The Legendary Shaiman Chat With the Kaplans

This is another one of my all-time favorite FSM pieces. It will definitely be going in our Best of FSM book! From FSM Vol. 5, No. 7, August 2000.

Checking in at the Mile High Club with Marc Shaiman

The following “conversation” between Marc Shaiman and brothers Jon and Al Kaplan took place over AOL Instant Messaging. Aside from a few changes in punctuation and capitalization, it is virtually unedited—a raw masterpiece. Given the medium, you won’t see Shaiman rattling off with pretentious speeches—comments are short and concise. You may also notice an endearing random and scattershot quality to this article—again, for those who are unfamiliar, this is part of the nature of Instant Messaging.

This is by no means the first dialogue Shaiman and the Kaplans have shared...but it’s the first we’ve gotten permission to run in FSM. Shaiman’s career and thoughts on film composing are touched on in numerous instances, but this is not a completely traditional “interview,” so try not to be offended by it. It’s more an insight into a famed composer’s personality than a report on his latest projects. If you hate this column we will be sure to run many, many more just like it, so react accordingly. [While foul language ordinarily has no place in the erudite publication that is FSM, it is retained in this article simply to preserve the realism of the piece.]

MS: I am on a plane (what a modern world)....so bored I am IM-ing you.

Kaplans: Wow.

Kaplans: Are you flying the plane?

MS: Those were JFK Jr.’s last words.

Kaplans: No one will sabotage your plane.

Kaplans: Are you going to NY?

MS: No, coming home from one day recording actors in Toronto.

Kaplans: Are Harrison Ford and Patrick Swayze flying the plane?

MS: No, they are drunk and stoned at the airport lounge.

Kaplans: Me Myself and Irene sucked.

Kaplans: Everything sucks.

MS: The commercials have never made it look good.

MS: Everything does suck.

Kaplans: Can you re-record all the songs from Cannibal the Musical with an orchestra and sweeten them and make them sound great like South Park? We will buy the CD.

MS: Use your imaginations.

MS: Speaking of imagination...

MS: Can you imagine how much this costs...being online thru an airplane phone??

MS: And yet, here I am, IM-ing with the K Bros.

Kaplans: But you are a rich, famous film composer.

MS: A Freddie Prinze, Jr. movie is playing.

MS: There were some walkouts!!

Kaplans: Fuck him.

Kaplans: We read your interview with that guy Michael Schelle.

MS: Who?

MS: Oh, that book.

MS: Right?

Kaplans: That guy who wrote the book The Score.

Kaplans: Yes.

MS: He was a great interviewer.

Kaplans: He seems smart.

MS: He had really done homework.

Kaplans: He understood The First Wives Club...

MS: Yes...

Kaplans: ...and gave you the chills.

MS: Maybe the air conditioning was just on too high in my studio.

Kaplans: No. Will you do Trey Parker’s next movie?

MS: Who ever knows...

MS: Will he ever DO another movie?

MS: The MPAA is out for blood.

Kaplans: Do you think any studio would buy a teen comedy about a giant killer penis?

Kaplans: Is the world ready?

MS: No.

Kaplans: Shit.

MS: You’ll have to make it with a video camera and put it on the Web.

Kaplans: How about a spoof of Jaws called Jews with a Jaws version of the Schindler’s List theme.

MS: Sounds great.

Kaplans: The penis would cost too much.

Kaplans: We have a lot of good ideas no one likes. Like Black to the Future, about a black kid who is angry cabs won’t stop for him so he goes back in time to change black history.

MS: Sounds great.

Kaplans: Jeff Bond says we will get “lynched” if our movies get made.

MS: So?

Kaplans: I know. As long as we make money.

MS: Well, I should go, I actually have to read a script now...

Kaplans: Did you know Alan Silvestri is a pilot?

MS: I have to read a script for a meeting tomorrow, but I fall asleep when I read scripts, especially on a plane.

MS: So I am fucked.

MS: But I must try.

Kaplans: Read the script.

MS: It probably won’t be as great as Black to the Future.

Kaplans: Black to the Future is clever.

MS: Maybe you should get jobs at MAD Magazine.

Kaplans: We’re going to send you a script and you can put it in that box, “things to look at” that dates back to 1984.

