Fame
Rather than laying an orchestral score beneath the action, the music weaves four years together from the sounds the students themselves drum, sing and dance. It begins with an improvised jam in the cafeteria and ends with a chorus on the graduation stage.
At a glance 🔭💭
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The people behind it ⏳🌊
- ComposerMichael Gore
Brought on as music director, Michael Gore wrote the songs and score, and the film won him both the Academy Award for Best Original Score and the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
- LyricsDean Pitchford
At Michael Gore's invitation, Pitchford wrote the lyrics for “Fame,” “I Sing the Body Electric” and others, work that later led to “Footloose.”
- DirectorAlan Parker
Parker reworked the screenplay to make it more realistic and set the music's overall shape by asking for a finale that held every genre.
- ScreenplayChristopher Gore
Christopher Gore wrote the original screenplay under the title “Hot Lunch” and received sole screenwriting credit.
- LeadIrene Cara
As Coco, she sang “Fame” and “Out Here on My Own” and became the voice of the film.
- ProducerDavid De Silva
Inspired by “A Chorus Line,” he first conceived the story of a performing-arts high school.
I. From Hot Lunch to Fame
(Conception) “Fame” follows teenagers who enter New York's High School of Performing Arts through four years, from audition to graduation. Producer David De Silva first conceived it around 1976, spurred by the stage musical “A Chorus Line,” and Christopher Gore wrote a screenplay titled “Hot Lunch” and sold it to MGM. Alan Parker, who took on the directing, reworked the script with Gore into something darker and more realistic. (On location) The New York City Board of Education objected to the script's content and refused to allow filming at the actual school. So the crew shot the interior scenes in places such as the Haaren High School building. Shooting began in July 1979 and ran for 91 days. (The composer) The music fell to Michael Gore. Born in Brooklyn in 1951, he is the younger brother of the singer Lesley Gore. His first job was not composing but serving as music director (music supervisor), a post that meant gathering the songs and classical pieces for the film's musical scenes. (Partnership) In the program for Peter Allen's Broadway show, Gore spotted the name of a lyricist he had never come across, then tracked down and recruited Dean Pitchford. As Pitchford recalls, whenever the two caught a hint of a musical scene in the script during filming, they stayed up all night writing a song and played it for Parker the next day. They wrote about thirteen songs that way, and three of them survived into the finished film.
II. The door of the audition hall
(Audition) The film opens in the audition hall. Applicants to the drama·music·dance departments fill the corridors, and the camera darts among their tense faces. Coco, who means to sing, act and dance all at once; shy Doris; Leroy, who tagged along as a friend's audition partner and ended up being the one noticed; Bruno, who lives with a tape recorder and keyboards at his side; and Montgomery and Ralph. Here the audience meets the faces it will spend the next four years with. (On-screen music) Most of the film's music is sound the characters play and sing themselves within the frame, that is, on-screen music (diegetic music). Instead of an orchestra laid underneath, a student's piano, an applicant's song and the beat of a rehearsal studio drive the scenes. So the music of “Fame” does not so much explain a scene as become the scene itself. (Generations) In the story of the first year, Bruno clashes with his father over electronic music, and later argues with the music teacher Shorofsky over the synthesizer (an electronic sound-synthesis instrument). This quarrel between music finished alone on machines and music shaped by many hands together becomes a thread running all the way to the film's final stage. (Lunchtime) In the first semester, as the students learn that academics matter as much as practical training, Doris is overwhelmed by the din of the school cafeteria. Someone starts pounding a piano, someone beats a tray like a drum, and dancing bursts out between the tables. The song playing in this scene is “Hot Lunch Jam.”
It plays in the first semester's school cafeteria, as the din that overwhelmed Doris turns into a single ensemble. It is the song that first tells us, in sound, what kind of place this school is.
- Much of the scene was improvised by the students. The way instruments and voices pile one by one onto a single short repeated phrase (a riff) until the whole thing swells resembles the flow of a real improvised ensemble (a jam session).
- Piano, percussion, handclaps and singing cut in one after another. The process by which the whole cafeteria becomes one band, with no one ever settled as the lead, is also the structure of the song.
- On the record, Irene Cara sang lead vocals. The writing credits went jointly to Michael Gore, his older sister Lesley Gore, and Robert F. Colesberry.
- It is studio-polished, yet it sounds as if it had been left deliberately rough. It is worth hearing as the moment where the film's on-screen music (diegetic music) approach is first declared.
