New York, NY (Top40 Charts/ CineMedia Promotions) Sony
Music is pleased to announce the digital release on November 1, 2011 of the soundtrack of My Week with Marilyn (a CD will be available later in the month). The film, about a week in the life of the legendary Marilyn Monroe, features a star-studded cast.
The movie, the feature debut of director
Simon Curtis, is based on the books by Colin Clark (played by Eddie Redmayne), who as an assistant on the set of The
Prince and the Showgirl in the summer of 1956 gave Monroe (Michelle Williams) an introduction to British life. Monroe was actually on her honeymoon with playwright Arthur Miller (Daugry Scott), but when Miller had to leave the country, Clark was her companion on a week-long escape from the pressures of life as a Hollywood luminary. Kenneth Branagh takes the part of Laurence Olivier, the other major star of The
Prince and the Showgirl, and the high-calibre cast features (in supporting roles) Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi and Zoë Wanamaker.
The themes of shooting a high-profile film, the complicated emotional life of
Marilyn Monroe and 1950s Britain provide irresistible material for a diverse and entertaining soundtrack. The score was written by Conrad Pope, one of the USA's leading arrangers, conductors and composers of film music. His recent credits include work on three of the Star Wars films, the Harry Potter series,
Pirates of the Caribbean, Star Trek X, the
Matrix films and Memoirs of a Geisha. "Marilyn's Theme" was contributed by Alexandre Desplat, winner of a Golden
Globe (The Painted Veil, 2006) and a British Academy Film Award (The King's Speech, 2011), and author of many other compositions for French cinema and Hollywood, including The Curious Case of
Benjamin Button, The Fantastic Mr. Fox and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
As if these credentials were not recommendation enough for this soundtrack, the brilliant piano playing of Lang Lang runs like a thread through the whole story and - it almost goes without saying when the
Marilyn Monroe is the centre of attention - there are some classic songs: "Autumn Leaves" by Nat King Cole, a medley of "When Love Goes Wrong" and "
Heat Wave", and
Michelle Williams singing "That Old
Black Magic" as the end-title song over the closing five minutes of the movie.
The world premiere of My Week with Marilyn was at the New York Film Festival on 9 October 2011. It was made in England at the Pinewood Studios - director Curtis was even able to use the same studio in which Monroe acted for The
Prince and the Showgirl in 1956 - at medieval Saltwood Castle, the family home of the upper-class Colin Clark, and on locations in and around London. Just as the visual sequences transport the listener back more than 50 years, the music too is a superb evocation of the mood and sounds of the mid-1950s, a window onto a bygone age and a moving homage to a tragic icon of the movies.
Tracklist:
1. Marilyn's theme - Conrad Pope
2. 'When love goes wrong, Nothin' Goes Right' & 'Heat Wave' - Michelle Williams
3. Colin Runs off to the the Circus - Conrad Pope
4. Colin Joins the Circus/Mr Jacobs - Conrad Pope
5. Driving through Pinewood - Lang Lang
6. Paparazzi - Conrad Pope
7. Colin and Vivian - Conrad Pope
8. Memories Are Made Of This - Dean Martin
9. Rushes - Conrad Pope
10. Lucy - Conrad Pope
11. Uno, Dos, Tres - La Tropicana Orchestra
12. Arthur and Marilyn - Conrad Pope
13. Marilyn Alone - Conrad Pope
14. Arthur's Notebook - Conrad Pope
15. Vivian Screens Marilyn - Conrad Pope
16. The Getaway - Conrad Pope
17. You Stepped Out Of A
Dream - Nat King Cole
18. Eton Schoolyard Conrad Pope
19. Autumn Leaves - Nat King Cole
20. Overdose - Conrad Pope
21. Colin's Heartbreak - Conrad Pope
22. Colin and Marilyn - Conrad Pope
23. It's a Wrap, I found a
Dream - Michelle Williams
24. Such Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of - Conrad Pope
25. Remembering Marilyn - Conrad Pope
26. That Old
Black Magic - Michelle Williams
