Finneas had to learn how to score music for a string quartet for ‘Disclaimer’
Oscar-winning composer and award-winning songwriter Finneas is no stranger to writing music for film. The composer and songwriter won Oscars – with his superstar sister Billie Eilish – for “no time to” from the James Bond film with the same name, and “What was I made for?” From “Barbie” in 2024. He won Grammy and has a solo career and multiplatin sum music with Eilish. He is a songwriter of all transactions, but when it came to writing music for the limited series ‘Disclaimer’ by AppletV+, the maker of the series and director Alfonso Cuarón wanted something different than him.
Despite the extensive CV of Finneas, he never scored TV, but Cuarón was a fan. Although the musician was on board while filming, it was only in post production that the work really started. “He sent me a couple of music that he loved as references, and they were usually string quartets,” says Finneas. “I immediately had something like:” Oh my God, I don’t know how to write music for a string quartet “, so I had to learn.”
The seven-part series Sterren Cate Blanchett, Kevin Kline, Sacha Baron Cohen and Kodi Smit-McPhee. The show follows the acclaimed journalist Catherine Ravenscroft (Blanchett), who built her reputation that revealed the crimes and violations of others. When she receives a novel from an unknown author, she is shocked to realize that she is now the main character in a story that exposes her darkest secrets.
Finneas started writing the music and brought composer David Campbell “to note and write what I had written and then orchestrate it in parts – because I don’t know how to write sheet music.” It was Campbell who recommended the Attacca quartet, and because Cuarón was a string quartet buff, he already knew the prestigious group of musicians.
When approaching the score, Finneas notes that most Cuarón films, such as “Roma” and “Y Tu Mama Tambien”, “have no score”, so the “Less is more” approach seemed appropriate. “There are great assembly sequences, such as the water Rescue, where we knew we needed the momentum of music, and there are times when the music is a bit of an inner monologue of character,” he says.
Episode 7 reveals the secret of Catherine. Jonathan, the young man she had met on vacation and saved her son from drowning, would later return to her room and her attacks. Cuarón gave Finneas a piece of music for the scene. He says: “I thought it was super spooky, and it just felt like the right terrible thing to play” under the realization that the story that had folded and destroyed Catherine’s life was not true. With that realization, all the fantasy music that had previously had to shift with the story.
When it comes to instruments, he gave Catherine a cello theme that could be heard early in episode 1. He also created a family suite. Catherine’s son, Nicholas (Smit-McPhee) “usually listens to rap, dirt and practice [husband] Robert (Sacha Baron Cohen). ”
Elsewhere he created various themes, including a love theme for Steven (Kevin Kline) and his deceased wife Nancy (Lesley Manville) who appears in Flashbacks.
Regarding his experience with scoring for TV, Finneas says that he did not work in a linear way. “I would work on instructions from episode 6 and then 2,” and jump around, “which was satisfactory.”
He adds: “If I did more television, I hope I could do that again, because, you know, it’s attractive to do it that way.”
