Mark Mothersbaugh and Wes Anderson used to be thick as thieves. The film composer (and former Devo frontman) and the filmmaker collaborated on all of Anderson’s films from “Bottle Rocket” to “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.” However, since then, their film careers have parted ways, as Mothersbaugh has gone on to score a ton of films including “The Lords of Dogtown,” “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs,” “21 Jump Street,” “Beatriz at Dinner,” and “Thor: Ragnarok.” Wes Anderson has gone to do…well, Wes Anderson films. You know the ones.
According to Premiere, the duo is getting back together on Anderson’s next film, the untitled 1950s French musical that he is currently prepping to begin filming later this fall. The report states that Mothersbaugh will compose the original songs for the musical. There are no further details as to whether or not he will also do the score, or if Anderson will stick to recent collaborator Alexandre Desplat.
Perhaps most likely, considering this is how musicals are done in many instances, there could be a situation where the duo of Desplat and Mothersbaugh handle the music, with Desplat providing the score and Mothersbaugh only working on the songs. Surely, that means that the music and score from the musical will be twice as Wes Anderson-y, right?
There’s still no further word on who will star in the film, as all we’ve heard is that a recent (within the last 5 years) Oscar-winning actor or actress will be featured. All we do know is that whatever the film is called will begin production later this fall and go well into 2019. Perhaps we can expect a late-2019 release, or more likely, early 2020.