Although Bernard Hermann, once of Juilliard, didn’t subscribe to “You have to lose yourself, to find yourself”, he may haveorchestrated the ten year ego trip with ”Hitch”, director Alfred Hitchcock’s nickname in the parlance of movie making on the Universal lot, off Lankershim and Bluffside Drive in North Hollywood..marketable turf for Gig Scala, Archie Leach munching into his favorite Hungarian
Goulash…., Debbie Reynolds, Gig Young, Tony Curtis, Dorothy Dandridge, Joyce Selznick the “Miracle Worker” and femme fatalemaestro...
II
Two indomitable geniuses or giants depending on how a sociologistmeasures their relationship in the conundrum of the studiomachinations and devilish self absorption.
The portly Englishman from across the pond, had been what is known as a film editor, the “headmasters” promoting his thankless role to director. And into the suspenseful scenarios…”The Lady Vanishes” and “The Thirty Nine Steps”, Mister Atomic”s fateddoom on the Music Hall stage, the devastation from somewhere in the orchestra seats.. the riveting gun shot sounds…”Mr. Atomic’sbody slumps. ‘….
The action on the train mirrors the “Mister Chips” handcuffed link to Madeleine Carol, the two fleeing the Mayfair theater for the Scottish Highlands of the fingerless master spy, trying to hunt them down in the tyranny of “Hitch’s” suspenseful plotting. And understated dialogue, the former film editor got the good word from the studio “bigs”, cavorting on the links at Hillcrest or the courts at the Beverly Hills Tennis Club or the gin rummy tables at Brentwood golf and tennis.
III
Meanwhile Bernard Hermann of the Big Apple, NYU, and Julliardwas chasing down Orson Welles at CBS’s radio Mercury theater. “Citizen Kane’s” original, made his reputation with the outer spacelanding from Mars, in clean cut middle class New Jersey, once the scene for Colonel Lindberg and his kidnapped son.
Once the doomed scene had come and gone, “Citizen Kane” heard the chimes of El Real Camino … the studio call at RKO’s MelroseAvenue..….and packed his toothbrush and Mercury Theateraficiandos for the energy and drive to chronicle William Randolph Hearst and his own larger than life ambitions beyond Marian Davies (“A star is born?”) and those Fatty Arbuckle Harold Lloyd Laurel&Hardy parodies and matinees for the man who wanted to becomePresident….. at his San Simeon castle.
IV
Here were the priceless ingredients for Bernard Hermann to musterhis musical themes , not withstanding John William’s Star Warsillusion of Cyber space….. and the Arthur Fiedler Boston Popsrebound off ET’s score at Universal Studio in North Hollywood..
.
V
But where doth the Bernard Hermann idiomatic short repeatingpulses(ostinati) go? …..Psycho, Vertigo, Rear Window, North by Northwest, Torn Curtain, Birds, those cackling catatonic measures unlike Stoki’s prelude and overture of Sebastian Bch’s harmonies in Disney’s “Fantasia”.
So why did the cubby “Hitch” fired Bernard Hermann after all those collaborations. An intervening power? The studio chiefs wanted to run with the Beatles and Rolling Stones rock and roll?.
How dare our potato stocked ears grab this melody?! Put yourself in Bernard’s shoes? A temper tantrum here and there . But “Hitch” sold out for the likes of the “chiefs” and Bernard Herman “bon voyage”left for England and the haunting “Fahrenheit 451” score.
Trufault’s “Jules and Jim”? No way Jose! Our own scenario buried away on the lot, far from the gas guzzling freeway sound and fury..……..hear the theremin….. sine qua non a synthesizer Bernard’s use of electronic orchestration. Extending his range beyond four and twelve flutes.
TV’s “Have gun, will travel” “The Twilight Zone.
Radio’s CBS workshop Norman Corwin . David Raksin’s “The Subject is film music”.“Eagles fly alone. A sparrow flies in a flock.”
December 3, 2014. The city that never sleeps.
