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Danny Elfman on Tim Burton, Gus Van Sant, and why it’s so hard to sing in Russian: An EW Q&A
by Kyle Andersonhttp://music-mix.ew.com/2011/07/22/danny-elfman-tim-burton-interview/
Cool interview. But wasn’t “Nightmare Before Christmas” what caused the rift between Elfman and Burton until 1996? He says it was his favorite experience in this one.
Elfman had fun WORKING on the music for Nightmare Before Christmas. It was afterwards when he didn’t receive proper credit that he got upset. Elfman felt he should have gotten a “story by” and a higher producer credit on the film. Instead, he had to settle for Associate Producer.
Yeah but there is also that rumour that say that he didn’t want to score Ed Wood ’cause Burton was asking him to compose something really close to the sound of Ed Wood’s films…which is what Shore did at the end of the journey.
I think that all in all, it’s a mix of all these things. That, plus the fact that after working almost 15 years with the same person, you may need a break in order to get a new start…
In 1993, Burton and Elfman had been working together for eight years. Neither Burton or Elfman have really gone into detail over what happened… I think the credit thing is assumption, more than anything.
And they split up well before ED WOOD was ready to be scored. Burton wanted Henry Mancini once it was clear that things wouldn’t be worked out with Elfman, and it was Mancini who suggested that he hire Shore instead.
From what I know, and my source is very reliable, Elfman and Burton had their first big, I mean BIIIIG fight at the end of the Batman Returns premiere, back in 1992. Elfman was really disappointed concerning the sound effects mixing, and the fact that a lot of the beautiful details of his score couldn’t be heard properly in the final mix. At that time, Elfman had already been working on Nightmare before Christmas for a while, and he finished it in 1993. I know there were some disagreements about the credits for NBC, but I don’t know exactly the details. What I do know is that Burton wanted a very specific tone for the Ed Wood movie, and he really wanted someone to compose in the style of another composer, and Danny wasn’t interested at all in doing that.
So, it’s not a unique reason that lead to this “vacation from each other”, but it was a serie of events that all started with Batman Returns.Elfman was really disappointed concerning the sound effects mixing, and the fact that a lot of the beautiful details of his score couldn’t be heard properly in the final mix.
That sounds a little far-fetched considering that the music dominates the sound effects in that movie. Plus, even IF he was disappointed with the mix, it seems a little odd for Elfman to blow up on Burton like that, considering that he had far worse experiences in Hollywood by then. His work on “Scrooged” and “Dick Tracy” were butchered on the final mix, for example. And he didn’t blow up on neither Richard Donner or Warren Beatty. Heck, Elfman even scored the theme to “Tales from the Crypt” which was produced by Donner. So, it seems WAY out-of-character for him to do that to Burton.
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