MS: Great.

Kaplans: Okay. Read the script you need to read. And IM us again someday.

MS: OK.

Kaplans: We are lonely and have no friends except for that pig Lukas Kendall.

MS: Hey, is your father still dead?

MS: If so, my condolences yet again.

Kaplans: You are a genius.

Kaplans: Thank you.

MS: I find that dead friends seem to never change.

Kaplans: I don’t know how you can ever be offended by anything we say.

MS: I never am.

Kaplans: Do you believe our father is dead?

Kaplans: He is.

MS: Of course I do...and knowing you two, I can’t blame him!

MS: But seriously.

MS: I kid the bereaved.

Kaplans: He used to say that the theme from A Few Good Men is inspired by Corigliano’s Altered States, and we’d say, “That’s ridiculous!” but he’d say, “I’m telling you, it is!”

MS: Well, whip out a Ouija Board and tell him he’s wrong.

Kaplans: You told us years ago that he was wrong.

MS: But that was a fantastic score...Altered States blew my mind when it came out.

Kaplans: Do you like Elliot Goldenthal then?

Kaplans: Elliot Goldenthal likes beer.

MS: DEF-initely a movie best appreciated in a big ol’ theater.

Kaplans: Jon Burlingame bought him beer once.

MS: No one ever buys ME a beer...of course, I don’t drink, but still...

Kaplans: Don’t worry, we like Altered States.

Kaplans: We had a million South Park questions ready for you and can’t remember any now.

MS: Good.

Kaplans: No. We demand answers.

MS: Well, questions must come first.

Kaplans: We’re thinking.

Kaplans: Did you write “Off to the movies we will go, where we learn everything that we know”?

MS: Yes, as a matter of fact.

Kaplans: Do you know how we know that?

MS: No.

Kaplans: You already told us.

MS: I thought so.

Kaplans: In what format did Trey give you the music to work with?

MS: He’d play and sing whatever he had written onto a tape.

MS: His computer also prints out music, but not very well.

Kaplans: Would South Park be as good a movie if Adam Berry had done the score?

MS: Just a little different.

MS: He does a great job.

Kaplans: Did Matt Stone help in any discernable way?

MS: Yes, of course.

Kaplans: Didn’t Adam Berry quit the show after he didn’t get the movie?

MS: Did he??

Kaplans: We’re pretty sure.

MS: Is someone else doing it now??

Kaplans: Yes. [Adam Berry is still credited as the composer of South Park as of this issue.]

MS: Whoa!!

Kaplans: Wouldn’t you have quit?

MS: Probably, yes.

MS: Trey could do it all if there was time.

Kaplans: We’re upset about Mary Bergman. Did you work with her a lot?

MS: Sure.

Kaplans: Did Mary Bergman ever carry a shotgun to the scoring stage?

MS: Well, she was never AT the scoring stage.

Kaplans: What a tragedy. The new voices aren’t as good.

Kaplans: But this last week was brilliant. It was about NAMBLA.

MS: Brilliant!!!

MS: I must get tapes!!!

Kaplans: You would have laughed, it was funny.

Kaplans: Who are you sitting next to?

MS: Some timid Oriental lady...

MS: I had to help her use the phone.

Kaplans: Sing “Uncle Fucka” to her.

MS: She is asleep.

Kaplans: Wake her up and sing “Kyle’s Mom Is a Bitch” in Chinese.

MS: She seems very peaceful.

MS: Maybe she’s dead.

MS: Anyone you’d like her to say “hi” to?

Kaplans: Oh my god...

Kaplans: You monster.

MS: Oh please, you two are cracking up, I’m sure.

Kaplans: We are.

Kaplans: One of us is.

Kaplans: The other one is urinating on the soundtrack album to North.

MS: That’s what it’s there for!

Kaplans: What is your least favorite score you’ve ever done?

Kaplans: Is it Speechless?

MS: Well, you should really just SAVE this IM and sell it to FSM.

Kaplans: With your permission we would.

Kaplans: Not that they could afford it.

Kaplans: We make 500 bucks a week between us.

MS: “Checking in at the mile high club with Marc Shaiman.”

Kaplans: Okay, say something generic about an upcoming project.

