READ Part one: August 2021 Dimitri Tiomkin options Will Henry’s novel and co-produces Mackenna’s Gold
A new approach to scoring
A composer “who scores a film should be involved in everything about it from the very beginning,” maintains Dimitri Tiomkin to a Hollywood Reporter writer in December 1966.
By serving as both producer and composer on Mackenna’s Gold, the production would provide Tiomkin an opportunity for a “new approach to using music in a dramatic film that is believed unprecedented.”
“[Tiomkin] plans to compose some of the music even before the picture rolls, employing a new story-camera music technique.”
Tiomkin elaborates on this new technique, first mentioned a year earlier after he optioned the novel. The composer “must be on hand during script conferences, actual filming, and above all, he must be involved during every moment of cutting, so that he can fit his themes not only to the footage itself but to the mood and general tenor of the story.” “He should never, under any circumstances, be called in in the final days of shooting and told to write the music in a matter of a few weeks.”
And the film’s co-producer agrees, “Carl Foreman recognizes that, to write music which will enhance and deepen the tale one is telling on the screen, one must live with it, not merely with a script or the rushes, but with the whole project,” Tiomkin said.
The unheard Mackenna’s Gold theme
Tiomkin and Foreman, to pre-sell the film, intend to record a title song as a single as early as September 1965, “before they start shooting.” While there is no evidence of that, a song was written after filming was completed in 1967.
Well, sort of. Tiomkin’s music for the title song for Mackenna’s Gold bears the same melody as “The Ballad of Jim West,” recorded by the composer on December 30, 1964, apparently at the behest of CBS television. “The Ballad of Jim West,” with lyrics by Paul Francis Webster, became an unused theme for the 1965 CBS television series The Wild, Wild West.
For Mackenna’s Gold, British record producer Norman Newell—his English lyrics were added to the hit sensation “More,” the theme from Mondo Cane—is engaged to write lyrics for Tiomkin’s repurposed “Jim West” ballad.
Newell writes three versions of lyrics and a demo disc of the theme is recorded in London in January 1968 with Tiomkin present.
Newell later meets with Carl Foreman and leaves the meeting with the impression that based on the demo he has lost any chance of further work on the song. When Tiomkin makes an effort to arrange a meeting with himself, Newell, and Foreman to move forward, Newell rebuffs him citing his unavailability due to prior commitments of daily recordings.
Other than this aborted title song, there is no evidence that Tiomkin wrote any other music or underscore for the film and, in fact, the parties would soon come to a mutual agreement that he would not score the film (his role as co-producer would remain unchanged).
On March 1, 1968, Sidney E. Cohn, on behalf of Highroad Productions, writes to Tiomkin in care of Tiomkin Musical Enterprises, stating that “today” it has been “mutually agreed that the contract between Tiomkin Musical Enterprises and Highroad, dated as of April 20th, 1965, is hereby mutually cancelled and terminated and that you have no obligations to render any services as composer and conductor in connection with the film MACKENNA’S GOLD.”
“All press statements and statements to the trade press will emphasize the fact that your professional engagements conflict with the time when it will be necessary for you to compose the score for MACKENNA’S GOLD, and therefore with regret another composer is being engaged.”
Enter Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones is offered the film less than two weeks after Tiomkin bows out and is signed by the first week of April 1968.
Gossip columnist Earl Wilson would later write, “Dimitri Tiomkin, who’s had 25 Oscar nominations as a H’wood composer, debuts as a film producer with ‘Mackenna’s Gold’ — and hired some else (Quincy Jones) to write the music.”
The press reports, “‘Mackenna’s Gold’ would be Jones’s first western, which, in a sense, might be an even bigger breakthrough considering his background.”
Jones tells Variety reporter Jerry Beigel, “You’re virtually tabooed from even looking at string sections if you have a hot-band reputation [as evidenced by Jones’s previous work with Count Basie, Lionel Hampton, Dizzy Gillespie, and other Black bandleaders],” he said, recounting that one producer of a Western “was afraid I’d put a big brass section in the middle of the picture.”
