Composer John Williams, who has scored all but two of Steven Spielberg’s feature films over the past 43 years, will not be doing the music chores on Spielberg’s “Ready Player One” — instead, that job will go to “Forrest Gump” composer Alan Silvestri.
Because post-production is happening on the same time on both “Ready Player One” and Spielberg’s other film, “The Papers,” Williams will score the latter film. It will mark their 28th feature collaboration.
According to a statement from Spielberg’s Amblin Productions: “Steven and John decided Alan Silvestri was the perfect choice for ‘Ready Player One’ since Steven has worked (as a producer) with Alan on the ‘Back to the Future’ films in the ’80s and Alan has scored other films for Steven’s Amblin and DreamWorks.”
“The Papers” opens Dec. 22 and “Ready Player One” opens March 30, 2018.
Williams has done all of Spielberg’s other films except “The Color Purple” in 1985 (that went to Quincy Jones) and “Bridge of Spies” in 2015 (Thomas Newman). Three of Williams’ five Academy Awards are for Spielberg scores (“Jaws,” “E.T.” and “Schindler’s List”).
Silvestri is one of the greats, a terrific composer with a magnificent body of work and, while nobody is will never be like the unique John Williams, a great choice for this. Those who talk about “a young urban” guy don’t seem to understand the basics of what film composition entails. A “blogger” would not do either. Film music, much like classical music, seems to be something less and less people understand every day. Some folks think movies can, or should, be scored with songs with somebody’s spotify list. The level of ignorance about music is staggering, as some of the comments displayed here evidence. Folks like James Newton Howard, Thomas Newman, Howard Shore or Alan Silvestri are some the truly top talents in their field and I for one am happy to see that Steven Spielberg, who clearly understands and appreciates music deeply, has chosen Silvestri to step in. The great John Williams is in his mid eighties, and even a genius like himself can’t keep up with a tight production schedule at that age. He’s been scoring the last jedi, and will do The Papers, but cannot, and probably does not want to, score four movies a year anymore.
well said
agreed
“According to a statement from Spielberg’s Amblin Productions: “Steven and John decided Alan Silvestri was the perfect choice for ‘Ready Player One’ since Steven has worked (as a producer) with Alan on the ‘Back to the Future’ films in the ’80s and Alan has scored other films for Steven’s Amblin and DreamWorks.”
No doubt true, but a rather coldly utilitarian line of reasoning, in that it omits any mention of Spielberg’s regard for Silvestri’s musicianship and artistic sensibilities. How many people would really liked to be “praised” in such off-handed terms?
Because sylvestri doesn’t score films with music. He wallpapers them with it. Like hans zimmer. Hacks, both.
I was really excited when I first heard that Spielberg took on this story. Now I’m not sure. This is a young, tech story. Scifi yes, but surely a young unexpected director could have kept the snappy vibrancy of the novel. And this old white guy for the score? Really? Williams wasn’t available so instead of a hot young urban composer they chose. What?
You’re joking, right? The talent involved in both films is exceptional.
Hot young urban composer? God, that sounds just terrible.
You know it is a movie right, not a sneaker commercial?
You do realise that Williams is a LOT older than Silvestri.