III. Dancing on a taxi
(The street) The film's best-known scene unfolds on the street outside the school. When Bruno's father blasts his son's music through his taxi's speakers, students pour out of the building. They block the roadway and climb onto car roofs to dance, and the whole street becomes a stage. It is the moment when talent once confined inside the school spills into the heart of the city for the first time. (Title song) The song “Fame” came into being only after shooting had wrapped. When the title changed from “Hot Lunch” to “Fame,” Gore contacted Pitchford, who had moved to Los Angeles, and proposed writing a title song together. Pitchford came back to New York, and the two labored for a month to finish it. Pitchford recalled that the hard part was the balance of writing something bursting with energy that never sounded smug. (Editing) During shooting, Donna Summer's “Hot Stuff” had been laid temporarily under the dance scene. When the new song went on, the scene at first fell flat, because the footage had been cut to another song's beat. Only after the editor recut it to the beat of “Fame” did it become the scene we know. (Crossroads) In the second year, a new character, Hilary, arrives, and in acting class the students each bring out their most painful memories. Lisa, cut from the dance department, transfers to drama. If “The Blues Brothers,” released the same year, pictured a street festival for famous musicians making a comeback, the street of “Fame” still belonged to kids without names.
This is the song for the scene in which the street outside the school becomes a stage. Written anew when the title changed after shooting, it became the face of the film over the recut footage.
- Behind the chorus you hear backing vocals (singing that supports from behind) stacking a single word in many layers. The idea came from Luther Vandross, who was then in charge of assembling the session singers, and he sang this part with Vivian Cherry and Vicki Sue Robinson.
- Pitchford has said the chorus's notion of living forever came from a piece by Dylan Thomas recited at a high-school speech contest. Inside a giddy dance track hides a longing to endure.
- The arrangement (dressing a song in instruments and texture) was by Leon Pendarvis. The driving bass and synthesizer capture the vigor of late disco.
- It won both the Academy Award and the Golden Globe for Best Original Song. It reached No. 4 on the US charts, and in Britain it hit No. 1 some 2 years later, thanks to the television series.
IV. Songs sung alone
(Solitude) In the third year, the film's music moves from the street into the room. As Ralph and Doris grow close, Montgomery is left standing alone. Doris starts to question the confines of home, and at a midnight screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” dancing along with the audience, tries out a different self for the first time. Parker wrote the scene in after actually attending such a screening with the students. (Monologue) Around this time, Coco sings “Out Here on My Own” beside Bruno's piano. It is the song in which the kid who talked about success louder than anyone confesses to being, in truth, alone. If the previous chapter's “Fame” was a song shouted outward, this one murmurs low, turned inward. (A song of one's own) “Is It Okay If I Call You Mine?”, sung by Montgomery, was written by Paul McCrane, the actor who played the role. With almost none of the other songs' ornament, it sounds like a song a sixteen-or-so-year-old made up alone in a bedroom. (Shadows) By senior year, the film grows noticeably darker. Temptations offstage, bargains between dream and reality, and doors that open only with a diploma lie before the kids. Through it all, Linda Clifford's disco number “Red Light” carries the pulse of a dance-rehearsal scene. A world where the body itself becomes a livelihood is drawing near.
This is the song in which Coco, always talking loudly of success, first reveals what lies beneath, beside Bruno's piano.
- The music is by Michael Gore and the lyrics by his older sister Lesley Gore. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song the same year, alongside “Fame.”
- A quiet ballad that begins with a single piano. From the very opposite place to the title song that shook the street, it shows another face of the same character.
- Rather than lament being alone, the song takes the tone of calmly accepting it. It is worth following Irene Cara's voice as it sets out quietly in a low register and opens up little by little.
- The 2003 reissue included an instrumental version by Michael Gore. Heard without lyrics, the hesitant movement of the melody itself comes through more clearly.
This is the song of Montgomery, left alone among friends. Written by the very actor who played the role, it sounds more personal than any other song in the film.
- Paul McCrane alone wrote the lyrics and the music and sang it. It is one of the few songs on the soundtrack that did not pass through the hands of the Gore and Pitchford team.
- Thanks to a simple texture with almost no flourish, it sounds less like a performance piece from the rehearsal studio than a song made up alone in a room.
- It is phrased as a careful question, asking whether one may call someone one's own. That hesitation overlaps with the plight of Montgomery, who cannot find a place among friends.
- Set beside “Dogs in the Yard,” also sung by McCrane, it lets you feel the range of one actor moving between rough rock and tender folk.
A disco number that carries the pulse of the dance-rehearsal scene as the film darkens toward senior year. It foreshadows a world where the body itself becomes a livelihood.
- Written by Gore and Pitchford. Gil Askey, who arranged and co-produced the track, was a longtime arranger at Motown Records.
