March 8 - Bruce Broughton

Image courtesy magazine.scoreit.org

On this day, in 1945, Bruce Broughton was born in Los Angeles, California. As the grandson of a composer, the nephew of a songwriter and the son of musicians, you might think it natural that Bruce has become an award winning composer himself, but he laughingly calls it more of a default position, not one he aspired to. He wanted to be an animator when he grew up but since there wasn’t a lot of support for that dream in the family, he dutifully studied music when he entered the University of Southern California. His act of rebellion was, since he felt he was already a good enough piano player, to study composition instead of piano. But it wasn’t until one day, after listening to a song that riled him up and he realized that he could write music to make people feel things, that composing started to become a lifelong passion. It helps that he had plenty of talent to back that passion up.

Image courtesy hulu.com

Bruce began his professional career in television, a medium he admits most composers don’t like because of the quick turnaround time (but he really enjoys). His first credits came in the early Seventies on shows like Gunsmoke and Hawaii Five-O.  He’s worked steadily on the small screen since then. Some of his longest running gigs include Quincy (64 episodes), Dallas (52 episodes) and Tiny Toon Adventures (11 episodes as well as the main theme). Over the years, he’s been nominated 22 times for an Emmy, winning ten of them. His latest work can be heard on the current Fox show The Orville (Bruce composed the main theme and scored the first several episodes).

Bruce made the leap to the big screen in 1983, scoring The Prodigal. Two years later, he earned an Oscar nomination for his work on the Western Silverado (he lost to Out of Africa). Since then, his work has been heard on dozens of projects as diverse as the remake of Miracle on 34^th Street to the experimental Michael Jackson film Moonwalker.

Image copyright Disney

Bruce is no stranger to the symphony concert stage either, even though he feels it’s harder to engage the audience with nothing visual to help out. He’s written 12 full orchestral pieces, 32 compositions for chamber groups and another dozen concertos and the like for symphonic band ensembles.

For his first Disney score in 1990, Bruce was given the task of creating music for the first theatrically released animated sequel in the company’s history, The Rescuers Down Under. This meant he not only had to incorporate elements of Artie Butler’s work from the first movie but then had to translate it into a sweeping adventure set in another country. He was more than up to the task and began a long relationship with the studio.

Image copyright Disney

For the silver screen, Bruce has scored Disney pictures including Honey, I Blew Up the Kid, Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey, Homeward Bound II, Betsy’s Wedding, Shadow Conspiracy, Krippendorf’s Tribe, The Three Musketeers (the animated version with Mickey, Goofy and Donald) and Bambi II (which technically was a direct to video project but is still feature length). For Fantasia 2000, Bruce was conductor and musical supervisor for the Rhapsody in Blue segment.  He also scored two episodes of The Wonderful World of Disney and both made-for-television movies based on the Eloise books (winning an Emmy both times, thank you very much).

Image copyright Disney

Bruce’s most often heard compositions, though, were the pieces he did for various Disney theme parks (even if, sadly, most of them are no longer operational). If you ever experienced any of the following attractions, you’ve heard one of Bruce’s scores: The Timekeeper (known as From Time to Time in Paris and Tokyo), Cinemagique (Paris), The Making of Me (Wonders of Life pavilion, Epcot), Honey, I Shrunk the Audience (Imagination pavilion, Epcot), Ellen’s Energy Adventure (Universe of Energy pavilion, Epcot), One Man’s Dream (Disney’s Hollywood Studios), Seasons of the Vine (Disney’s California Adventure) or Golden Dreams (Disney’s California Adventure). The one place you can still hear his work is on Spaceship Earth in Epcot (so I suggest you run right over there and take a listen before they change everything on us).

In between all his composing, Bruce has managed to find time to be the Governor of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (the Oscar people), the Governor of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (the Emmy folks), President of the Society of Composers and Lyricists (they don’t give out any awards) and is currently on the board of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP). He is also a lecturer at USC and still actively writes music. Who knows, the next time you find yourself in a darkened theater, you just might see the words Music by Bruce Broughton.

September 19 - Jeremy John Irons

On this day, in 1948, Jeremy John Irons was born on the Isle of Wight in England.

Jeremy attended the Bristol Old Vic Theater School in Bristol, England for his formal theatrical training. The Old Vic is, of course, the most prestigious British acting school having been founded by Laurence Olivier himself, don't you know. His training definitely took though, as he's managed to win all kinds of awards since his West End debut 47 years ago.

And what a debut. He played John the Baptist and Judas in the original London production of Godspell, which ran for over 1100 performances. Jeremy would go on to grace West End stages for multiple productions right up to this year. He's played with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre and at the Globe Theatre. All that success on British stages naturally made British television notice him.

Jeremy began appearing fairly regularly on all sorts of programs on the BBC starting in the early 1970s. In 1977, he starred in Love for Lydia for 13 episodes. The following year he was romantically linked to Judy Dench in Langrishe, Go Down.

But it was in 1981's Brideshead Revisited that Jeremy got a taste of what could really be called fame. A Golden Globe nomination would come out of that performance. The same year, Jeremy would star opposite Meryl Streep in The French Lieutenant's Woman. A BAFTA award nomination would come out of that performance. If you can believe it, things would only get better for Jeremy after that pretty spectacular year.

A Tony Award win for his Broadway debut in The Real Thing in 1984. Multiple awards for playing twin brothers in 1988's Dead Ringers. Multiple awards including an Oscar and a Golden Globe for Reversal of Fortune in 1990. Primetime Emmys in 1997, 2006 and 2014. Another Golden Globe, a SAG Award and more nominations then most graduating classes can usually amass collectively. Yes, Jeremy is just that good.

His contribution to the Disney Studio is threefold. First, and foremost, Jeremy turned an a deliciously unctuous performance as the villain of The Lion King, Scar. My second favorite Disney bad guy earned Jeremy a well deserved Annie Award. The second place you might known him, actually seeing him this time, was as HG Wells in the Circle-Vision movie called The Timekeeper. This film played in Walt Disney World, Disneyland Paris and Tokyo Disneyland from the mid 1990s through the mid 2000s. The third place Jeremy was heard was also a place that almost paired him with Judy Dench again. He was the third person to narrate the Epcot attraction Spaceship Earth, replacing Walter Cronkite in 1994. She was his replacement in 2008.

As I said earlier, Jeremy was playing on the West End earlier this year. Even though he turns 70 today, he may have a few more award nominations in his future. I think I speak for all of us when I say we look forward to seeing what that future brings.