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| March
2001 |
The
Day the Music Died
The Mad Hatter
Mon., Mar. 19, 2001 20:33
Richard Stone, one of the key music composers forevery animated comedy
produced at Warner Brotherssince TINY TOONS, passed away March 8th
of pancreaticcancer. He was 47.
Stone first made his mark in Hollywood as a musiceditor for the obscure
Carol Burnett movie, CHU CHUAND THE PHILLY FLASH, in 1981. Though
the 80s, hisediting talents were applied to a number ofincreasingly
popular movies, including WITNESS, THEBIG EASY, PRETTY IN PINK and
PLATOON. In 1987, Stonebegan his shift to theatrical composition in
thedepression-era movie SUMMER HEAT, and composed musicfor a number
of independant movies such as SUNDOWN:THE VAMPIRE IN RETREAT and VIETNAM,
TEXAS.
But in the 90s Stone would find his niche in animationwhen he was
selected to be one of the 26 composers towork on TINY TOONS, the first
production from thelong-dormant Warner Brothers Animation department
indecades. Stone's work stood out, and he began to betapped for episodes
the most often of all theconductors.
Douglas Frank, the executive vice president of musicat Warner Bros.,
said of Stone in an interview withFilm Score Monthly in August 1999:
"I remember havinglunch with him and asking him what he wanted to
dowhen he grew up. And he told me that if he was so busydoing animation
for television that he had time fornothing else that he would be the
happiest composer inthe world... at which point I warned him to be
carefulwhat he wished for. And basically that's exactly whathappened."
Since then, nearly all of his musical work has beenfor Warner Brothers
Animation, as he composed thethemes for and contributed music to ANIMANIACS,
PINKYAND THE BRAIN, FREAKAZOID!, SYLVESTER AND TWEETYMYSTERIES, ROAD
ROVERS, PINKY, ELMYRA AND THE BRAINand HISTERIA! At one point, Stone
was supervisingmusic for six different shows at once.
Yet after nearly a decade of joyously frantic work,Warner Brothers
scaled back its animation production.His final animation projects
for Warner Brothers camein 1999, when he composed for WAKKO'S WISH
and theunreleased theatrical short LITTLE GO BEEP. FilmScore Monthly
captured his reflections on that era."Animaniacs wrapped up its last
show, Pinky and theBrain has wrapped - it's the end of an era again,"
hesighs. "We've been privileged to be a part of theresurrection of
this style, and it's been unbelievablethat we've been able to work
with a full orchestraevery week for the past eight or nine years,
which isunheard of in animation, let alone television ingeneral. There've
been maybe two or three prime-timeshows that have had acoustic scores
in the last fewyears, and we've been lucky to be able to have workedwith
the greatest musicians in the world. I have nocomplaints whatsoever."
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