Film on the Radio

24 Dec 2019

Home Alone – Transcript

CARLA: Hello and welcome, I’m Carla Donnelly and this is Film on the Radio – your weekly deep dive into the scores and soundtracks of the films you love. Thanks to This Australian Life for bringing us in with intimate stories from our LGBTIQA+ community. Last week we discussed the completely wonderful score to the 2018 film Phantom Thread. Sonically sublime and challenging at times. What did you think of it? I’d love to hear from you – our Facebook and twitter handle is @filmontheradio or you can always email us at filmontheradio@joy.org.au. That broadcast has been podcasted so if you want to catch up and add us to your favourite app, you can do so. In case its passed you by it’s Christmas Eve and I, even I – the anti-capitalist, kind of Marxist bah-humbug Grinch couldn’t resist the challenge of finding something Christmassy to play so.. dear listener… tonight is Home Alone! AHHHH – part score, part soundtrack by the granddaddy of modern scoring John Williams. Yes, he of 24 Grammys, 7 BAFTA’s, five Oscars and 4 Golden Globes. He is no slouch. John Williams is the second most nominated person for an Oscar with an insane 51 nominations (trailing only behind Walt Disney). He has scored most Spielberg films, half of the Harry Potters, the list is too long to go through, and of course the most famous I would say would be Star Wars, or Jaws. I have to admit I never wanted to a Williams score but honestly, I also thought there would be no avoiding it. I’m sure his orchestration has incorporated a kitchen sink in there somewhere. I honestly, I actually never thought “more is more” could be reputed but here is my only example. I couldn’t bring myself to play the Oscar nominated full theme “Somewhere in my Memory” BUT I can play the instrumental “The House” which is basically the theme without the choral arrangement. In terms of fitting the Christmas brief I feel like it does it well. So grab a whiskey or a Christmassy drink and settle in for “The House” and “Star of Bethlehem, instrumental”.

MUSIC: “The House – Instrumental” – John Williams, “Star of Bethlehem – Instrumental” – John Williams

CARLA: You’re on Joy 94.9 and this is Film on the Radio. And I rest my case it was incredibly difficult for me to get the levels, to get the levels right for that broadcast that orchestration just went all over the place. If you’re just tuning in we’re discussing the 1990 film Home Alone, and it’s going to be a mixture of the score and the soundtrack. Yep just in time for Christmas, if you haven’t noticed it’s Chrismas Eve and even though I do not celebrate Christmas I felt the ingrained desire to present something Christmassy. And what’s more Christmassy then someone going on a revenge bender? To set the mood let’s check in with the Home Alone trailer.

CLIP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEDaVHmw7r4

CARLA: “A family Christmas movie without the family”. I love it. I also love that Little Richard song in the trailer. I always get disappointed where there’s amazing songs in the trailer or film that don’t make it into the official soundtrack. Apart from the John Willimas score some really great Christmas songs did make it onto the soundtrack we’ll play a couple after this.

MUSIC: “Run, Rudolph, Run” – Chuck Berry, “White Christmas” – The Drifters

CARLA: You’re on Joy 94.9 and you’re listening Film on the Radio. We’re diving deep on the 1990 soundtrack to Home Alone and those tracks were “Run, Rudolph, Run” by Chuck Berry and “White Christmas” from the Drifters. I’m sure we are all remembering that scene in the bathroom with little teeny tiny Macaulay Culkin lip syncing into the comb. Here on Film on the Radio, each week, we deep dive into a soundtrack or score exploring its history of creation. We’d love to hear from you whether you love this score or about others you love, especially Christmas or New Year themed soundtracks or scores – get in contact on Facebook and Twitter through our handle @filmontheradio or you can email us at filmontheradio@joy.org.au.

