Wide Shut screenplay drafts in chronological order 65 2.1 Magnolia cue list 102 2.2 Available Magnolia screenplay drafts 108 2.3 Introduction of characters in “One” 112 3.1 List of Fincher-directed music videos 147 3.2 Fight Club cue list 160 3.3 Fight Club screenplay drafts 172 4.1 Moulin Rouge! compiled cues by decade 199 4.2 Moulin Rouge! song clearances in end credit order 204 4.3 Moulin Rouge! cue list 212 4.4 Songs in “Elephant Love Medley” 222 4.5 Clearance listing of pre-existing songs used in the original score 238 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this project was greatly aided by the generous support and feedback from my committee, as well as other professors at Washington University in St. Louis. Gaylyn Studlar and Claudia Gorbman provide their expertise to the project, which aided my discussions of film theory and industrial history. Pat Burke helped with the descriptions of jazz, pop, and world music throughout the chapters, while Paul Steinbeck provided clarification of the theoretical analyses. William Paul, Craig Monson and Alex Stefaniak all gave support and advice at crucial stages in my graduate career. I am most thankful for the advice and guidance of my advisor Todd Decker. Without his insightful questions and willingness to read a large number of chapter drafts, this project would not have been possible. Thanks to the librarians and archivists who assisted me at the Margaret Herrick Library at the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Science in Los Angeles, Writer’s Guild Foundation Shavelson-Webb Library in Los Angeles and the Stanley Kubrick Archive, University of the Arts in London. Generous financial support from Washington University in St. Louis in the form of the Nussbaum Fellowship enabled me to visit all three archives in the summer of 2014. I would like to show appreciation to colleagues and friends whose openness to discussing my developing project helped clarify the many concepts involved. I am lucky to have undertaken this project with such a supportive collection of graduate students in the Music Department at Washington University in St. Louis. Special thanks goes to the department’s dissertation group: Liza Dister, Kelsey Klotz, Darren LaCour, and Karen Olsen. v Likewise, two former professors deserve mention. Many thanks to Dr. Elizabeth Seitz for introducing me to musicological study, and to Dr. Eftychia Papanikolaou for her never-ending support, objective advice, and friendship. I want to thank the family members who have supported this journey from the beginning, including my brother Aaron and his girlfriend Kristen Miller. Also, many thanks to Denise and Matt Piskulic for being my St. Louis support system. Finally, endless gratitude goes to my boyfriend, Adam. I cannot imagine completing this project without his patience, support, and ability to help me focus on the big picture. I dedicate this project to him and my parents (Saundra and Francis Psujek) who have always provided me the confidence and support to chase my dreams. vi INTRODUCTION INDIEWOOD, COMPOSITE SCORES, AND THE MÉLOMANES The wake of 9/11, the economic downturn, and the widespread introduction of digital streaming caused dramatic changes in the American film industry in the early years of the twenty-first century. Most importantly for this dissertation, after the economic collapse in 2008 most of the studio-owned production companies were either sold or went out of business. Now gone from the scene, these production companies were at their height of production and won many prestigious awards between 1999 and 2001. In those three short years, stylistic and industrial trends that had begun in the 1960s reached a culmination of sorts. In this dissertation, I examine four films from this narrow window of time to tell the story of music’s role in the production context of Indiewood (mid-1990s to 2008), a key part of the changing social, industrial, and sonic complex of American film at the turn of the 21 st century. In each chapter- length study, I examine how industrial and aesthetic issues characterize Indiewood film music practices. The composite score—which uses both pre-existing and original music in an equitable way—provides a strong link between these directors, their films, and in the late 1990s. Film music scholars have tended to discuss either the pre-existing or original music in isolation. Thus, by analyzing these scores as organic wholes, I insert industrial and historical concerns into film music analysis, demonstrate the expressive parity between music and image in late 1990s film, and create a needed new category in film music studies. Composite scores became more prevalent in the mid to late 1990s, especially in Indiewood—a category of films that were produced by a major studio’s subsidiary but still 1 claimed an “indie” aesthetic. The reasons for each composite score’s creation reflected the two aims of Indiewood films, to be seen as different from standard Hollywood fare while also attaining commercial success. 1 Film scholars rarely discuss music’s relationship to Indiewood, yet my analysis illustrates how the composite score can work as a defining element of Indiewood films. The four directors discussed in this dissertation are connected through their use of the composite score and their link with Indiewood production. Kubrick began his career at the end of the Classical Hollywood era in the 1950s and 1960s—of the thirteen full length features he completed, eight were released in those decades—which separates him from the other three directors. 2 His generational difference places Kubrick as a trendsetter, has contributed to the belief in his uniqueness, and has inspired comments that border on hero-worship. Scholars such as Robert Kolker have gone so far as to say that Kubrick is “inimitable, [his] films are made with a complexity of perception and execution—a formal integration of style and meaning—that cannot be copied or absorbed, that cannot even be parodied, except through joking reference.” 3 Some directors, however, have incorporated elements of Kubrick’s films, especially his use of music, into their own work. For example, Fincher incorporates classical pieces into his films, 1 Geoff King, Indiewood, USA: Where Hollywood Meets Independent Cinema (New York: I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd., 2009), 2. 2 The thirteen completed feature films of Kubrick’s output (including the early films that he discounted) are Fear and Desire (1953), Killer’s Kiss (1955), The Killing (1956), Paths of Glory (1957), Spartacus (1960), Lolita (1962), Dr. Strangelove (1964), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), A Clockwork Orange (1971), Barry Lyndon (1975), The Shining (1980), Full Metal Jacket (1987), and Eyes Wide Shut (1999). 3 Robert Kolker, A Cinema of Loneliness , fourth ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 184. 2 while Anderson uses primarily pre-existing music interspersed with original cues. Again, Luhrmann proves the outlier. He compiles song, not records, and re-arranges much of the pre- existing material in his films. This process creates a subset of the composite score, which I call the blended composite score. Despite their differences, all three younger directors follow Kubrick’s tendency to walk the line between popular filmmaker and “auteur.” They were expected to create films that appealed to the public, the critical establishment, and award-giving institutions. The three younger directors in this dissertation—Fincher, Luhrmann, and Anderson— began their careers in the mid-1990s. They were strongly influenced by the industrial changes occurring at the time, as well as the new digital technologies then appearing in the production process. Each director used the latest technology and responded to the shifting industrial structure in different ways.