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Is the Biggest Star in Family Plot....John Williams?

posted 8 years ago by ecarle
13 replies | jump to latest

Compared to the multi-starred, tres expensive thriller Marathon Man of late 1976, Family Plot came out early in the year with a feeling of "smallness" to it. Cheapness, even.

The budget wasn't shoestring, but it wasn't blockbuster. Much of the film was filmed on Universal soundstages that looked a lot like TV show soundstages(Columbo, MacMillan and Wife.) Whereas Marathon Man had NYC, Paris and South American locations, Family Plot was confined to some location footage in LA and San Francisco(oddly "mixed together" to create one seamless unnamed city.)

And as noted elsewhere here, all sorts of known stars(Al Pacino, Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford, Burt Reynolds, Roy Scheider, Faye Dunaway) turned Hitchcock down, the four leads he did get(Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Barbara Harris and William Devane) were good actors but not big stars.

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But for all of those modest elements to Family Plot, it seems, in retrospect, that Hitchcock DID land someone very big, and very significant in movie history, to work on Family Plot.

Its musical composer, John Williams.

Williams scored Family Plot for 1976 release. This put the score right between Williams' famous score for Jaws(1975) and for Star Wars(1977). This also put Alfred Hitchcock in a "three man team-up" with the two main guys who were about to replace him as the most famous director in Hollywood: Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. Well, it took TWO of them to match ONE of Hitchcock.

Its interesting about John Williams. By the time his Jaws theme made him super-famous, Williams had been in Hollywood at least since 1960 -- when he was known as "Johnny Williams" and offered the spooky powerhouse credit score for the TV show "Checkmate."

Johnny Williams worked through the 60's on TV shows like Lost in Space and movies like Penelope(haven't heard of it? Its not much, but it has a great score.)

Somewhere along the way, Johnny Williams became John Williams and -- without us even knowing it -- John Williams started putting rich, muscular scores on movies in such a way that we SENSED his music, even without knowing his music.

Perhaps to his detriment, John Williams did the scores for too many seventies disaster movies -- The Poseidon Adventure, Earthquake, and The Towering Inferno all have Williams scores. But they were all hits. And the opening credits of the very classy Towering Inferno(with McQueen, Newman, Holden and Dunaway) are a very exciting helicopter ride down the California coast and over San Francisco...which are matched by Williams' truly thrilling overture.

John Williams also had a flair for emotional Western or "Western-like" scores, with a certain Aaron Copland feel, and a bit of harmonica. I'm thinking of the John Wayne movie "The Cowboys" and the Steve McQueen Southern period piece, The Reivers. As well as the first score that Williams did for Steven Spielberg: "The Sugarland Express."

Given that George Lucas didn't work all that much, John Williams eventually linked himself most permanently and career-long to Steven Spielberg. Not a bad ship to sail with. But of course John Williams MADE many a Spielberg film -- with the John Williams score, Jaws, Close Encounters, and ET simply wouldn't be the great movies they are.

Hmmm. An interesting analogy arises here. Spielberg's Jaws, Close Encounters and ET wouldn't be so great without John Williams' scores. And: Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo, North by Northwest, and Psycho wouldn't be so great without Bernard Herrmann scores.

The Hitchcock/Herrmann collaboration SHOULD have been as long-lived as the Spielberg/Williams collaboration...but the eras were different, and a scared and resentful, citing Herrmann's work as too "old fashioned" for New Hollywood, Hitchcock fired Herrmann off of Torn Curtain in 1966 and never worked with him again. For Hitchcock , that was four more films.

It interests me that while Hitchcock worked with Herrmann for 10 years and 8 straight films -- The Trouble With Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Wrong Man, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds(no score, just "sound design") and Marnie -- Hitchcock never worked with the same composer twice after Herrmann. Here are the four final Hitchcock movies and their composers:

Torn Curtain: John Addison
Topaz: Maurice Jarre
Frenzy: Ron Goodwin
Family Plot: John Williams

Of those four, Addison and Goodwin really weren't top of the line guys. Jarre was -- Lawrence of Arabia and Dr. Zchivago had Jarre scores, as did the muscular 1966 Western The Professionals -- and Jarre properly gave the France-based story "Topaz" a Gallic flavor (and a latin flavor for its Cuban sequences.)

