New article in The New York Times on John Williams - says he will soon step away from film projects

[Tom 4,639]

7 minutes ago, mrbellamy said:

It's too bad West Side Story bombed because if JW's opting out, then I'd just as soon see Spielberg do Broadway musicals the rest of his career. 

It only bombed objectively, not subjectively.  

[mrbellamy 6,272]

I know. I loved the movie. He's not gonna get $100 million to direct another musical. 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

5 minutes ago, mrbellamy said:

I know. I loved the movie. He's not gonna get $100 million to direct another musical. 

 

 

The only way Spielberg ever gets $100 million again for anything is if he sells his soul to the devil, like Scorsese.

 

[Tom 4,639]

I think he could still get a huge budget, but not for a period piece or musical.  It would have to be big, and have whoever the star of the day happened to be.

 

That being said, one would think he could fund his own movie ala Lucas to the sum of just about anything.  

[King Mark 3,625]

15 minutes ago, Tom said:

It only bombed objectively, not subjectively.  

I dunno I read he went full woke with it, like not putting english subtitiles because it might be offensive to the latino cast. In that case no wonder it tanked

[mrbellamy 6,272]

11 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

The only way Spielberg ever gets $100 million again for anything is if he sells his soul to the devil, like Scorsese.

 

I'd love to see his $100 million debut on Jeffrey's Quibi 2.0

[King Mark 3,625]

On 14/02/2022 at 2:38 PM, Disco Stu said:

 

A thought I hadn't admitted to until now: when the article mentioned that he was recording Fabelmans next month I couldn't help but think "oh thank goodness that means he's probably finished or just about finished writing the score so if the worst happens, they can still record the music he wrote"

I've been feeling  like that since Kingdom of the Crystal skull in 2007

[Marian Schedenig 8,174]

9 minutes ago, King Mark said:

I dunno I read he went full woke with it

 

Oh no!! 

 

9 minutes ago, King Mark said:

like not putting english subtitiles

 

Oh no!!! 

 

9 minutes ago, King Mark said:

because it might be offensive to the latino cast.

 

No.

[mrbellamy 6,272]

The lack of subtitles is such a non-controversy in the movie...every Spanish scene has them speaking some Spanish and English and all the important lines are in English. It's only "woke" because of people who think they see "woke" in everything. 

[Not Mr. Big 4,639]

2 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

I will eat nails if Ready Player One made any profit.  Nearly half of its gross came from Chinese box office, and while that market is obviously very important to these tentpole kinda movies, never forget that the Hollywood studios get a significantly smaller percentage of ticket sales from China than they do in America.  As important as China is as a film market, RP1 bombed in America and that matters.

 

I'm sure Bridge of Spies broke even, but they were definitely hoping for a Lincoln size hit and it just wasn't.

I thought RP1 did modestly well

[Disco Stu 15,495]

20 minutes ago, Not Mr. Big said:

I thought RP1 did modestly well

 

Out of the $580 million it made worldwide, I'm willing to bet Warner Bros. didn't even quite get $200 million in revenue.  If the reported production budget of $150 million is accurate (which is dubious, I bet it was more) then there's just no way they made a profit.

 

This is all based on the very generalized assumption that a studio gets about 60% of the domestic take and 20-30% of the worldwide take.

 

For RP1 that means:

domestic BO $137 * .6 = ~83 million

inernational $441 *.25 = ~110 million

 

The very weak American performance really killed it.

 

Compare that to, say, Aquaman from the same year, same studio.

 

domestic BO $335 * .6 = ~200 million

inernational $808 *.25 = ~200 million

 

Then Warner Bros might have made about $400 million on a reported $160 million budget, a much healthier margin.

 

I'm so sorry about this probably inaccurate numbers post, I was a business major.

[mrbellamy 6,272]

I still think Spielberg is Spielberg and could theoretically get $100 million for something again, but it would have to have some other X factor like a major star or IP. It'd be much tougher for him to get $100 million sold primarily on his name again like BFG, RPO, WSS. Tintin too, which also falls into that "sort of a hit but not really" RPO category.

 

But...I also wouldn't say never. He is persuasive. 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

4 minutes ago, mrbellamy said:

I still think Spielberg is Spielberg and could theoretically get $100 million for something again, but it would have to have some other X factor like a major star or IP. It'd be much tougher for him to get $100 million sold primarily on his name again like BFG, RPO, WSS. But...I also wouldn't say never. He is persuasive. 

 

He's just gotta start making sequels to his movies that haven't gotten sequels yet!  Hollywood only understands sequels!

 

Majority Report

Distant Encounters of the Fourth Kind

Natural Intelligence

Never

[Jurassic Shark 12,030]

Emostad.

[mrbellamy 6,272]

I mean there's always Jaws 5...that would definitely be selling his soul.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

6 minutes ago, mrbellamy said:

I mean there's always Jaws 5...that would definitely be selling his soul.