However, Jones notes, “There’s a wild transition over all in the scoring business. Lots of young people with different bags are getting a chance and breaking everything wide open.”
His nomination for best original score for In Cold Blood ups his already high market value and a week before he is scheduled to fly to London for Mackenna’s Gold on April 14, 1968, he can be seen in New York, Atlanta, and Hollywood.
In London in late May or early June, Jones completes the main theme which Billboard describes as a “Cat Ballou” style cynical comment on the narrative.
Billboard is referring to a new exploitable song by Jones intended for use throughout the film to accompany the unifying motif of a buzzard in flight. (The use of the song as commentary throughout the film à la High Noon was not carried out.) Conceived and copyrighted under the title, “Ole Turkey Buzzard,” and even billed that way in display adds when the film was released, the song is now known under the title by which it appears in the film credits, “Old Turkey Buzzard.” Listen closely, can you tell if Feliciano is singing “Ole” or “Old”? I believe “Old/Ole” is only heard in the lyrics three times in the nearly three-minute song. My unsubstantiated theory is that “Ole” became “Old” because it rhymes with “Gold” which after all is in the title of the film and also in the song lyrics.
Jones and RCA Records staff producer Rick Jarrard produce English and Spanish versions of the song featuring Puerto Rican vocalist and guitarist José Feliciano. The Spanish-language version, “El oro de Mackenna,” is arranged by Larry Stanton with lyrics by Pupi Hurtado.
In September, Foreman is set to supervise the recording of the music score in Hollywood. Two weeks before the sessions, Jones suffers an appendectomy, which he writes about at some length in his autobiography, whereas Mackenna’s Gold receives no mention in that work. Two recording sessions are scheduled for September 27 and September 30, at Goldwyn studio in Hollywood, with 87 musicians, including seven bass players.
1968 is a banner year for Feliciano and Jarrard is behind the singer’s hit of the cover version of The Doors, “Light My Fire,” released in July 1968. Feliciano then signs for Mackenna’s Gold in early August and this results in his first appearance on a film soundtrack. Then, in the week after recording with Jones in late September, there is Feliciano’s controversial personal rendition of the “Star Spangled Banner” before game 5 of the baseball World Series in Detroit on October 7, 1968. The unfavorable reaction—Feliciano describes the performance as a soul interpretation aimed at showing “young people what the song could mean”—pushes him into the national spotlight overnight. The Columbia studio publicity department later downplays the controversy characterizing his performance as a “highly individual rendition” and “unorthodox.”
The lyrics for the English-language version of “Old Turkey Buzzard” are by Carl Foreman, credited in the film titles and advertising as Freddie Douglas. Foreman, while blacklisted, was known to use the pseudonym Freddy Douglass when providing lyrics for other films.
The RCA soundtrack is recorded in London in January 1969. The soundtrack liner notes describe Jones’s score as “memorable, dramatic, reflecting the strength and gut feelings of the story.”
Another take, by professor and composer Juan Chattah, “Jones’s score is not the typical Western score; its ‘hip feel’ stems from Jones’s novel use of rhythmic devices blended with musical gestures characteristic of Aaron Copland’s music.”
In a television featurette, Feliciano—Quincy Jones, shot by Columbia and available from the studio’s exploitation department in New York, Jones explains how he worked to meet the various moods of the film musically and Feliciano is shown singing “Old Turkey Buzzard” for the soundtrack.
The music for Mackenna’s Gold inspires fellow composer David Shire after Stanley Wilson at Universal recommends a listen when Shire is struggling to write typical period Western music for the weekly television series, The Virginian.
The song, “Old Turkey Buzzard,” has a second life after David Letterman adopts it as a running gag on his talk show some forty years later. As a result, Feliciano is invited to perform a “lengthened” version of the song on October 16, 2007, on The Late Show with David Letterman.
The roadshow that never was
The film’s spectacular settings call out for widescreen treatment and at the outset the intent is to give the film “the Cinerama treatment.” It would have been the first Western since How the West Was Won to be made in Cinerama.
