John Williams
“I was filled with the love of music,” John Williams says in a trailer for a new documentary.
From Star Wars to Jaws to Superman to Harry Potter to The Olympics, the briefest of looks at the CV of Hollywood’s most decorated composer shows the many ways he’s instilled that same love into generations of audiences.
Williams’s illustrious career has spanned over 70 years. Now 92, he boasts the second most Oscar nominees for any individual (only Walt Disney has him beat) and is the oldest Oscar nominee of any category.
Premiering November 1 on Disney+, Music By John Williams celebrates the composer’s incomparable legacy. The documentary features interviews with collaborators George Lucas, Ron Howard, and J.J. Abrams, plus film composers including Alan Silvestri and Thomas Newman. Also present will be musicians Yo-Yo Ma, Gustavo Dudamel, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Branford Marsalis, and Itzhak Perlman.
The film also features interviews, demonstrations, and archival footage from Williams himself.
The documentary’s director, Laurent Bouzereau, has directed behind-the-scenes documentaries for many of Spielberg’s films as well as titles by Martin Scorsese, David Lean, Sidney Lumet, and Alfred Hitchcock. In 2017, he directed an exploration of World War II through the lens of Hollywood filmmakers in the series Five Came Back. That same year, he directed another doc about Williams called Steven Spielberg & John Williams: The Adventure Continues.
On the transcendent and prolific musical output of John Williams, Spielberg says it most emphatically: “It’s the purest form of art I’ve ever experienced from any human being.”