But the truth of the matter is that it was only when Hitchcock landed John Williams for Family Plot that he really got back to someone at "Herrmann level."

Its a lucky break for Family Plot to have John Williams, and a lucky break for Hitchcock that, at the very end of his career, he ended up making a movie that sounded exactly like...a Steven Spielberg movie! Thus are the greats of two eras forever linked.

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Grand irony: As it turns out, Bernard Herrmann lived until late 1975 before dying of a heart attack. This means that, had Hitchcock stuck with Herrmann from Torn Curtain through Family Plot(which completed filming in mid-1975), Herrmmann COULD have scored all of Hitchcock's four final films. And with Hitchcock making no more films after 1975, Herrmann and Hitchcock would have professionally bowed out at the same time.

Word has it that Bernard Herrmann figured importantly in John Williams doing the score for Family Plot.

First of all, John Williams called Herrmann and said "I will only score Family Plot if it is OK with you." Herrmann gave his blessing.

But a strong rumor of recent years is that Hitchcock asked BERNARD HERRMANN to score Family Plot..in a very late-breaking attempt to make amends for past slights. BIG slights. (Said Herrrmann's friend film composer David Raksin: "Herrmann gave Hitchocck everything -- and Hitchcock had the loyalty of an eel." Just how loyal IS an eel, anyway?)

But Herrmann told Hitchcock "I can't do Family Plot because I'm doing a movie called Taxi Driver for a director named Martin Scorsese."

Sweet revenge.

[–] AtomicReturns (1252) 7 years ago

Great writeup there. I liked the part where John Williams asked for Bernard Herrmann's blessing. I also didn't realize (more like didn't pay attention) to the fact Family Plot was sandwiched between Jaws and Star Wars. Because I distinctly remember John Williams credited as "Johnny Williams" I always assumed Family Plot was young, jazzier, experimental John Williams years before Jaws/SW fame. I also remember seeing "Johnny Williams" in Clint Eastwood's Eiger Sanction and I think The Cowboys as well.

I really liked Maurice Jarre's work in Topaz. I think the documentary mentioned people hating the score and saying it didn't fit. It seemed to work for me, and did not sound like your typical spy movie score. And, in a way, Family Plot and Topaz's score might have more similarities now that I think about it. Musically they are obviously not identical, but I remember many passages (was it synthesizer or piano?) that had feelings of lightness, deftness and almost playfulness - as if Maurice and Johnny Williams were having immense fun with the freedom they had with these films. They certainly didn't sound anything like the, as you said, sweeping, muscular scores of ANH and Lawrence of Arabia/Doctor Zhivago.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I liked the part where John Williams asked for Bernard Herrmann's blessing.

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Yes...very compassionate on Williams' part.

I was more stunned when I read...some years later...that Hitchcock may have actually offered Family Plot to Herrmann himself.

The irony is incredibly thick about how Bernard Herrmann COULD have scored Torn Curtain(well, he did, it was thrown out), Topaz, Frenzy , and Family Plot just in time to die in 1975. A perfect collaboration with Hitchcock "right to the end"(Hitchcock died in 1980, but never made a film after Family Plot.)

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I also didn't realize (more like didn't pay attention) to the fact Family Plot was sandwiched between Jaws and Star Wars.

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I recall that feeling rather "delicious." It was as if Hitchcock "got in on the party" of the Spielberg/Lucas gang. And though it has its own distinct motifs(a harpsichord, ala The Addams Family, a heavenly choir) a lot of Family Plot sounds just like Jaws and Star Wars.

BTW, in the John Williams score for Star Wars, the famous "three notes of madness" that close Psycho appear when the Storm Troopers walk over a grate in a hall and the three heroes emerge. Williams had used the Herrmann notes for 'filler" during editing...and decided to put them into the finished score. Those three notes of madness also end "Taxi Driver" with HERRMANN using them.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

Because I distinctly remember John Williams credited as "Johnny Williams" I always assumed Family Plot was young, jazzier, experimental John Williams years before Jaws/SW fame. I also remember seeing "Johnny Williams" in Clint Eastwood's Eiger Sanction and I think The Cowboys as well.