Roadshowing showcased prestige pictures that were usually longer than regular features and typically included exclusive rights by exhibitors to screen the film in a limited number of theaters in major cities twice each day with reserved seating and higher ticket prices. Roadshow runs could last from weeks to years before the film went into wide or continuous release.
Post-production languishes in 1968 and decisions are yet to be made regarding the film’s release format.
For a thorough accounting of the film’s production history, including the fifteen-month gap from wrap to release, see “The Roadshow That Never Was: Mackenna’s Gold” by Brian Hannan in his 2019 book, The Gunslingers of ’69: Western Movies’ Greatest Year.
After presumably viewing a rough cut of the film in November 1967, Foreman writes to director J. Lee Thompson and tells him that the editing is “appalling.” Bill Lenny is the credited editor on the film. (After the film is completed, in relation to a different kind of editing in the form of censorship, to protest “brutal and capricious cuts at the hands of [French] censors,” Foreman actually withdraws from the Cannes Film Festival jury as a representative of Great Britain.)
The length of the film is in flux, at one point it clocks in at two hours and fifty-three minutes, not atypical for a roadshow film.
Columbia announces plans to launch a roadshow version of the film, complete with prologue, intermission and exit music at the DeMille theater in New York after a February premiere in Phoenix. Both plans are scuttled early in 1969. Roadshow releases, with their initial run limited to a handful of key venues, delay the more immediate income stream offered by wide release and saturation booking and that may have played a role in the decision to not roadshow the film.
In March 1969, Columbia announces the worldwide release plan that will allow the film to open in every part of the world between March and June. The running time is then cut down to one hour and 28 minutes for release.
While some films made in Super Panavision were presented in Cinerama in select theaters using special optics to project the 70mm prints onto a deeply curved screen to mimic the effect of the original three-strip Cinerama process, Mackenna’s Gold was only exhibited in Super Panavision.
The Royal charity premiere in London
Robert S. Ferguson, Columbia Pictures vice president in charge of advertising and publicity, writes to Tiomkin in March 1969 to see if the co-producer can attend any of the film premieres planned for March and April in Munich, Rome, Paris, and London, and the American premiere in Phoenix on May 10. “[Y]our presence in London and Phoenix would draw a considerable amount of publicity to the picture.”
Tiomkin receives a “Royal Enclosure,” a presentation card that would grant him entrance to the “presentation line-up” at the Odeon Leicester Square theater. H.R.H. Princess Margaret would be present to greet special guests. Sir Frederick Gibberd would introduce Princess Margaret and Sydney Samuelson would present Lord Snowden.
Tiomkin and Foreman both attend the premiere alongside the director, J. Lee Thompson, stars Omar Sharif and Telly Salavas, and executives from Columbia and Highroad.
The American premiere in Phoenix, Arizona
Film premieres in Phoenix come around about once every decade. The first and only one in the 1960s is for Mackenna’s Gold, selected since parts of the film were shot in northern portions of the state, from Canyon de Chelly, near Chinle, to Marble Canyon, south of Page. For the May 10, 1969, gala premiere, nine hundred seats at the recently-built Chris-Town Theatre in Phoenix are sold at $60 per seat, and, the Mayor of Phoenix and the Governors of Arizona and Oregon are present. While three of the film’s stars are expected, only Julie Newmar, “barefoot and wearing a mostly see-through sari,” appears after Gregory Peck and Telly Savalas are no-shows. Of Newmar, another attendee writes, “She looked like a giant moth in a gown that flowed loosely around her like mottled chiffon wings.” Barry Glazer on seeing Newmar wrote, “The tall one wore a lunar dress, a soul – type print in tunic style by Ethniks of California, and that’s the schtik—wear it without shoes or stockings.” The short-lived Ethniks boutique, on a not-yet-trendy Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles, featured a line of clothes based on authentic American-Indian designs from owner and designer Marne Murray, in collaboration with folk singer Buffy Saint-Marie.
Heroine Carmilla Sparv, seen opposite Newmar and Peck in the film, adds an additional female presence to the premiere. And Ted Cassidy, best known as the butler on the The Addams Family television series, brings some small screen star power. Cassidy plays Hachita, a Native American muscle man, with a considerable role in the film. In his assessment of the novel, Guy Endore calls Hatachi, as he is known in the novel, “the best character.” “He is the symbol of the primitive animal, all muscle and no brain. But a soft and loving heart for all that.”