- The long version on the album, running just over 6 minutes, is built for the club, its repetitions stretched out for dancers. The same pulse drives on relentlessly, pushing the body forward without letup.
- It reached No. 1 on the Billboard dance chart. Even people who never saw the film knew it first as club music.
- The red light of the title is a signal to stop. The tension between that signal and a beat that never stops running seems to course through the whole song.
V. Singing the body electric
(Graduation) The four years end with the graduation concert. The film sets “I Sing the Body Electric” on this stage. Within the story the song is framed as Bruno's composition, so a kid who used to make music alone on machines ends up offering a piece for the whole school. The tug-of-war with Shorofsky that has run since the first year finds an answer on this stage. (The commission) Parker's conditions for the song were demanding: orchestra, soloists, rock band, dancers and gospel choir all had to be in it. The song met them by moving among several styles within a single piece. A quiet solo meets a rock pulse, a gospel choir builds on top of it, and at last the orchestra enfolds everything. (The poet) Pitchford is said to have wanted the graduation song to carry a famous line of literature. So the song borrowed its title from a poem by Walt Whitman. The voice of a nineteenth-century American poet who praised body and soul together is set at the graduation of kids who learned to dance and sing. (The stage) Laura Dean, as Lisa, opens with the first solo. Who takes this stage and who does not, and where each student's four years have led, are not revealed here. But to the very end the music walks a path that starts from a single voice and swells into the sound of the entire school. In one song, it replays what the film has done across four years.
The finale of the graduation concert. Packing orchestra, rock band, gospel choir and dance into a single song, it gathers four years of story onto one stage.
- Alan Parker asked for orchestra, soloists, rock band, dancers and gospel choir all in this one song. Gore answered by switching styles several times mid-song. It's worth listening along the seams, as a quiet solo gives way to rock, to gospel, to full orchestra.
- The title comes from a Walt Whitman poem. Pitchford said the aim was for an arts school's graduation song to carry a famous line of literature.
- The first solo is sung by Laura Dean as Lisa. The director had originally had no plans to have the character sing; it came about when Gore happened to overhear Dean singing and put Dean on the demo recording.
- The arrangement was by Steve Margoshes, who later became the composer when the work was adapted into a stage musical.
- Within the story, the song is Bruno's. Heard as an ending in which the music of a kid who made songs alone on machines becomes the sound of the whole school, it brings the film full circle.
VI. The songs that remain
(Awards) At the next year's Academy Awards, Michael Gore won both Best Original Score and Best Original Song. “Fame” and “Out Here on My Own” were nominated side by side for Best Original Song, and the award went to “Fame.” “Fame” also won the Golden Globe for Best Original Song. (Charts) In the United States, Irene Cara's “Fame” reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100, and “Out Here on My Own” climbed to No. 19. “Red Light” hit No. 1 on the Billboard dance chart. In Britain, “Fame” failed to chart when it first came out in 1980. Then in 1982, when a television series based on the film went on the air, it was reissued and held No. 1 for 3 weeks. The soundtrack album also topped the UK albums chart that same year. (Afterlife) By way of the television series, the film went on to become a stage musical in 1988. Steve Margoshes, who wrote that stage score, was the man who had arranged “I Sing the Body Electric” for the film. Gore went on to score “Terms of Endearment” and “Pretty in Pink,” and Pitchford returned to songs of dancing teenagers with “Footloose.” 3 years later, Irene Cara stood on the Academy Awards stage again with the theme song from “Flashdance.” (Legacy) In 2023 the Library of Congress added the film to the National Film Registry. Its way of driving the story with songs the characters themselves sing and play on screen carried over into the dance films of the 1980s. Perhaps the music of “Fame” still resonates because it began not on glittering stages but in the sounds of practice rooms, the cafeteria and the street.
Lesser-known stories
Both the film and the song were originally titled “Hot Lunch.” The title was reportedly dropped after Parker saw an adult film of the same name on a 42nd Street theater marquee. The new title, “Fame,” was taken from a David Bowie song. Had the title not changed, today's most famous title song would never have been written: it was composed over a month after filming wrapped, to fit the new title. Gore and Pitchford wrote some thirteen songs during the shoot, but only three survived in the finished film. Pitchford recalled the days of staying up all night to write a song at the faintest hint of a musical scene in the script, then playing it for the director the next day. Among the unused songs, “Miles from Here” was not released until a 2003 reissue. The voice backing the “Fame” recording belonged to a still-unknown Luther Vandross. Vandross was in charge of gathering the session singers for the recording, and the idea of stacking a single word in layer upon layer of backing vocals was Vandross's too. Left as a single line in the album credits, this record drew fresh attention only after Vandross became a star. It was also by chance that Laura Dean came to sing the finale's opening lines. Gore was washing up in the restroom when Dean's singing drifted in, and Dean was put on the demo recording; Parker liked the result and used it in the film. The director had never originally meant to give that character a song. In Britain, “Fame” failed to chart when it first came out in 1980. Then, 2 years later, as the television series aired, it held No. 1 for 3 weeks. The song won British hearts thanks more to television than to the film.
