STeVE Did It First, Bucko

Jeff and I spent many hours (unpaid) at the old Todd-AO in Hollywood on Seward pouring over the files, films, mags, etc. on this puzzle. Also spent many hours in the dusty vault of Warner Bros. in Burbank. Even over at Turner/M-G-M (who control the UNITED ARTSTS catalog). UA distributed 80 Days in the 1950's and 60's and yes, they had some print material as well, left over!

You understand that the SOUND of the movie was nowhere near the PICTURE of the movie. Two separate locations, two separate studios! Arggh! There was edited up 1968 sound that only matched the 24 frame, there was sound that matched the edited up 30 frame but we couldn't find the print master for the 1956 versions. We realized that they just CUT THEM UP to match the edits and then dumped the rest. Typical.

One good thing came out of that Todd-AO search, we found the nice music score. We wanted to issue it on DCC (licensed from Universal) but believe it or not, WB objected, thinking THEY own the music. They do, only for the film use. Uni owns it for "records" because VICTOR YOUNG was an exclusive Decca artist at the time. The 1956 soundtrack was supposed to come out on RCA-Victor until Decca fixed that. So, no "revised" soundtrack, only what was issued in 1957 on phonograph records. We had a nice hour or so of music all ready to go. That was frustrating..

An interesting thing happened at Todd-AO, we found the "DIRECTOR'S CUT" of Blade Runner and notified Mike Arick over at WB. That started the entire "Director's Cut" rush that we still have today. Our fault!

Another good thing that came out of that. We got to talk to Liz Taylor (who owned the movie until she sold it to WB). That was fun. She was very helpful.

I’m sure you remember this, Steve---back in the late 80’s Jeff Joseph put together at the Fairfax Theater by Television City a great Sunday morning screening showcase of vintage 70mm and 35mm 4-track mag prints--- Lot of great titles too! Off the top of my head I saw The Great Race, In Harms Way, The Wild Bunch, Blade Runner, Finnian’s Rainbow, The Music Man, Ben-Hur, Oklahoma, and many other. I was a teenager then, but never missed a screening----

Wow, I was there for every one. First breakfast at Cantor's, then, watching a studio vault "DO NOT PROJECT" print in mag stereo at the Fairfax with Jeff.

Good times!

All the print masters were over at Todd-AO on Seward Street in Hollywood. Same room that had the Director's Cut of BLADE RUNNER that Jeff Joseph and I sent over to WB and started this entire "DIRECTOR'S CUT!!" thing.

Over at Todd-AO in 1990 they still had the various perfumes and scents for the rare "SCENT OF MYSTERY" movie in SMELLOVISION! It was a great place to hang out. Totally bulldozed to the ground a few years ago now, sad to say. Fred died a few years ago as well but I still have all of his notes on track/Channel selection, mic placement, etc. for all the Todd-AO music scores, especially 80 Days. Neat stuff but useless..

In many ways I think Jeff Joseph and I can take credit for this. After all, we did find the "alternate version" of BLADE RUNNER at Todd-A0 back in the late 1980s, called Mike Arrick at Warner Bros. to come pick it up and the rest is history! :cool:

Not to pointlessly brag again but it was Jeff Joseph and I (nosing around the Todd-AO vaults) who stumbled upon the "Director's Cut" of BLADE RUNNER; unprojected since the day the print was struck. We got the word out and the next thing we knew, bingo, the print was being used to make a new home video version.... Where is my finders fee!

Jeff Joseph (of SabuCat) and I were over at Todd-AO looking for mag on AROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS and came across BLADE RUNNER (and a host of other "lost" stuff that we promptly handed over to several movie studios).

We knew it was unique because of the printing notes, etc. with the reels....

Mike at WB was just the guy to call (a film nut in his own right) and that's the start of the story..

This was 1990.

Never seen the jaws clip before. I don't mind new mixes to take advantage of home theatre or whatever, but like music... give us the option of the original as well.

I remember bragging about my LD of 7th Voyage of Sinbad because it was the only medium with a stereo soundtrack. Then I found out they used alternate musical cues to achieve the stereo and my enthusiasm waned.