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Great as John Williams contribution to film music has been (right up to this year and Spielberg's The Post -- after an ill Williams could NOT score Spielberg's "Bridge of Spies" two years ago), it seems that in the 70s and early 80s, Williams and Jerry Goldsmith were the "two main guys" hired to score ALL major movies. Honestly, if the movie wasn't scored by Williams, it was scored by Goldsmith...and excitingly every time. In 1978, Williams overture for DePalma's "The Fury" and Goldsmith's overture for "Capricorn One" were duelling Herrmann knockoffs.

[–] AtomicReturns (1252) 7 years ago

Wow, you're right. I did a check and those three notes of madness at the end of Psycho now remind me of that scene in SW.

Here's the Psycho notes, hopefully correctly time-stamped at 1:30

https://youtu.be/dYDxxHrlmUg?t=1m30s

I always thought those three notes in SW seemed very....different. Not necessarily out of place, but just unexpected during a rather simple and quiet scene with the Storm Troopers scouring the Millennium Falcon for the heroes. But this nice Hermann nod does give things an appropriately ominous touch.

And Jerry Goldsmith was indeed another great 70s/80s composer. I'm still amazed at the versatility of his work, going from Lilies of the Field to Patch of Blue to Planet of the Apes (very much imitated) and Star Trek.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

Wow, you're right. I did a check and those three notes of madness at the end of Psycho now remind me of that scene in SW.

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There's more to the story. John Williams evidently did a "rough cut score" of Star Wars by using musical tracks from other movies. So the REAL Psycho three notes were placed on the soundtrack there. Lucas said "I like that three-note motif from Psycho -- can you score it for the movie?" Done. Similarly, Scorsese requested that the REAL Bernard Herrmann(in his last score before dying -- though Obsession was released last) put the three notes on the end of Taxi Driver -- thus linking Travis Bickle to Norman Bates.

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Here's the Psycho notes, hopefully correctly time-stamped at 1:30

https://youtu.be/dYDxxHrlmUg?t=1m30s

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There they are. You know, the "screeching murder violins" are the most famous musical effect in Psycho, but it had several other major motifs. The credit music was one. But the "three notes of madness" was bigger than that. It recurs throughout the movie, weaving in and out to suggest Mother's madness AND Norman's madness. It turns up in the parlor scene as Norman goes off the deep end. It appears TWICE when Arbogast sees the old house and decides to walk up the hill to it -- once when he first sees the house, again when he reaches the house porch. And then, most famously, with Norman in the cell at the end. I also think the three notes weave in and out of the "clean up and burial of Marion's corpse."

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I always thought those three notes in SW seemed very....different. Not necessarily out of place, but just unexpected during a rather simple and quiet scene with the Storm Troopers scouring the Millennium Falcon for the heroes. But this nice Hermann nod does give things an appropriately ominous touch.

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What's interesting is that the three notes of madness "fit" the end of Taxi Driver -- clearly linking Bates to Bickle. But they arrive rather "out of nowhere" in Star Wars, unsettling us -- probably subconsciously announcing Psycho to those who had seen it.

All because Williams laid down these tracks on the rough cut.

I once got to see a film in some embryonic stage on the Columbia lot -- it was Stripes, starring Bill Murray. The director came out and told us that we would see some clapboard shots("Action!") and some scenes not fully edited -- AND that the movie had no score yet. It was largely scored to Elmer Bernstein's music for "The Great Escape." Which was fitting because Elmer Bernstein scored Stripes itself(because he had scored Animal House, given that his son knew John Landis.)