 

Only if Michael Caine returns

[Thor 7,471]

There's a way to go untill Max Spielberg's JAWS 19.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

And the shark will still look fake  

[BrotherSound 2,242]

On 11/02/2022 at 3:54 PM, Jay said:

Huh, that completely contradicts the pictures shown; That one Indiana Jones one has a huge scotch tape section.

 

Unless.... it's a photocopy scotch-taped to a photocopy?  Maybe that would explain everything... maybe JW's handwritten originals never leave his house, and only photocopies get sent to JKMS?

 

Yep, exactly this.

 

It's actually fairly common that sketches need to be assembled like that, especially for revisions and inserts. The composer will write in a short-hand indicating "these measures are exactly the same as measures 3-9 in that other cue", etc. and then someone involved with the score preparation will cut and tape copies of both together, using heavier paper so that there's no bleedthrough, which is why that "Indiana Jones on the Train" sketch looks so different than the others.

 

 

 

 

Also, it is possible to tell apart the look of pencil on paper vs. a photocopy of something written in pencil, because the original pencil is notably lighter than the staff, whereas in the photocopy it's just as dark. JW frequently cuts the prewritten four measures per line in half to eight. The barlines written in pencil are significantly lighter:

 

 

And there's also the red pen annotations visible in the originals, as @TownerFan mentioned. Something else to look for is that this manuscript paper is quite yellow.

 

[Jay 37,287]

But isn't it still possible that his original sketches are kept somewhere safe, and those binders contain nice color photocopies of them? 

[mrbellamy 6,272]

54 minutes ago, Thor said:

There's a way to go untill Max Spielberg's JAWS 19.

 

I remember in an Aint It Cool interview, Spielberg said he has a specific idea for a Jaws scene in his head that he loves fantasizing about, even though he would never do it. Would be interesting to know what that is.

[King Mark 3,625]

Aint it Cool, now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time

[Tom Guernsey 2,280]

9 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

 

He's just gotta start making sequels to his movies that haven't gotten sequels yet!  Hollywood only understands sequels!

 

Majority Report

Distant Encounters of the Fourth Kind

Natural Intelligence

Never

Peace Treaty Negotiations of the Worlds

Consulting for the FBI

1942

Johnson

Trip to the Glue Factory

 

(sorry, I can't resist stupid wordplay jokes)

[Jurassic Shark 12,030]

Jaw

[Tom Guernsey 2,280]

3 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Jaw

That's a prequel, surely?

[Jurassic Shark 12,030]

Exactly!

 

And the prequel to the prequel:

 

Trout

 

And:

 

Schindler's Post-it^TM Note.

 

 

[Tom Guernsey 2,280]

12 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Exactly!

 

And the prequel to the prequel:

 

Trout

 

And:

 

Schindler's Post-it^TM Note.

 

 

The latter would be the cheap version, the remake would be Schindler's List App.

 

(I kinda avoided SL for reasons of taste but here we are...)

[Marian Schedenig 8,174]

Schindler's Lists: He's Doing More

[JohnnyD 1,220]

By chance, has anyone been able to download a copy of this article? I'd like to have a copy as a keepsake.

[MaxTheHouseelf 324]

12 hours ago, JohnnyD said:

By chance, has anyone been able to download a copy of this article? I'd like to have a copy as a keepsake.

I downloaded a simple PDF from my browser (looks awful).

 

It also appeared in the print edition on February 13 along with the other article (Concert hall introduction): "A version of this article appears in print on Feb. 13, 2022, Section AR, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: A Maestro Looks Beyond the Movies." https://www.nytimes.com/search?query=john+williams

Maybe you can order a reprint or something?

 

This would be nice to have, but no chance getting this in Germany at least. Also I don't know if they give out an official PDF of this article and how to contact them. News agencies in Germany give out PDFs with nice layout if it is just for personal use AFAIK.

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Just out of curiosity, I looked at how much an official framed print of a page of the NYT costs.  $500! 

[Will 2,215]

Perhaps relevant to the debate over who has JW's actual original sketches: 

 

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CaIM0XKFMs_/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

 

"printed scan of John's original pencil sketch"

 

Of course this doesn't rule out the possibility that JKMS has both the originals and scans.

[BB-8 3,461]

On 17/02/2022 at 11:17 PM, Jay said:

But isn't it still possible that his original sketches are kept somewhere safe, and those binders contain nice color photocopies of them? 

 

I am assuming JW donated the originals to Juilliard and keeps photocopies at home.

 

 

[Josh500 1,615]

Putting aside the fact that the NYT is probably the most overrated and biggest purveyor of fake news in the US.... 

 

Well duh. He's 90. He probably won't be scoring for the next two decades (although that would be great, of course)! 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Tell me you didn't read the article without telling me you didn't read the article.

[Marian Schedenig 8,174]

3 hours ago, BB-8 said:

 

What the??

[Taikomochi 1,136]

The quote system right now:

 

 

[BB-8 3,461]