And you know what? They didn't have to. Jeff J. and I found the original 35mm mags of 7th at Todd-AO in 1989. We sent the word out but I have no idea if any one retrieved the mags. In that same vault we found the "alternate version" of BLADE RUNNER that started the entire "Director's Cut" thing. Should have kept that one a secret

Well, the original 30 minute soundtrack album was going to be on RCA-Victor in 1956 and was prepared, mastered and everything. When Decca's Milt Gabler found out, Decca threw a sheet feet because Victor Young was an exclusive Decca artist for phonograph records. Decca demanded (rightly) that the soundtrack of the music be released on Decca or nothing. After three months of legal stuff the album was released on Decca in 1957 after Victor Young had passed on, with Sonny Burke re-programming the music cue sections and blending them together in perfect sequence. Sold a million records in one year, amazing for a soundtrack album. Actually it brought in the era of Soundtrack recordings released on LP.

Move ahead to 1989, Allen Sides, owner of Ocean Way had mentioned how wonderful the original six channel mags of Todd-AO stuff sounded including 80 days. Both Kevin Gray and I had discovered the old Decca soundtrack album in our parents' record collections (in fact, that's how we met, when Kevin heard me playing the album at the studio back in 1982 and came up to see who was playing his childhood favorite).

We wanted to see if there was any more music that had not been released. Film historian Jeff Joseph of SabuCat Productions and I went over to Todd-AO in Hollywood and the wonderful Sharon Lewis (daughter of trumpet wiz Cappy Lewis) got us in to the vault to see what we could see. That's where we found the original director's cut of BLADE RUNNER by the way, which started THAT whole thing in motion.. At any rate, marked "Todd-AO Music Library" and still stored on little cores in cardboard boxes (no metal, thank God) was Victor Young's six channel original music to 80 DAYS. Thanks to Sharon we contacted Fred Hynes, the original recording engineer and the inventor of the Todd-AO/Westrex sound process. He explained what was on the six channels, how they were laid out, that they used six Neumann mics, one for each channel and how to make the best sounding stereo mix. A great man, very helpful, very informative. We were sorry when he died.

Every step of our journey had a hurdle. The first hurdle was finding a lawyer who wanted to work on spec. There was a hurdle at Todd-AO. They let us inventory the music but we couldn't mix it. They didn't come out and say what they wanted from us to let us actually mix anything. We had to figure it out. The hurdle at Todd-AO was that, since they didn't own the music any more, who was going to pay them the vault storage fee for 33 years worth of storage? Jeff and I paid the fee which simply meant that the film went about 600 feet, from the vault on Seward Street to their mag dubber room so we could mix the thing on to recording tape.

So, we got the music, mixed it from mag to tape at Todd-AO (we paid for it ourselves) and tried to figure out how to have a major label release it. Kevin Gray and I "pieced" the cues together in the style of Sonny Burke's original programming of the other cues back in '57 for the soundtrack.

When we had a finished master the next step was to get it issued. I figured MCA Records. We contacted MCA legal and they said they owned it (naturally). Problem is, Warner Bros. also claimed ownership of the music. WB (who bought the movie from Michael Todd's widow Liz Taylor) said THEY owned it because it was unissued therefore Uni had no claim and on and on and on.

Neither would budge so we figured we should get Victor Young on board to show the powers that be that he signed off on it (his estate). Next hurdle. We found his last living close relative (A wonderful woman) who received Young's royalty checks and got her to sign off on it.

We contacted Elizabeth Taylor directly, played her what we had done and she signed off on it, bless her. She wanted to form a record company just to release the album. She wanted to call it LIZA RECORDS (sweet).

However, MCA wouldn't license the released stuff to Ms. Taylor to add to the unissued stuff because of the WB involvement and the fact that Victor Young had been a Decca artist. I didn't blame them, it's their artist. Still, we needed WB on board, a hurdle we couldn't jump.. Never could get MCA and WB to agree.