For awhile there in the sixties and seventies, Elmer Bernstein was one of the greats too, yes? The Magnificent Seven. The Great Escape. The tear-inducing To Kill a Mockingbird. And The Sons of Katie Elder and True Grit for John Wayne. Then there was a lull ...and suddenly he was a comedy guy courtesy of Animal House. And Airplane. And Stripes. And Ghostbusters.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

And Jerry Goldsmith was indeed another great 70s/80s composer. I'm still amazed at the versatility of his work, going from Lilies of the Field to Patch of Blue to Planet of the Apes (very much imitated) and Star Trek.

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Perhaps moreso than John Williams - who used Spielberg(a lot) and Lucas (a little) as his "base" -- Goldsmith seemed to be an all-purpose Jack of All trades. In the sixties when Westerns were in, he did some great scores for mediocre movies -- Rio Conchos(well I really love that one), Bandolero, 100 Rifles. And he scored a GREAT small movie -- a modern Western -- called Lonely are the Brave.

But Goldsmith could do SciFi(Apes, Star Trek). And epics(The Sand Pebbles.) And thrillers (The Omen, Capricorn One, The Boys From Brazil, Psycho II.) And even the sappy spy spoof "Our Man Flint"(which has a great, serious score.)

In some ways, Jerry Goldsmith was a "generic composer for all movies" in his working days, suggesting that Hollywood only really had a handful of composers in that era. You went for Goldsmith first, then Bernstein. Then you went for Goldsmith first, then Williams. Then Williams first, then Goldsmith. And for awhile in there -- Lalo Schifrin. Oh, Henry Mancini of course, but he was more a jazz and comedy man, sophistication in his own realm.

All those guys, btw -- and through no wish of their own -- pretty much led to Hitchcock firing Herrmann off of Torn Curtain because Hitchcock's Hollywood bosses thought that Herrmann was too old-fashioned(his love themes, ala NXNW and Vertigo, WERE.) But he was still a great. When Scorsese and DePalma hired him, Herrmann told a friend "The new guys want me!" Shortly before his death by heart attack.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I really liked Maurice Jarre's work in Topaz.

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If we couldn't get Herrmann for all the final four Hitchcocks, I think it is notable that Hitch got John Williams the one time...and Maurice Jarre the other. Both men were "big names" in their field -- truly bigger stars than anyone in the casts of Topaz or Family Plot.

And Hitch COULD have had a third great collaborator -- Henry Mancini, inexplicably fired off of Frenzy. As I've noted before, his credits overture is on YouTube and it is SCREAMINGLY better than what Ron Goodwin gave the final film.

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I think the documentary mentioned people hating the score and saying it didn't fit. It seemed to work for me, and did not sound like your typical spy movie score. And, in a way, Family Plot and Topaz's score might have more similarities now that I think about it. Musically they are obviously not identical, but I remember many passages (was it synthesizer or piano?) that had feelings of lightness, deftness and almost playfulness - as if Maurice and Johnny Williams were having immense fun with the freedom they had with these films.

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Interestingly put. I'm no musical expert, but something perhaps about "the light playing of strings" give Topaz and Family Plot a similar lilt.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

They certainly didn't sound anything like the, as you said, sweeping, muscular scores of ANH and Lawrence of Arabia/Doctor Zhivago.

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For Hitchcock to have gotten the composer of those two films' scores seems like a major triumph on Hitchcock's part...big movie stars started turning him down after Torn Curtain, but there can be no doubt that Jarre was a Really Big Deal Composer when Hitchcock hired him.

Upon hearing Jarre's score, Hitchcock gave him a personal note: "I have not given you a great picture, but you have given me a great score." Hitchcock KNEW the score on Topaz.

I like two things about the Topaz score:

ONE: The opening credits score. Using only drums, Jarre gives us the same "building, building, BUILDING" opening notes that Herrmann gave the opening of North by Northwest: we are meant to be EXCITED about the movie about to start(alas, it was not to be so, this time, in the payoff.) Then the drums suddenly cut off and we get a "martial marching theme" to match the stock footage of a Russian military parade(compete with nuclear missiles on wheels.)

TWO: The film's main theme, which plays in a kind of Gallic mode for the French scenes, and with a more Latin, near-Calypso beat for Cuba. Exact same theme -- rejiggered for two countries and cultures.

