Up Against It

The network is torturing me about the music. They didn't like my approach (after approving the picture aspect of my cut almost without any changes at all) so I cheerfully dumped all but about four cues. Those four cues really work. They make people cry. I've seen it. But the network wants them "younger", whatever that means. They want to "go against the drama", whatever that means. As in "This works. Hm. Let's change it."

Today we had the big music conference call. I will admit: I played the emotion card. I got emotional. Not a tantrum, nothing loud or obnoxious: I'm too smart for that. I just got...sad. which made, I think, though I could be wrong, a slight chink in the armor of their self-convinced-ness. At one point I said I was sorry for taking such a strong position and after the call I got an email from the head of movies at the network: "You need never apologize for passion... that's what makes you so amazing creatively..." Which sounds nice, but it wasn't yet: "Yes, you're right, the final cues can stay as you have them." My poor executive producer was literally in tears after the call because she felt so bad that she couldn't fix this for me, that she had no power to set it right. The head of the studio may come in and argue my case, if it comes to that, though in the studio/network showdown the network always walks away blowing the smoke off the muzzle of its gun. For the moment what we seem--I stress seem--to have gotten is that they'll wait to hear the other cues the composer is working on before they make a decision.

This one I want to win.