Music by John Williams

because it has all the movie stars in it 536 00:32:57,246 --> 00:33:01,749 and it seems like I don't know anything about George Lucas or his film <i>Star Wars</i>." 537 00:33:01,750 --> 00:33:05,044 I said, "I'm looking for somebody that can do classical music." 538 00:33:05,045 --> 00:33:09,674 The old Korngold, Newman, old fashioned scores for films 539 00:33:09,675 --> 00:33:11,217 during the '30s and '40s. 540 00:33:11,218 --> 00:33:14,178 And Steven said, "I got just the guy for you, John Williams." 541 00:33:14,179 --> 00:33:16,514 I said, "Well, isn't he a jazz pianist?" 542 00:33:16,515 --> 00:33:19,059 And he said, "No, no, he does great scores." 543 00:33:20,394 --> 00:33:23,021 So Steven, of course, who I've just done <i>Jaws</i> with, 544 00:33:23,022 --> 00:33:25,064 said, "You need to meet this guy, George Lucas," 545 00:33:25,065 --> 00:33:26,649 who I'd never heard of. 546 00:33:26,650 --> 00:33:29,652 I didn't know <i>American Graffiti</i>. My fault, not his. 547 00:33:29,653 --> 00:33:33,448 So I met George and we talked about music a little bit. 548 00:33:33,449 --> 00:33:34,950 He's very young to me. 549 00:33:35,701 --> 00:33:37,535 We hit it off right away. 550 00:33:37,536 --> 00:33:39,787 He's a gentleman and an easy guy to get along with. 551 00:33:39,788 --> 00:33:42,874 And he was also extremely knowledgeable about music. 552 00:33:42,875 --> 00:33:45,961 And he was extremely knowledgeable about symphonic scores. 553 00:33:47,212 --> 00:33:49,464 I talked to Steven the next day and he said, 554 00:33:49,465 --> 00:33:50,923 "John, you should do <i>Star Wars</i>. 555 00:33:50,924 --> 00:33:53,468 Do <i>Star Wars,</i> that's the thing you should... really have some fun with it. 556 00:33:53,469 --> 00:33:57,180 Don't worry about <i>A Bridge Too Far</i>. That's just commercial. 557 00:33:57,181 --> 00:33:59,641 This is going to be something really good." I said, "Okay." 558 00:34:01,226 --> 00:34:03,312 So he convinced me to do it. 559 00:34:04,104 --> 00:34:05,481 But it didn't take much pushing. 560 00:34:10,194 --> 00:34:14,864 I think the whole project was imbued with a sense of something very special. 561 00:34:14,865 --> 00:34:17,743 I think everybody knew that George was doing something 562 00:34:18,535 --> 00:34:22,830 a little kooky, a little off-kilter. It was like nothing else we really had. 563 00:34:22,831 --> 00:34:26,250 We've had space films before, but nothing had 564 00:34:26,251 --> 00:34:29,922 quite the imagination and the spark that this had. 565 00:34:34,051 --> 00:34:36,385 We worked for several days going through the film 566 00:34:36,386 --> 00:34:39,138 and deciding where to introduce the music, where to take it out, 567 00:34:39,139 --> 00:34:44,311 or talk about the temp cue that we used, like <i>The Planets</i> by Gustav Holst, 568 00:34:44,937 --> 00:34:48,272 the final movement of Dvorák's <i>New World Symphony</i>. 569 00:34:48,273 --> 00:34:53,237 Bits of music from <i>The Rite of Spring</i> and Max Steiner's score to <i>King Kong</i>. 570 00:34:53,862 --> 00:34:56,489 Sometimes John, he endorsed our choices 571 00:34:56,490 --> 00:35:00,035 and sometimes he had an idea that improved the idea. 572 00:35:01,495 --> 00:35:04,705 You do what you have to do to put the pieces of a puzzle together 573 00:35:04,706 --> 00:35:06,207 and that's what it was like. 574 00:35:06,208 --> 00:35:08,167 We had talked about <i>Peter and the Wolf</i> 575 00:35:08,168 --> 00:35:11,212 and some of those older symphonic pieces, 576 00:35:11,213 --> 00:35:15,007 'cause I wanted to have each character have their own theme. 577 00:35:15,008 --> 00:35:19,221 So that when we go from one character to another, the theme goes with you. 578 00:35:26,854 --> 00:35:29,313 The sketches in the scores for <i>Star Wars</i> 579 00:35:29,314 --> 00:35:32,733 are the most disjointed things you could imagine 580 00:35:32,734 --> 00:35:34,777 because there were so many changes. 581 00:35:34,778 --> 00:35:36,320 This was a minute and a half. 582 00:35:36,321 --> 00:35:38,406 The next day, it was a minute and 45 seconds. 583 00:35:38,407 --> 00:35:40,116 The next day it was out of the film. 584 00:35:40,117 --> 00:35:42,785 And the late Ken Wannberg, who was my music editor, 585 00:35:42,786 --> 00:35:45,664 drove me crazy with changes everyday. 586 00:35:46,456 --> 00:35:49,292 Kenny called up in a panic. 587 00:35:49,293 --> 00:35:50,918 He said... 588 00:35:50,919 --> 00:35:54,088 "You can't... There are a million changes." I said, "Yes, I know." 589 00:35:54,089 --> 00:35:57,092 And he said, "John's written all this music already." I said, "I know." 590 00:35:58,260 --> 00:36:00,428 I worked for quite a number of weeks, 591 00:36:00,429 --> 00:36:04,182 never knowing what to do for the