'Light Fantastic' and 'Joanna'

July 20, 2022

'Light Fantastic' and 'Joanna'

Lately, I've been exploring mid-1960s films and their soundtracks. I'm particularly curious about barely known and forgotten movies, experimental in some cases or low-budget, but keenly scored. The world changed dramatically during this period and almost overnight. The pre-teen and teen market started to gain commercial value and power, and young adults felt at sea. Films emerged to capture the anxious plight of the middle generation shaped by a late-1950s ethos and the exciting new youth scene driven by Motown and the British Invasion. Many of these films used new composers and arrangers, or turned to jazz musicians for music that expressed uncertainty and confusion.

Two films I discovered recently by accident are Light Fantastic (1964) and Joanna (1968). Interestingly, both films were released by 20th Century-Fox and the soundtrack albums were put out on 20th Century-Fox Records.

Light Fantastic is a romantic drama directed by Robert McCarty, whose 1961 documentary, Rooftops of New York, looked candidly at dramas unfolding on the tops of apartment buildings. It received an Oscar nomination for Best Live Action Short Film. Light Fantastic examined the seduction of a milquetoast secretary by a seedy and aimless dance instructor. The pair are stand-ins for the frustration faced by young adults stuck in meaningless jobs and trying to find a mate in pre-pill America.

The music was by Joseph Liebman and was scored by Judd Woldin. Liebman, who died in 2001, scored three of McCarty's films in the early 1960s and is probably best known for writing Charlie's Tune for the 2012 movie Argo. Woldin, who died in 2011, was best known for the short-lived Broadway musical Raisin in 1975, which won a Tony and Grammy for Best Musical and Best Original Score From a Musical. For the most part, neither artist seemed to have made it big.

In the film's street scenes and passages where there is little dialogue, the music takes center stage. On the back of the Light Fantastic soundtrack album, the notes include this: "The composer wishes to pay special thanks to Buzzy Brauner's magic flute, Buddy Iannone on the trumpet and Jimmy Cleveland's torrid trombone."

Brauner was predominantly a saxophonist who played in the post-war bands of Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, Billy VerPlanck, Richard Maltby and Benny Goodman. He also appeared on jazz albums led by Percy Mayfield, Houston Person and, my favorite, Leon Spencer Jr. That's Brauner's flute on If You Were Me and I Were You, arranged by VerPlanck. Ionnone is on trumpet on Art Ford's Jazz Party broadcasts on WNTA in New York in 1958. Cleveland, of course, was a major jazz trombonist. The music on Light Fantastic is quite good. To give you a taste, here's I Never Found a Way from the film...

Joanna is a completely different bag. It was a British film written and directed by Michael Sarne, who also directed the cult movie Myra Breckinridge (1970). Sarne had an affair with the film's lead actress, Geneviève Waïte, and told New York Magazine in 1968 that he routinely hit her during production because it was the only way to direct her. Sarne would spend the rest of his career in acting roles.

In short, Joanna is a campy film about a 17-year-old girl who comes to Swinging London, meets a range of colorful characters (including Donald Sutherland, who had appeared in four other films that year), discovers the pleasures of casual sex and falls in love. Tony Hatch and Jackie Trent were originally asked to write the theme song, but that idea was scrapped in favor of Rod McKuen's compositions (words and music), with the music arranged and conducted by Arthur Greenslade. Interestingly, at 55:35 in the film, When Joanna Loved Me pops up, sung here by British-American singer-songwriter Scott Walker and written in 1964 by Jack Segal and Robert Wells.

The draw for me in discovering these minor films are their interesting scores that are virtually unknown today. When I went onto eBay a couple of weeks ago to see about the soundtracks, I found both albums factory-sealed for about $9 each. The hot pink covers alone were worth the price.

Let's dig in.

Here's Light Fantastic (1964), starring Dolores McDougal as Beverly (1964). There is some great footage of New York in the summer of 1963, including scenes showing the city's old "Jackie Gleason" model buses and the scenes shot on the Upper West Side and Riverside Park...