By this time it's like 1993 and Jeff and I were STILL working on getting this released somehow, some way. By this time (and with our Victor Young and Liz Taylor "signed on the dotted line" contracts in place, MCA Records was willing to release a long version themselves and Jeff and I would have gladly DONATED the complete mastered music to them just to get the sucker out already, but alas, the final hurdle was unexpected. What was it? Well, since the unissued portion of the music was never released on phonograph records back in 1957, the "second usage" thing kicked in with the union and we would have had to pay all the musicians over again to release the unissued stuff. No one wanted to spend the $$ to do that so it was over. Took us five years to get to that point and then, nothing. Sigh.

Note that Jeff and I never expected to make a dime on this, in fact we spent a small fortune on it. No big deal, we just loved the music. Kevin Gray and others, even legal people donated their time, pro bono to make this happen but the union thing was just too big a hurdle.

It's my favorite film score though and the sound quality of that six channel mag film must be heard to be believed. I played it blindfolded for a famous composer a few years back and he asked what orchestra recorded it because he wanted to use them. I broke it to him that he was hearing the original KLING STUDIO (Charlie Chaplin Soundstage) 1956 stereo recordings conducted by Victor Young himself and he flipped.

Anyway, there are volumes more drama on this 80 DAYS saga but I digress...

Back to FLEETWOOD MAC!

Yes, those were done by Dolph Thomas. 1963 is the year the music for the roadshow pictures was recorded not only on mag 3 track film but on 1/2" 4 track magnetic tape using an Ampex. The MY FAIR LADY stuff was all done on that as well. By the way, in my short time at Warners (1991) doing soundtrack restoration I found all the MY FAIR LADY sessions piled in a heap in the corner of a music storage vault. They used a bunch of those when making the special Laser Disk version and then I am sure they dumped them in the trash..

By the way, George R. Groves was the original head of the Warner Bros. sound department starting in 1925. He won his first Oscar as part of the Warner Bros. sound department team under Nathan Levinson in 1942. He retired in 1972.

Thanks Steve. Frank's vocal has a kinda "off" coloration to it (I guess the mic he used?), but otherwise the sound is really good.

How was the condition of the stuff you worked with, especially considering the not always ideal storage?

Condition? I've written about this before. I had to use a full oxygen mask when working on this stuff. NEVER store mag in metal cans! Almost had a nervous breakdown doing these and that is no exaggeration. I did it on weekends and nights and had to stop; the smell and the feeling of claustrophobia were too much for me. Ever tried to do an edit wearing a mask and headphones? Geez, like being under the ocean and trying to concentrate.

I did (in this way) GIANT, SAYONARA, SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS, THE SEARCHERS, THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY, RIO BRAVO, AUNTIE MAME, THE NUN'S STORY, THE MUSIC MAN, GYPSY and a few others that I can't remember plus a bunch of WB Merrie Melodies and Loony Tunes scores by Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn like "The High And The Flighty".

When I was done with all of the soundtracks I removed the metal and put them all in proper cardboard boxes and labeled each tape of each movie correctly including all of the take numbers. About 2 years later a buddy of mine in Palmdale in his screening room had a reel of some WB film score and with shock I recognized my writing on it. I asked him where the hell he got the reel. He said someone found it dumpster diving in Burbank. In other words, they threw out all the original "music storage" material. I guess they felt that the DAT's I made took up less room...

A shame.

When Jeff Joseph of SabuCat and I did some soundtrack restoration on AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS at Todd-AO in 1990 (the VICTOR YOUNG score), the fullcoat stuff stored in metal cans had already turned. The stuff they carelessly stored in cardboard cartons on spools from the same era (1956) was fine including (thank God) the actual six channel Todd-AO/Westrex alignment tones from 1955 created by Fred Hynes who invented the six-track system. We would have been dead meat without it. By the way, this is when Jeff and I discovered the original BLADE RUNNER interpositive that caused such a stir a few years later. We sent it over to Mike Arrick at Warner Bros. and the rest is history..

Over at Turner (where we found some 80 DAYS mag left over from the United Artists days) all the fullcoat mag film scores from the 1950s were going. BEN HUR, etc. A shame. We told them over there to take the stuff out of the metal cans and give it some air but they didn't listen....

Such is life. Even if I get just a whiff of that smell when I'm in a vault now my stomach turns. Just a bad smell that reminds me of some bad times and decomposing classic film scores from the 1950's and 60's...

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