[–] AtomicReturns (1252) 7 years ago

////Upon hearing Jarre's score, Hitchcock gave him a personal note: "I have not given you a great picture, but you have given me a great score." Hitchcock KNEW the score on Topaz.//////

Very interesting! I never knew Hitchcock said this about Topaz. I appreciate your trivia and quotes. Always read something new about the man and his films.

/////ONE: The opening credits score. Using only drums, Jarre gives us the same "building, building, BUILDING" opening notes that Herrmann gave the opening of North by Northwest: we are meant to be EXCITED about the movie about to start(alas, it was not to be so, this time, in the payoff.) Then the drums suddenly cut off and we get a "martial marching theme" to match the stock footage of a Russian military parade(compete with nuclear missiles on wheels.)

TWO: The film's main theme, which plays in a kind of Gallic mode for the French scenes, and with a more Latin, near-Calypso beat for Cuba. Exact same theme -- rejiggered for two countries and cultures.///////

That's actually a very good description of the music. Especially the French scenes - I remember it sounding light and playful, and now I can see Jarre was consciously trying to create a musical style for the two countries. A very nice touch there

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

////Upon hearing Jarre's score, Hitchcock gave him a personal note: "I have not given you a great picture, but you have given me a great score." Hitchcock KNEW the score on Topaz.//////

Very interesting! I never knew Hitchcock said this about Topaz. I appreciate your trivia and quotes. Always read something new about the man and his films.

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Well, its a lifetime -- not wasted IMHO -- of reading books and articles that were often not necessarily ONLY about Hitchcock and from which one could glean things like the above quote.

Appropos of Topaz, I recall Hitchcock writing the forward to a book written by Hitchcock's friend, LA Times critic Charles Champlin. Hitchcock wrote something like "Mr. Champlin understands that sometimes a filmmaker is thwarted in creating the film that he originally intended to make, through any number of failures in the script, casting or production." I expect Hitchcock felt Topaz was this way, "from the get go." Torn Curtain, too. Paul Newman said that at an early meeting with Newman, Hitchcock said, "I know that you have script approval as the star, but the script simply isn't in good enough shape to show you right now." Hitchcock promised improvements that Newman felt never came.

[–] AtomicReturns (1252) 7 years ago

Thank you ecarle for all of the terrific responses (sorry for the late response on my part). Your detailed analysis, behind-the-scenes stories and quotes are very much appreciated.

I also like reading about the classic film composers. We don't get to hear much about the likes of Elmer Bernstein, Bernard Herrmann, and Jerry Goldsmith these days.

I really need to bring out that Hitchcock boxed set again. I never upgraded it to Blu-Ray and I really should. I'll probably drop by more often when after a rewatch and the films are more fresh in my mind again (haven't seen Torn Curtain in ages - despite its weaknesses, it's still a Hitchcock film and I get a curious enjoyment out of seeing what the Master was attempting, even with the script deficiencies anda Julie Andrews that always seemed rather "lost" in this movie).

And excellent points made in your other post about the 1970s films checking off their list of taboos. I didn't think of it that way at the time, but it sure seems like that's what they were doing (like the parents are finally gone for the weekend and the teens run wild with the list of things they've wanted to do, lol).

I'll see you around :)

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I'll see YOU around.

I thank you for reading. I put out these posts to (a) leave some facts out that I actually read somewhere and would like to share and (b) to offer some opinions. Feedback is great, but just getting read is an honor.

I really do see the 70s as checking off the taboo list. People were aware of what scripts were out there, what had been done, and what had not been done. Problem was: each taboo film tended to lose mainstream audiences a bit(not a lot, but too much for studio head tastes.) Came the 80's, there was a cutback on taboo topics -- they'd all been done.

I like Torn Curtain. Its part of a decline that was reversed with the hit Frenzy 6 years later, so it wasn't a straight decline of age. Hitchocck seemed hamstrung by having such big young stars working in a script that didn't quite hit the heights and was made subject to Universal budget controls(no overseas travel for Newman and Andrews.) But it IS a Hitchcock tale, through and through, shot by shot, and with the great Gromek Murder scene for history.