MS: OK....Working with ________ on __________ was a great experience.

Kaplans: Did you vomit when they screened The Kid for you?

MS: Of course not.

MS: I did want to vomit that day you guys visited my studio though.

Kaplans: Why? We’re good-looking Jews.

Kaplans: Do you think Jerry dropped the movie because he didn’t like it?

MS: I believe Jerry leaving was a mutual decision.

Kaplans: Jerry needed more time to score Kevin Bacon’s naked penis in Hollow Man.

MS: Does an invisible penis require a minor or major motif?

Kaplans: It requires quintal harmonies.

MS: Speaking of invisible penises, how’s your love life?

Kaplans: We have no love life. We’re going to fuck each other soon if things don’t shape up.

MS: Speaking of vomiting...

MS: Good thing I have a barf bag close by.

Kaplans: Do you remember what we look like?

MS: Only generically.

Kaplans: We look like Tom Hanks and Tom Cruise.

MS: From what angle?

Kaplans: In front of and next to.

MS: Well, I seem to remember two gangly nerds.

Kaplans: No!

MS: Perhaps I am mistaking you two for Lukas Kendall and Jeff Bond.

Kaplans: Yes. Jeff Bond is a gangly nerd.

Kaplans: You are definitely mistaking them for us.

Kaplans: Do you like Lukas Kendall still or have you stopped reading FSM like Chris Young?

MS: I don’t buy it anymore, no...

Kaplans: We are very handsome.

MS: I read it online once in a blue moon.

MS: But since their search doesn’t work anymore, I don’t bother.

MS: ‘Cause now I can’t search for that one mention a year.

Kaplans: Doesn’t Lukas send it to you for free?

Kaplans: You are mentioned. We reviewed South Park...

Kaplans: ...and they had a picture of you at the Oscars.

MS: Sweet!

MS: I did see that.

Kaplans: And we did the Christmas album.

MS: Well, you’ll have to email me those reviews.

Kaplans: See, you are mentioned a lot.

Kaplans: More than Alan Silvestri.

MS: You two are my only FSM fans.

Kaplans: That is not true. One schmuck didn’t like In and Out and you think everyone hates you.

Kaplans: That one schmuck was Jeff Bond by the way.

MS: Yes, I remember.

MS: I believe the phrase “bottom of the barrel” was used.

Kaplans: Not by Jeff Bond. He’d never say that.

MS: Someone did.

Kaplans: Which part of the barrel did you get In and Out from?

MS: Well, it was low, but not quite the bottom.

Kaplans: It was probably some idiot reader writing in to the Mail Bag.

MS: No, it was a review.

Kaplans: Of In and Out?

MS: Maybe it was a “Worst of” column.

Kaplans: Yes, that’s true.

MS: What’s true??

Kaplans: That it was in the “Worst of” column.

Kaplans: That penis-hat Andy Dursin put it in his “Worst of” and Jeff put it in his too...that’s why you were upset.

Kaplans: Lisa Schwartzbaum from Entertainment Weekly mentions you in her reviews a lot. She must like you.

Kaplans: Even when she knocks you, she compliments you and calls you “versatile.“

MS: Bless her.

Kaplans: Can we have the residuals you get for when the Castle Rock theme plays on TV?

MS: What are you two doing in honor of Gay Pride Weekend?

Kaplans: We are not gay.

Kaplans: We are waiting for Howard Stern to cover it.

MS: Ouch.

Kaplans: What? You love Howard.

MS: They only ever show old leather queens and bizarre drag queens.

MS: That’s like showing a trailer park to the world once a year and saying “This is America.”

Kaplans: They have ugly men trying to win anal sex with a porn star with “Butt Billionaire.”

MS: Who is “they?” Howard Stern?

Kaplans: Yeah. And yesterday, some guy came in with his invention: “scratch and sniff panties.” You scratch the panties and it covers the bad smell from the woman’s private area.

Kaplans: We saw Billy Crystal get extremely pissed at Stuttering John on Howard Stern.

(Marc Shaiman gets booted offline at this moment. He tries to sign on again but gets thrown off immediately and gives up.)

###

All right, that made me laugh more than once, but I’m also wondering how many apologies I’ll have to email later today...