This week on “Picture Perfect,” with conclaves and popes very much in the news lately, it’s an hour of music from movies set in the Vatican.
It would appear that Alex North (born just south of Philadelphia, in Chester, Pa.) was Hollywood’s “go to” composer for papal scores. In “The Shoes of the Fisherman” (1968), Anthony Quinn plays Kiril Pavlovich Lakota, an archbishop who serves 20 years in a Siberian labor camp. He is released and sent to Rome where is promoted to the cardinalate. When the Pope dies, suddenly, Lakota, a dark horse candidate, is elected as his replacement. The story balances Lakota’s internal struggles and personal torments with mounting global turmoil. North juxtaposes the melancholy lyricism of Russian folksong with the steely grandeur of his music for the Vatican.
“The Agony and the Ecstasy” (1965), about the war of wills between Michelangelo (played by Charlton Heston) and the warrior-pope Julius II (played by Rex Harrison) over the painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, suggested a completely different approach. North’s other Vatican score is rich in allusions to authentic music of the era – and of the Church – which is most impressive when we think that the Early Music Movement was, at the time, in its very infancy, and the music of the pre-Baroque would not have been particularly well known.
Otto Preminger’s “The Cardinal” (1963) follows a fictional Boston Irish Catholic priest from his ordination in 1917 to his appointment as cardinal on the eve of World War II. Tom Tryon played the lead. Tryon later became a best-selling author (as THOMAS Tryon), with books such as “The Other” and “Harvest Home.” An interesting factoid: the Vatican’s liaison officer for the production was none other than Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI.
The composer this time was Jerome Moross. The producers of the recording we’ll be sampling incorporate the sound of the actual bell of St. Paul’s Cathedral into the opening of the suite.
Christopher Reeve may have been trying just a bit too hard to shake his “Superman” image when he signed on to “Monsignor” (1982). Reeve stars as a Roman Catholic priest whose ascent through the ranks at the Vatican parallels his underhanded dealings with a mafia don and an affair with a woman in the postulant stage of becoming a nun (none other than Geneviève Bujold).
Likewise, composer John Williams received his only nomination from the Golden Raspberry Awards for Worst Original Score. Tune in for this rare opportunity to hear music from Williams’ first project after his Academy Award-winning contribution to “E.T.”
It’s a Pope-pourri of scores from movies set in the Vatican this week, on “Picture Perfect,” now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!
Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:
PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT
SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT
THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT
Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!
