Danny Elfman On Dumbo, Tim Burton’s 'Unpredictable' Mind, And Writing His First Song At 18

Tim Burton and Danny Elfman are one of the most prolific pairs in Hollywood. For more than 30 years right now, Elfman has offered the soundtrack to Burton's signature macabre whimsy. Their latest big-screen adventure with each other, Disney's live-action Dumbo, ticks all of their typical boxes: a film starring a quirky outsider (check); a fantastical setting (check); a bittersweet, sad tone (check); Michael Keaton and Danny DeVito (check and check). Yet that doesn't mean that it's all smooth sailing for Elfman. Case in point, even right considering that these years of working with each other, he'd never be so bold to assume he is aware what Burton likes. "His mind is a curious and interesting and unpredictable place," the composer tells MTV News.


Speaking to MTV News at a recent press day for the film, Elfman talks about his creative partnership with Burton, how he broke his cardinal rule for Dumbo, and how he picked up a violin at age 18 — a move that, by pure chance, solidified his entire career.


MTV News: You and Tim have worked with each other for over 30 years right now, and you've got such an incredible creative partnership. How would you describe that relationship?


Danny Elfman: It's sort of hard to mention. It's routinely full of surprises for me. I learned long ago never to take Tim for granted. People think that we have this automatic thing with each other, yet we really don't. He's got things that are in his head that he's going to have to evolve throughout the making of the film, and I'm going to need to do a lot of experimenting to figure it out, and to assist him figure out what it is he wants. So it's typically something a method of honing in on just where the musical center of the film is going to be and why he feels about it. It's routinely interesting, nevertheless it's routinely different as well.


Director Tim Burton (left) and composer Danny Elfman (right)


MTV News: Would you describe it as a marriage?


Elfman: It's weird. It's more than a marriage; it's almost like siblings. I think of him much like I think of my own brother, which means that we know each other really well, yet however it's a constantly evolving thing. We occasionally have big fights, and then like with my brother, habitually just be feeling bad about it and making up again. It's almost like a blood thing at this point.


MTV News: What were some of the surprises with Dumbo? Were there things that he threw at you that were unexpected?


Elfman: Originally, it's like how are they going to prepare a CG Dumbo look like an elephant and fly? You know, it's real easy in a cartoon; you just do it, and the cartoon flaps his ears, and off he goes. And if it's a cartoon, you ignore picture it. Yet here, he looks more real and why is that going to work? That was my single biggest question. And then I saw how they designed him, and somehow it just felt real while he took off flying. I go, "Yeah, OK. I purchase that."


MTV News: Did you need to be able to see Dumbo and why he would look before you can begin working on the score?


Elfman: That's almost habitually the case. I typically don't write anything before I visualize something. That's a lesson I learned all of the way back on Beetlejuice, where I began writing a month early because I had some additional time. And then I saw the movie, and none of what I had written ... It all got thrown out the initial starting day. I saw it, and it's, like, that's not what I was imagining — just so different. So I started a method of doing the opposite If I went into movies, and attempting to blank out my mind as much as possible up until I visualize a movie for the opening time, and Dumbo was a rare exception. Because I got the call and I thought about the character, Dumbo, being parted from his mother, and I wrote theme per year early, and recorded it and put it away in a file. I disregarded picture it again. And then per year later, I come back, and it's like I know I did something, somewhere. I'm lucky I noticed it because case in point it ended up being Dumbo's theme.


MTV News: Did you go to the animated film at all for any inspiration?


Elfman: I had actually never seen the full animated film up until I got brought on the project. It wasn't actually segment of my childhood. I remember seeing parts of it with my own children, nevertheless I hadn't seen it before I was an adult, and I don't think I ever saw the complete thing. So I was surprised several, several years later Whenever I went and put it on, it's like, oh my god, "Pink Elephants on Parade" is so recognizable. I loved that song. And "Casey Junior." I was very eager to pay homage to both of these tunes in the score.


MTV News: Dumbo is a story about an outsider, and these kinds of characters tend to resonate with you and Burton quite well. Why is that?