I have to admit I’m not the hugest John Williams fan, I feel like is scores are pretty saccharine or overblown, or both at times, but I have to admit in the production for this broadcast I learned a lot about his work and for Home Alone in particular the score really does do the heavy lifting of mood and comedy for the final 1/3^rd of the film, the battle scene which is essentially dialogue-less. John Wiliams was interviewed by ET online and had this to say about his involvement and direction of the piece “I hadn’t done a comedy for a good long time, and usually they’re not really gratifying from the point of view of music compared with something like ET or an action film like Indiana Jones – it’s more exciting for a composer one would think. But here’s a comedy Home Alone, comedy, with the usual restricting parameters of comedy, with a lot of leeway for music. I looked at it and I’ve loved, A: loved the film and B: something I’ve always wanted to do in my life was to write some Christmas music. You can imagine what a challenge that is because of 4, 400-500 years of great church music, great Christmas music – the idea to write something new for the holidays is in a way a kind of a temerity, you know to think that one could do it. But I’ve never had that opportunity in all my 30 years of writing so that was one thing that appealed to me. And the other was I could see when these two thieves go into this house and the little boy sets all these traps and does all these things – that all of that action, there isn’t very much dialogue in it. There was an opportunity for the orchestra to score all of that like the way you would some kind of theatrical burlesque or ballet piece. And so, I saw it was a great musical opportunity. Let listen to some of that scoring we’ll start with “Man of the House” and move onto “Scammed by a Kindergartener” you’re on Joy 94.9.

MUSIC: “Man of the House” – John Williams, “Scammed by a Kindergartener” – John Williams

CARLA: You’re on Joy 9.49 and this is Film on the Radio. The previous tracks were “Man of the House” and “Scammed by a Kindergartner” from the Home Alone score. Did you recognize it? You probably did because Home Alone is the highest grossing live action comedy of all time – with a total box office close to half a billion dollars. Pretty nuts for a film that almost didn’t make it. This is truly one of those lightning strikes stories. The budget was $14.7 million but Warner’s didn’t want to go over $14… in the end they decided to put the project up for sale thinking not much of it. This is a recurring theme with Home Alone, even the actors basically thought the film wasn’t great and wasn’t too invested in it. There’s a fantastic article in Chicago magazine for the 25^th Anniversary, which I’ll link to in the show notes where I got so much information from. It’s an oral history of Home Alone as gathered by James Hugues – the son of the films writer John Hugues. After Warners put it up for sale it was optioned by Fox pretty much immediately – as told to James Hugues by Joe Roth who was the Chairman of 20^th Century Fox at the time:

“I was having lunch with Jack Rapke [Hughes’s and Columbus’s agent at the time], and he told me Home Alone was costing $14.7 million and Warners would only pay $14 million. I said, “What’s the idea?” He told me. I said, “OK, if you can get it out of there, I’ll make it.” Seemed like a no-brainer. Didn’t cost much. I didn’t have a Thanksgiving movie. I liked the idea. I loved the people involved.”

I’m gathering a few people got fired at Warner’s after the outrageous success of Home Alone. However a lukewarm response was a common theme… which director Chris Colombus chalked up to how Home Alone was one of those truly radical things that only persevered through the eyes of its believers and creators. It was a film who’s cast was mostly children. It was a sadistic revenge comedy starring a child. You can kind of understand why people weren’t that enthused about it. But it also had such fantastic lineage.. I mean John Hugues is the most iconic and successful film maker alongside Spielberg of the 80’s. It’s mind blowing that they weren’t just throwing money at him to make whatever he wanted. Coming up next let’s listen to a clip and some more tracks from the soundtrack.

MUSIC: “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” – Brenda Lee, “Please Come Home for Christmas” – Southside Johnny Lyon

CARLA: You’re on Joy and this is Film on the Radio. That was “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” by Brenda Lee and “Please Come Home for Christmas” by Southside Johnny Lyon and they’re both tracks on the Home Alone soundtrack. The Brenda Lee song in particular still climbs the Billboard charts every year at Christmas. There is no music supervisor credited for Home Alone but I can’t imagine that John Williams chose all the non-orchestral music either. In any even the soundtrack/score is credited to him so he gets the credit for this musical direction. In this episode we’ve been talking about how Home Alone is I believe one of Williams better scores, mostly because there’s a lot of the movie (the action battle sequence) that doesn’t have a lot of dialogue… which makes room for his huge orchestral pieces… there’s a space for them to overrun the direction. And honestly, I don’t think this movie would be half the movie without the music. But Williams wasn’t the first composer tied to the film – here’s Chris Colombus the director talking about getting John Williams on board “We didn’t expect to get him. Even the teaser poster [for the movie] had Bruce Broughton’s name on it, who scored Young Sherlock Holmes, which I wrote in 1984. Someone at my agency got a finished print to John Williams. He looked at the film and fell in love with it. John called me and said he’d love to do the score. I was shooting Only the Lonely in Chicago, so I couldn’t go to the scoring. We got cassettes mailed to us. I remember breaking for lunch and sitting eating lunch with the crew and playing the Home Alone score for the first time on a boom box. It was one of the great moments of my life. I thought, This score is going to be in our film? It was fantastic. It elevated everything.” This quote is from an oral history of Home Alone from Chicago Magazine which I have linked in the show notes. Let’s listen to a clip where you can really hear the score lifting and directing the action.