Producer Carl Foreman and composer Quincy Jones both attend the premiere and one writer notes, “The milling Phoenix fans seemed to be perfectly satisfied with a glimpse at this representative Hollywood handful.”
Revisiting the film; another look
After researching Mackenna’s Gold I didn’t have high expectations for the film. Streaming the film on Apple TV more than 50 years after initial release the film looks and sounds spectacular. Compared to the squeezed images produced by anamorphic lenses, spherical lenses have a shorter depth of field (at the same field of view) and produce a sharper image since anamorphic lenses soften the edges. The sharpness of the film and the sound design, complete with ricocheting gunshots and echos in deep canyons, are remarkable. Many accounts note the great attention given to the six-track stereo recording. And while the acting is mostly fine, the greatest weakness may be the script and dialogue. The film’s advertising tag line was “A Giant of a Movie,” perhaps to reflect the scope of the film and recall the glory of Giant (1956) which Dimitri Tiomkin happened to score.
The cinematography and technique of the soaring camerawork and filming from the viewpoint of the buzzard were intended for the Cinerama experience and if the film had been released in the early 1960s it may have been attractive to Cinerama audiences; however, by 1969 those traits were passé and even Super Panavision 70 presented in 70mm Cinerama (supplanting the original three-strip Cinerama extant from 1952 to 1963) was history by 1970.
Further, by 1969 audiences were moving toward films like Easy Rider and away from big budget dramas to smaller films and independent cinema. During filming George Lucas was put off by the opulence and huge sums of money being spent on the film. In his early twenties, Lucas represented the moviegoing demographic in America and in retrospect his reaction to the filming might have offered an indication that the film would not resonate with audiences of young moviegoers.
A cult film in India
You know your film is in trouble when the first lines in reviews read, “a Western of truly stunning absurdity” or “Few films bear the visible scars of such extensive post – production mutilation…”
Mackenna’s Gold did not find a large audience in the United States; however, it did connect with audiences in other countries. Russian director Timur Bekmametov reminisces, “I grew up in the Soviet Union, behind the Iron Curtain, and the first American movie I remember seeing was Mackenna’s Gold.” In Pakistan the film sees record boxoffice returns in Karachi and Lahore in 1972.
Composer A.R. Rahman of Slumdog Millionaire fame recounts the following conversation with his American agent and friend, Sam Schwartz.
Rahman: “Have you seen Mackenna’s Gold.”
Schwartz: “What’s that?”
Rahman: “Mackenna’s Gold, man. It’s a cult film in India like Enter the Dragon is a cult film here in the States.”
What might have been
Dimitri Tiomkin’s co-producing contract shows that he is to receive 10% of the 100% of net profits; however, the prediction of hearty profits in a trade paper review fall short and accounting by Columbia and Highroad by the end of 1970 indicate that “there is still no real likelihood of the picture getting into profit.”
Christopher Palmer, Dimitri Tiomkin’s biographer, writing in his book, The Composer in Hollywood, has the last word. “And throughout his film-career Tiomkin reacted to films which enabled him to celebrate this or that feature of his adopted land, most regularly its landscape. Ironically the one film which—towards the end of his career—he wanted to score so badly that he actually bought the property and set it up with himself and Carl Foreman as co-producers, ultimately slipped through his grasp. This was Mackenna’s Gold, the tale of a quest for legendary Apache treasure-trove buried somewhere in the canyons of the American south-west (stunningly photographed on location principally in Arizona). Tiomkin must instinctively have recognized this as a picture made, god-sent, for him to score. It would have been an apotheosis. He would have turned it, musically at any rate, into one of the great screen epics in the tradition of his Lost Horizon and Search for Paradise.”
