ISCHIA GLOBAL FILM & MUSIC FEST INTERVIEW # 2: PAUL HAGGIS

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Paul Haggis wrote and directed Crash, winner of the Academy Award for best picture and best screenplay in 2006. For Clint Eastwood he has written both Million Dollar Baby and Flags Of Our Fathers. He is also the creator of the TV show The Black Donnellys and has penned the screenplays to The Last Kiss, Quantum Of Solace and In The Valley Of Elah, which he also directed.

TIMOTHY E. RAW: How involved are you in the scoring process of the films you’ve directed?

PAUL HAGGIS: I think if there’s anything in a film at all, any element of it, as a director I have to be a part of it. Every sound in the film, every footfall and how it’s EQ’d, every piece of music and how it’s laid in and ultimately, how it comes across in the final mix and then in the layback, I’m there for. Every scene.

RAW: Can you describe what it’s like to watch a film you’ve written, and listening to the score as a viewer. What the music does to what you put on paper. How it might aid and also complicate your words?

PH: I think Million Dollar Baby is probably a good example of that. I thought Clint’s score for that was quite beautiful, quite simple, not at all what I had imagined. It really, I think, pulled the emotion, rather than sentimentality off the page and onto the screen. Its spare quality really, truly brought the drama to the fore.

RAW: Having used Mark Isham on both the films you’ve directed thus far, would you be looking to collaborate with him again, the next time you climb into the director’s chair?

PH: I love working with Mark. I’ve already shown him the script for the next thing I’m doing, he’s one of the first people I ever show a script to. I’m very much hoping that he’ll be available to do it for me.

RAW: A lot of the other people I’ve interviewed here at the festival are very wary of getting into a comfort zone with a composer in that way and stress that the material must dictate the choice.

PH: I like working with the same people over, over and over again, as long as they don’t do the same thing over and over again. Mark always completely recreates himself; his score for In The Valley Of Elah couldn’t be more different than the score for Crash. I’m sure the score he’s going to do next for me will be that much different as well. You trust your composer to be an artist and not just someone who has one style and one thing they do.

RAW: How is it that he goes about changing his style like that and was it the case that after the huge success of Crash, he felt the added pressure to do so?

PH: We start with the script and the material, we start with the characters, we have long discussions, during which we start to talk about style. We oddly, are thinking the same kinds of things and even though it’s not on the page, we are in synch in so many ways. What I love too about Mark is that he’s often convinced me, not to use music in a scene. We’ll watch a scene, I’ll be saying what I think the score is and that maybe we should start here, go up there etc and he’ll go, “Why? What’s the music gonna do?” I say, “Well, it’s gonna underscore the drama”, he says, “It’s dramatic enough the way it is, you don’t need music!” So we listen to it without music and of course, he’s completely right. Other times he’ll convince me to use music in places I’d have no idea how to use music and was adamant that I wouldn’t. He’ll say “I’m just gonna write something”. He’ll spot it, he’ll write and I’ll go “Oh, it really works much better”, or on the rare occasion, I’ll disagree. That give and take is a wonderful thing; it’s the nature of trust between two artists.

Paul Haggis, chairman of the Ischia Global Film & Music Festival.

RAW: How did you first become aware of Mark’s work?

PH: I’d been a big admirer of his early work, I certainly loved his score for Never Cry Wolf. Also, all the Alan Rudolph films that he did, I just love the scores to those, so I was a huge fan of his before I ever met him. And so we started working together in television on a series called Easy Streets, which was a great score with Celtic underpinnings and very dark elements. I used him in television, I used him in film, I use him whenever I can.

RAW: Outside of working with Mark, are there any other composers that you particularly admire, scores that they’ve done?

PH: I admire so many. There’s not one in particular I could speak to. There’s Michael Nyman… so many people, I didn’t want to just single him, he just happened to pop into my head. There are people whose music is just so unique and has such a strong voice. Yeah, if Mark wasn’t available for any reason, there’s a dozen I could pick who I’d love to work with.

Other articles of interest:

• ISCHIA GLOBAL FILM & MUSIC FEST INTERVIEW # 3: BILLE AUGUST

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