Notes on terms 📚🔎
On-screen music (diegetic music)
(Meaning) Diegetic comes from the Greek diegesis (diegesis), meaning the act of telling — narration. Diegetic music, then, is music that actually exists inside the world of the story. (In film and musical scores) It is music the characters can hear too. A radio on screen, a piano a character plays, a song performed on stage all count. By contrast, background music that only the audience hears, unknown to the characters, is called off-screen music (non-diegetic music). In game terms, a character hearing a minstrel's song in the village square and dancing to it is diegetic music. The background music that plays on behind the screen can't be heard by the character, so it is non-diegetic. In “Fame,” most of the music is diegetic, so the story flows on the sounds the students themselves play and sing.
Music director (music supervisor)
(In film and musical scores) The person who chooses and gathers the music for a film, sorts out copyright issues, and manages the whole musical effort between composer and director. Often they write no music themselves. Think of the friend who picks the songs for the class performance at the school festival, tracks down the recordings, and divides up who sings which part. Michael Gore began on “Fame” in this role and went on to write the songs. (Elsewhere) In companies and factories, a supervisor generally means a floor manager or overseer.
Improvised ensemble (jam)
(In film and musical scores) Ensemble playing in which musicians, without sheet music, build the music on the spot by listening to one another. Usually someone starts a short repeated phrase (a riff), and the others join in one by one. It's like break time, when one friend drums a beat on a desk, the next starts clapping, another begins to hum, and before long the whole classroom is singing. “Hot Lunch Jam” is exactly that kind of scene. (Elsewhere) Jam is also the fruit spread for bread, and, as in the English traffic jam, it can mean a state of being packed tight.
Synthesizer
(Meaning) The English synthesize means to combine several elements into one whole. A synthesizer is an instrument that creates sound by synthesizing electrical signals. (In film and musical scores) An instrument in which pressing a key makes electronic circuits generate sound, from a piano tone to sounds the world had never heard. It dramatically changed the color of film music and pop in the 1970s and '80s. In “Fame,” Bruno makes music alone on this instrument while a teacher insists on playing together on real instruments, and this quarrel mirrored a real debate in the music world of the time. Just as you mix paints in art class to make a new color, a synthesizer mixes the raw materials of sound to make new sounds. (Elsewhere) In chemistry, synthesis means reacting substances together to create a new one.
Gospel
(Meaning) Gospel (gospel) comes from the Old English god-spell, “good news,” and means the Christian Gospel. (In film and musical scores) Choral music that grew up in Black churches in America. Its hallmarks are call and response, with one voice leading and the choir answering in force, along with handclaps and steadily mounting fervor. In film scores it often powers the climax that lifts a scene to overflowing. Picture a sports-day cheer, when the cheerleader shouts a line and the whole stand shouts it back. The graduation finale of “Fame” also swells on a gospel choir, and the soundtrack includes “Never Alone,” sung by a real high school gospel choir.
Arrangement
(Meaning) The Korean pyeongok (編曲) joins 編 ('to weave, compile') with 曲 ('tune'). It means weaving and knitting an existing melody into a new shape. (In film and musical scores) The work of deciding, from the melody and harmony a composer has written, which instruments play when, how the backing vocals go in, and how the rhythm and texture will run. The same song can become a ballad or a dance track depending on its arrangement. It's like instant ramen: the same noodles taste completely different depending on what you add and how you cook them. In “Fame,” each song had a different arranger, with Leon Pendarvis, Gil Askey and Steve Margoshes each lending their own color.
Finale
(Meaning) The Italian finale means the end, the last part. It shares a root with the Latin finis ('end'). (In film and musical scores) The big number or scene that crowns the very end of a show or work. In musicals, the principal characters and the ensemble usually all take the stage, gathering the themes so far into one. Picture the end of a school talent show, when every class comes onstage to sing together. The finale of “Fame,” “I Sing the Body Electric,” brings orchestra, rock band, choir and dance together at once to close the story of four years. (Elsewhere) Sports broadcasters, too, call the last game of a season or tournament the finale.