Sources
Correspondence courtesy of Olivia Tiomkin
“Gold Legend Mined Anew” [book review], by John Harris, Los Angeles Times, March 10, 1963
“Stirring, Fast-Paced Story” [book review], by Marilynn Leathers, Arizona Republic, May 12, 1963
“Tiomkin Acquires Novel For Film Production,” Hollywood Reporter, March 29, 1965
“Tiomkin-Foreman Partners for Col,” Variety, April 21, 1965
“Carl Foreman Coasting For Tiomkin Parley,” Variety, July 14, 1965
“‘Gold’ Song Before Film,” Hollywood Reporter, September 1, 1965
“Tiomkin’s Outpost,” Variety, September 3, 1965
“Hostilities Postpone Film on Churchill,” Morning Call [Paterson, New Jersey], September 13, 1965
“Tiomkin and Foreman,” Variety, May 24, 1966
“Just for Variety,” by Army Archerd, Variety, June 14, 1966. Contains quote from Foreman on success of his films at the box office.
“Foreman Hopes to Reverse Runaway,” by Charles Champlin, Los Angeles Times, October 10, 1966
“Cash Advantages Motivate Foreman, Not Europe’s ‘Authentic Locales’,” Variety, November 9, 1966
“Foreman Asks For Film Subsidy; May Shoot In U.S. If The Cost Is Right,” by John Mahoney, Hollywood Reporter, November 9, 1966
“Radin, Jaffe Hold ‘Free’; Carl Foreman’s Views,” Variety, November 15, 1966
“Dimitri Tiomkin In New Music Trend,” Hollywood Reporter, December 13, 1966
“‘Mackenna’s Gold’ Filming Site Still Is Undecided,” Boxoffice, December 19, 1966
“Jurow Becomes V-P Of Production Unit,” Hollywood Reporter, January 16, 1967
“Abe Greenberg’s Voice of Hollywood,” Los Angeles Citizen News, January 26, 1967. On Cinerama treatment.
“Movie Call Sheet: ‘Gold’ will be in Cinerama,” Los Angeles Times, January 30, 1967
“First Time Since 1951: Blacklisted Producer To Make Film in U.S.,” Tampa Times, January 31, 1967. On Carl Foreman.
“‘Mackenna’s Gold’ To Be Filmed Here Beginning in February,” Southern Utah News, February 2, 1967
“Tiomkin: Tovarich of Cinema,” by Charles Champlin, Los Angeles Times, February 19, 1967
“Carl Foreman To Lecture at USC Tonight,” Hollywood Citizen News, March 17, 1967
“Foreman Initiates Student Film Work,” Hollywood Reporter, May 15, 1967
“Abe Greenberg’s Voice of Hollywood: Carl Foreman Set To Aid Student Movie-Makers,” Los Angeles Evening Citizen News, May 15, 1967
“Interns Begin 5-Min. ‘Gold’ Productions,” Variety, June 19, 1967
Ted Cassidy: Adams [sic] Family Butler Turns Indian,” The Town Talk, July 11, 1967
“‘Mackenna’s Gold Carries The Legend of ‘High Noon,’” by Philip K. Scheuer, Los Angeles Times, July 29, 1967
“Ali Sar: On Hollywood,” Valley News, October 6, 1967. On Tiomkin’s travel plans.
“Charles Champlin: Four Filmmakers Film a Filming,” Los Angeles Times, November 13, 1967
“copy of a letter from Foreman to J. Lee Thompson telling him that he found his editing ‘appalling,’ November 13, 1967, noted in the Gregory Peck papers inventory as seen on oscars.org, accessed August 3, 2021
https://collections.new.oscars.org/Details/Archive/71321341
“Foreman’s Student Filmmaker’s To Enter Pix in Nat’l Film Fest,” Variety, December 12, 1967
“Door to Pix Scoring Now Wide Open To Negroes, Observes Quincy Jones,” by Jerry Beigel, Variety, March 13, 1968
“International Sound Track,” Variety, April 3, 1968. On signing Quincy Jones.
“Just for Variety,” by Army Archerd, Variety, April 9, 1968. On Quincy Jones’s schedule.
