Before the first part of Stranger Things Season 5 arrives on Netflix later this evening, Shawn Levy is ready to give Star Wars fans some food for thought regarding the filmmaker’s upcoming project, Star Wars: Stafighter. While crashing On Film… With Kevin McCarthy to discuss everything from Stranger Things to Night at the Museum, and more, Levy shared that American Beauty and 1917 composer Thomas Newman would arrange the score to his upcoming Star Wars movie.
Shawn Levy on Wanting Thomas Newman for Star Wars: Starfighter
During his interview with Kevin McCarthy, Levy let it drop that Newman would compose the score for Star Wars: Starfighter, to which McCarthy, understandably, freaked out.
“If you asked me to name my favorite scorers, five of the Top 10 are Tom Newman,” Levy proclaimed after the reveal. “Shawshank, Road to Perdition, Nemo, American Beauty. The guy is a maestro,” Levy continued. “I was thinking about this movie and what I need the music to be, because it wants to be classically inspired, but it’s not going to be remixes of Williams’ cues. It may be inspired by some of that, but I knew that I needed a big-hearted movie score from a composer who, like John Williams, doesn’t shy away from themes. In other words, every movie should have a musical theme.
What John Williams embraces is that a movie can have multiple themes. There’s Leah’s theme, the Force theme, known as Binary Sunset, the Imperial March. So, not shying away from myriad musical signatures that help tell the narrative alongside and in addition to the words and the images.”
How Did Thomas Newman Join Shawn Levy’s Star Wars Movie?
According to Levy, he called Thomas Newman to pitch him the idea of scoring Star Wars: Starfighter. Newman asked Levy to send him a script alongside his ideas for set pieces and themes. Levy enthusiastically went to work on preparing documents for Newman, hoping their visions would align. After considering the concepts, Newman accepted Levy’s offer, paving the way for today’s excitement about Newman’s official joining of the project.
Are you familiar with Thomas Newman’s body of work? Is he the right composer to bring Shawn Levy’s original vision for Star Wars: Starfighter to life on the silver screen? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
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