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Elfman is attempting to countersue Abadi for fraud.
Danny Elfman Seeks to File Countersuit Against Pianist For Fraud
Chris Bacon has been recording music for Season 2 over the last few months. No indication (that I can see) that Elfman’s involved so far.
Yeah, he’s currently being sued for defamation for his retort to the RollingStone article – for depicting Abadi as being obsessed with him and wanting to replace his wife. He attempted to have it dismissed, but a judge ruled it should go ahead. Elfman’s team are currently appealing the dismissal, I believe.
Oh, 100%. There are several more ‘gossipy’ threads I chose not to post for that reason. I chose to post that one because it has evidence that:
1: A composer approached Abadi’s society, having been drugged and assaulted by someone in a company
2. Abadi and the now-head of the society acknowledged the situation and then ignored it
3. The society publicly praised that company
3. After the accuser’s story went quasi-viral on Instagram, Abadi then reached out to the accuser, offering support, but only on the condition that the accuser take down their negative social media posts about the society.I’ve mulled on all this over the last few days, and, after nearly of two years of, frankly, believing (and ignoring, if I’m being truthful) Elfman to be at least somewhat guilty of what he’s accused, I’m at a point now where I genuinely believe he’s innocent. I’ve still bought his albums and seen his music performed live five times since the accusations, so I can’t take any high ground here, but it was always there in the back of my mind.
After all this information provided in the last week, though, I really don’t see any reason to doubt anymore. Abadi’s best friend at the time believes she’s lying, and has come forth with loads of texts which indeed depict Abadi as being obsessive. Her boyfriend at the time believes she’s lying (and has since had his own legal troubles with her – of which he was found innocent and granted a restraining order against her). Abadi’s own words are the most damning of all.
Melissa McGregor took the infamous martini picture, and she’s willing to say it was intended as a joke. There’s substantial text message exchanges between Abadi and Elfman which highlight her initiating contact with him (even after the alleged assault and even after she’s been receiving settlement money for the alleged assault).
The narrative that this was a character assassination is completely backed up by Abadi’s own words, Elfman’s evidence that he did in fact make the payments, and the fact that the case was immediately arbitrated when it reached court. It never had any chance of succeeding. Abadi’s text in the wake of the article being published supports this idea, too.
What’s missing, of course, is what happened in between the texts. That we’ll never truly know. But Abadi’s initial file against Elfman and what she’s later accusing him of are wildly inconsistent. The defamation suit seems ludicrous, too, because what Elfman said about Abadi – that she was intent on replacing his wife – is paraphrasing a text that Abadi actually sent to her then-best-friend. I believe Elfman probably has been sleazy. Bridget Fonda apparently knows this, too, and is alright with that. If that’s their relationship, that’s their business.
I saw on Filmtracks that a user claimed this was a ‘hit piece’ on Abadi. Abadi was approached to comment on the article several times, and she refused each time. This was an opportunity Elfman wasn’t provided for the RollingStone article. I reread the that article in the wake of this all coming out, trying to remind myself why I was convinced of his guilt, and there’s just not very much there. No texts from the people involved. No quotes from people affiliated with either party. It’s empty. And it all happened, apparently, because Elfman missed payments – but we now know he didn’t. We also know Elfman provided all of these things to RollingStone and they chose not to include it.
There’s just too much there to support Elfman’s side of the story at this point to ignore. The damage is done, of course, and there’ll probably always be that little niggle in the corner that maybe something did happen. But unless new evidence comes forward, I think I’m comfortable in my stance. If the initial article had included even one or two these texts from Abadi, I wonder if I ever would have believed it at all.
Through my interactions with Nomi Abadi and the Female Composer Safety League (FCSL)—and based on receipts and documentation I’ve recently obtained, including an email received today—I have come to believe the organization may have engaged in conduct that allegedly contradicts… pic.twitter.com/CqddnYHmOI
— Eiko Ishiwata (@eikoishiwata) April 2, 2025
He mentioned recording another rock album back in 2023, before the article was released. I’m not really convinced there’s an audience for this stuff. It seems to me that people going to the rock concerts are doing so for the Boingo material. But, yeah, all these conventions and meet-and-greets do suggest that his income has taken a big hit.
Between winning the Emmy for Wednesday, making the BAFTA/Oscar longlist for Best Original Score for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice and winning the Saturn Award for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, there’s evidently still some industry support. Though Elfman was apparently locked in his house during Beetlejuice promo, he still had his name associated with a massive hit. Scoring a European movie for a semi-disgraced director (Dracula) and an indie film for one of his friends (Dead Man’s Wire) doesn’t really tell us much, but that’s already more film work than 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024 and the same amount as in 2022. He also has ‘Dark Universe’ opening soon, and he’s recording his cello concerto this fall.
I think whether or not he’s involved with Wednesday Season 2 and/or Raimi’s Send Help will be telling. If he’s working with Netflix on one of their biggest shows and with Disney for Send Help, I think he’ll continue to work in that ‘part time film composer’ space he occupied in the few years leading up to the accusations.
It’s his classical composing that seems to have taken the hit: no new commissions in over two years (that we know of anyway).
I’m naturally predisposed to side with Elfman here, but the information presented does seem very compelling. Some of those texts from Abadi are chilling.
The link would help.
https://airmail.news/issues/2025-3-29/the-alien-and-the-fawn
Airmail have done an extensive write-up of the Elfman/Abadi saga. You need to provide your email to read.
Composer Danny Elfman’s Complicated #MeToo Story: Jacob Bernstein Reports – Air Mail
It’s filled with quotes and text messages. It also details the Raimi connection which I previously noted. It seems compelling….
I had no idea that theme park stans were a thing, but they are, and according to them:
1. This sold out immediately.
2. These sorts of things are hardly ever released.
30th January 2026 – release date.
https://deadline.com/2025/02/elio-disney-release-dates-1236289608/
This will open in France on 30th July.
Serra’s score for Besson’s previous movie, Dogman, was released on CD in France. Fingers crossed the same happens here.
So… Dracula is done.
Wednesday Season 2 has finished filming.
Van Sant’s Dead Man Walking started filming a month ago.
Raimi’s Send Help started filming a few days ago.
Elfman worked on Wednesday Season 1 for two months, so I guess it’s possible he manages to fit all of them in.
This is really cool, but are they releasing an alternate or extended video or something? The actual video has none of these segments.
Has started shooting.
The writers have seemingly (and recently) deleted their tweet which suggested that Danny would score, Bill Pope would lens and Bob Murawski would edit.
Elfman was recording in Budapest yesterday. I have no idea if Dracula is recorded yet, so it could have been for that, but he previously recorded his Wednesday episodes there, so it could suggest that he’s scoring some of Season 2.
This was for Dracula.
Elfman was recording in Budapest yesterday. I have no idea if Dracula is recorded yet, so it could have been for that, but he previously recorded his Wednesday episodes there, so it could suggest that he’s scoring some of Season 2.
The score has made the BAFTA longlist. The longlist is ten scores, but five will be nominated.
I don’t expect it to get nominated there or at the Oscars (that longlist was 15 scores), but I’m really surprised by the apparent support. I can only guess that voters are thinking, “I like the Beetlejuice theme” and ticking the box.