Los Angeles, Billboard, April 13, 1968 [“Quincy Jones scored…”]
“Jones Back to Hollywood After Scoring a Film in England,” Billboard, June 8, 1968
“Using 87 Sidemen In Recording ‘Gold’ Score,” Variety, September 26, 1968
“Los Angeles,” Billboard, October 19, 1968 [Announcement of Feliciano recording]
Saturday Evening Post, volume 241, 1968, page 72. On problems during filming.
“Mackenna’s Gold,” Filmfacts, 1969, volume 12, pages 329-331
Program, Mackenna’s Gold [distributed at screenings at high-end theaters], circa March 1969
“Worldwide Release Plan For ‘Mackenna’s Gold,” Boxoffice, March 24, 1969
“Col’s ‘Mackenna’s Gold’ Sure Reap Hearty Profits” [film review], Hollywood Reporter, March 26, 1969
“Earl Wilson: Protest Is the Answer To Sexy Shows,” San Francisco Examiner, April 1, 1969
“Royalty at Preem For ‘Mackenna’s,’” Hollywood Reporter, April 10, 1969
“Open Letter to Robert Lebret: Foreman Quits as Representative,” Los Angeles Evening Citizen News, April 16, 1969
“‘Mackenna’s Gold’ premieres,” by Thomas Goldthwaite, Arizona Republic, May 10, 1969
Earl Wilson column, Long Beach Independent, May 15, 1969. On Julie Newmar’s attire at Phoenix premiere.
“Anthem Rendition Led Jose Feliciano to Top,” New Jersey Herald-News, May 22, 1969
“Barry Glazer’s: Glazed Bits,” South Pasadena Review, May 26, 1969. Writing from Phoenix after the premiere.
“The Screen: ‘Mackenna’s Gold’ in Apache Country,” film review by Vincent Canby, New York Times, June 19, 1969
[Information on the Ethniks boutique], http://web.archive.org/web/20200624114314/https://www.adsausage.com/freep7/, accessed August 1, 2021
[Display ad], “A Giant of a Movie,” New York Times, June 15, 1969
“Jazz Records,” by Sam Peters, The Guardian, November 13, 1970 [on recording in London in January 1969]
Catalog of Copyright Entries: Third Series, Library of Congress, 1971. Entries on “Ole Turkey Buzzard”
“‘MacKenna’s Gold’ Hits B.O. Paydirt in Karachi Despite Censor Snags,” Variety, September 20, 1972
The Bloomsbury Review, Volumes 1-3, 1981. Interview with Henry Wilson Allen with comment on Mackenna’s Gold.
The Composer in Hollywood, by Christopher Palmer, London and New York: Marion Boyers, 1990
George Lucas: Interviews, edited by Sally Kline, University Press of Mississippi, 1999
The Autobiography of Quincy Jones, New York: Harlem Moon trade paperback edition, 2002
Beating the Odds: A Teen Guide to 75 Superstars Who Overcame, by Mary Ellen Snodgrass, 2008 [On José Feliciano.]
A.R. Rahman: The Spirit of Music, Conversations with Nasreen Munni Kabir, Om Books International, 2011
David Shire’s The Conversation: A Film Score Guide, by Juan Chattah, Scarecrow Press, 2015
“Timur Bekmambetov at the Movies,” Boxoffice, August 2016
George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones, New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2016
“Once Again, Jose Feliciano Strikes Gold,” by Dan Woog, posted on December 10, 201, accessed July 18, 2021: https://06880danwoog.com/tag/rick-jarrard/
“The Roadshow That Never Was: Mackenna’s Gold” by Brian Hannan in The Gunslingers of ’69: Western Movies’ Greatest Year, McFarland, 2019
“The 1968 National Anthem Performance That Changed José Feliciano’s Life,” by Roger Weber, wbur, April 12, 2019, accessed July 18, 2021
“Music from the Score of the Motion Picture MacKenna’s Gold Composed and Conduced by Quincy Jones,” RCA LSP-4096, liner notes
Mackenna’s Gold [film entry], American Film Institute, accessed August 7, 2021, https://catalog.afi.com/
“Music and the Roadshow,” in The Oxford Handbook of Cinematic Listening, by Carlo Cenciarelli, Oxford University Press, 2021