Elfman: Any time Tim and I first met, I think the reason why we connected, we were both very much outsiders as a kid. His idol in life was Vincent Price and mine was Peter Lorre. That sort of says a lot about the two of us. We grew up in a similar way: Los Angeles kids who grew up on several of the same movies. We both had our own personalized reasons for feeling connected to outsider characters in just our own lives. And for myself, because I can't speak for Tim, I routinely felt disconnected somewhat from popular culture and things around me.


MTV News: I think people go into a Tim Burton-Danny Elfman group effort with a certain expectation. It's going to be dark and whimsical and macabre. Do you ever feel like you should, or desire to, defy those expectations?


Elfman: you could only do that for now, because a film's necessitates are the film's requires. As much as I could want personally to move fully outdoors of my wheelhouse and keep myself habitually challenged, ultimately you have got to do what the film asks for. And I also learned this a long time ago, that it's just wrong to put my own personalized desires above the needs of the score. The way I've resolved it is I split my year right now between writing film music and concert music.


The concert music permits me to just go completely outdoors of anything I'm comfortable with as much as I like, and I get that out of my system. And any time I'm on a movie, I attempt to look for something fresh, something I could do to keep it fun for myself. Yet on the other hand, I'm realizing in the dialogue of a film like Dumbo, I'm not going to completely surprise anybody. No one's going to mention, "That doesn't sound like Danny Elfman." To do that, I would have had to really not work to the film's best interests.


MTV News: How did you keep things fresh for Dumbo?


Elfman: In this one, it was all of the circus and clown music; something I really jumped into and wanted to do every minute of it because I love that sort of stuff. And I generally don't like doing source music, although I told Tim, "I aspire to do almost every second of source music if it has anything to do with the circus."


MTV News: You were talking about how every score has its own set of needs. What were the needs of this score in particular?


Elfman: Primarily, there has to be a bittersweet tune, a melody that can do a lot of different things. The same melody had to play the heartbreak of this little, poor baby elephant being taken away from his mama, however it also has to play the triumph of him flying over audiences, and saving and rescuing his companions. I knew that it was going to be sort of a monothematic film to an enormous extent, although there were some other themes, although that the theme would have to do a lot of different things.


Burton on the set of Dumbo


MTV News: Would you mention that was the largest challenge for you?


Elfman: No. The largest challenge habitually for me isn't so much that. It's really figuring out what's going to work for Tim. That's the challenge because his mind is a curious and interesting and unpredictable place. I never think, "Oh, Tim's going to love this," because he's surprised me for 17 films, all of the time, by picking up on some weird segment of music that I didn't think he was going to like and having that become his preference piece, and something that I think could be a slam dunk, he was like, hmmm, not so much. So I never have any expectations of what he's going to like or not like any time Once I begin his movies.


MTV News: You've had such a prolific career, and you've scored so several assignments, so several films and TV shows. However do you remember the opening song you ever wrote, and what that was like? What was it?


Elfman: the opening thing I ever wrote… I was 18 and I had just picked up my first musical instrument six months earlier, which was a violin. My brother lived in Paris and he was with a theater, musical theater troupe called the Grand Magic Circus. I was visiting him and practicing in the other room, and I didn't know the director had come over any time While I closed the doors. And I came out and he mentioned, "Eh, you're pretty good. Why don't you come play with us?" So six months into playing my first musical instrument, I toured with this French theatrical troupe for a month. And throughout that period, he invited me to write several things. It had never even occurred to me before. Honestly, before I was 18 I never had any thoughts of getting into music.


MTV News: Why the violin?


Elfman: Because I was going travel for per year in Africa, plus it was either a flute or a violin. They were the only things small enough to bring around, and flute didn't appeal to me.


MTV News: and you also brought your violin to Africa?


Elfman: I did. I spent each year dragging a violin around. It was in the starting of that trip that I met with the Grand Magic Circus. I finished my stint with them, and I went off for per year in Africa with my violin.


MTV News: And right now you're making circus music professionally.


Elfman: Yes, exactly. And here I am, making circus music. Full circle!