CLIP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7OWoc-j8qQ

CARLA: You’re on Joy 94.9 and that was a clip from Home Alone… It doesn’t even really need any dialogue for me to remember what happens blow by blow… We’ve been discussing how I’m not normally a John Williams fan but believe the Home Alone score does a lot of heavy lifting… I think the score is an equal character/entity in this film. The best part about the scene is the line, “You guys give up, or are you thirsty for more?” was improvised.

Choral music features heavily in the score, as it does in many Christmas carols. As it’s a film that features children Williams really utilized the whole childrens choir element, for some of the most beautiful music in film. Let’s listen to “O, Holy Night” and “Carol of the Bells”.

MUSIC: “O Holy Night” – Adolphe Adam & John Williams, “Carol of the Bells” – Mykola Dmytrovych Leontovych & John Williams

CARLA: You’re on Joy and you’re listening to Film on the Radio. Each week we dive deep into a single soundtrack or score – digging up history on its production. We’re talking Home Alone – what are your memories of this film? And I say this to everyone listening because I don’t think I could find someone who hasn’t seen it. Multiple times. I was 10 when this came out – exactly Macaulay Culkin’s age so it’s been in my life at the appropriate time and then forever onwards. I’d love to hear from younger listeners on how and when they encountered it. Apparently in Poland its now a national tradition and the public broadcaster plays it every year on Christmas. Rewatching it I had a lot of feelings and memories. I remember being a kid and thinking “wow this is great… it really captures how annoying it is to be a kid and not have people take you seriously” my most distinct memories from childhood was humiliation… I found the condition of being a child humiliating – especially in Australia where adults are kind of rude to children.. always winding them up and trying to get them to believe nonsense things. Or maybe that’s just my family. So when this movie came along I was like this is a revelation.. and perhaps that is part of its enduring quality… I was also annoyed that it was a little boy… thinking that of course it will be a little boy it will never be a little girl…

Taken from the Chicago magazine oral history of Home Alone – Julio Macat (cinematographer) said “I have family in Torino, Italy. They loved it. I also have family in Argentina. In Italian, the movie is called Mom, I Lost the Plane. In Argentina, it’s Oh, the Poor Angel. Being foreign, I can tell you: Home Alone has an international theme. Other countries, especially poorer countries with less means, have to be more resourceful. So seeing a little kid who is resourceful and can protect his home resonated with everybody, especially kids who have nothing, who put together a toy from sticks and stones. I think that’s why everybody responded to it, because the theme is empowering kids.”

Watching it now it’s kind of shocking how violent it is… Someone did the math on all the attacks and these burglers would have died like halfway through the movie. If you’re parents now do you let your kids watch it? It’s still a fave at Christmas all over the world and orchestras regularly play the soundtrack. It was on recently in Melbourne if you went let me know. You can contact us on Facebook and Twitter @filmontheradio and via email at filmontheradio@joy.org.au. Let’s listen to a couple more tracks from the soundtrack.

MUSIC: “Star of Bethlehem (Voice)” – John Williams

CARLA: This is Film on the Radio and you’re on 94.9 and this week we are discussing Home Alone. So we’re at the end of our show, we’re wrapping it up, we’ve listened to some great scoring from John Williams also some really great Christmas songs I think – that are involved in the soundtrack. Thanks for listening today and I hope you’ve enjoyed this, the best Christmas special that I could make for you. I’ll leave you on Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas by Mel Torme and Hugh Martin. If you celebrate it I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and tune in next week for our New Years Eve special with Boogie Nights! Coming up next is Triple Bipass, stay with us.

MUSIC: “Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas” – Mel Torme and Hugh Martin