Styles and Methods with Bruce Broughton

Bruce Broughton titled this evening “Styles and Methods” and hosted it in 1994 at the Director’s Guild of America in Hollywood, CA. He chose to talk about what he finds interesting about what he does – all the different styles that he gets to work in. He likes to be “a moving target musically.” He begins by saying that composing for film is a special kind of work where one composes “with handcuffs on, composing with constraints.”. He claims that you don’t have to be a great composer to be a great film composer.

Broughton gives a little of his background, describing his growing up in a very musical family. He himself is a pianist with strong sight reading chops. Straight out of college he landed a 10-year job as assistant music supervisor at CBS, a “cue picker.” From there he went into writing for numerous television shows such as “Quincy,” “Dallas,” “How The West Was Won,” “Hawaii Five-O,” “Barnaby Jones,” and other westerns, soaps, police dramas, and animation.

The first of his feature film work discussed was “Silverado,” for which Mr. Broughton was nominated for an Oscar. This was the pivotal film that led him to score many more theatrical features. The long list includes “Lost in Space” (1998), “A Simple Wish” (1997), “Holy Matrimony” (1994), “Miracle on 34th Street” (1994), “Baby`s Day Out” (1994), “For Love or Money” (1993), “Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey” (1993), “Tombstone” (1993), “So I Married an Axe Murderer” (1993), “Off His Rockers” (1992), “Honey, I Blew Up the Kids” (1992), “The Presidio” (1988), “The Boy Who Could Fly” (1986), and “Young Sherlock Holmes” (1985).