We already knew that Terminator Salvation Director McG met with Terminator Legend, and the composer of the first two Terminator movies, Brad Fiedel but what we didn’t know is that McG more or less agreed that him flying out Brad Fiedel for a meeting was on the terms that they wanted him as composer as Brad wasn’t interested in auditioning for the position. Brad was ready, and had agreed to take the role of composer only for McG to then ghost him by never calling him back.
This will come as frustrating news to Terminator fans who have wished for the return of Brad Fiedel as composer – since 1991’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
Clip of our upcoming interview with Brad Fiedel:
Audio of our interview, transcribed by TheTerminatorFans.com:
“McG.”
TheTerminatorFans
“Yeah, that’s right. My favorite guy.
Brad Fiedel
Anyway, he uh, I was in the midst, I had- I had become a bit of a surf er, bum, after you know, moving to Santa Barbara and the Hollywood thing kinda finding its own uh, ending, between me and between them; ‘them’ being producers and directors of Hollywood but anyway um – I realized that I needed something else to do, I actually designed and built a little hotel, surf hotel, in Mexico but the bottom line is – I was down there doing my business, doing a whole different thing, I hadn’t scored anything in like eight years and I got the call that McG wanted to talk to me, and I said: “Man, I can’t” you know, “I can’t do that” and he said- they said: “No, no, no, he [McG] really wants to be true to the other films, he really wants you”, and I, through my agents or whatever, I said: “Look, I’m not coming up there for an audition, if he really wants to hire me to do it; I will come up” you know.
So they flew- they said “Yes, absolutely”, they flew me up there, I watched the film, I guess I wasn’t jumping up and down in, in enthusiasm but I- ‘cos I’ve always been a straight shooter but I didn’t, you know, I was diplomatic and I said: “Wow, yeah there’s a lot here, I think music can really be a contribution” (trying to find positive things to say) but I guess he, he thought that I wasn’t, you know, I wasn’t kissing his ass for the job that he’d done um, or whatever, I don’t know, I, truthfully I don’t know, all I know is he said: “Great, great!”, we had a great- we had a really good constructive meeting and the reports back was ‘that was a good meeting‘ you know, from my agent, whatever, and I went home and I said: “Well,” uh, “we need to get this together” uh, “because if not I need to really get beck to Mexico, things are being built down there and I need to be there if I’m not doing this gig”.
So, the fact is… we never heard back, not even a phonecall, not even; ‘Sorry but’ you know, ‘the chemistry wasn’t right’, whatever it could have been but not even the respect of a call, after they swore up and down that if I came up from mexico; I was the guy“
Wikipedia reads:
He (McG) wanted to discuss scoring the film with Hans Zimmer but he was unable to arrange a meeting. McG met with the original Terminator composer Brad Fiedel but was not interested in repeating the sounds Fiedel achieved in his films. However, McG wanted Elfman to give those themes and ambient sounds a “Wagnerian quality”.
McG told Brad Fiedel the opposite in that he wanted to hire Brad to score as to be true to the original movies.
Brad Fiedel additionally clarifies:
It was in a phone conversation that I told him I wasn’t interested in coming up for an audition and he assured me that he was seriously wanting to hire me. I came up on his word about that, but there was no official negotiation or even discussions about terms.
Brad Fiedel
Terminator Salvation was also made famous for Christian Bale’s on set rant, which left the star with his privacy breached following the ‘leak’ of an on-set recording, and also left the actor never wanting to work with McG again.
Brad Fiedel is currently releasing a musical FULL CIRCLE which you can find out more about by clicking here.
3 Comments
Maccie G sounds like such a raging douche, the guy wouldn’t know talent if it bit him in his ass. He’s probably got lyme disease LOL.
Unbelievable.
Actually, it’s par for the course with McG, but who would have thought he would have made the effort to get one of the most important people involved, only to drop them like a hot potato.
Brad is the one and only composer for Terminator. It seems like McG knew that but couldn’t get over himself enough to let Brad do the work that was needed. Salvation still would have been a bad movie but it would have been so much more authentically Terminator.
If I was Christian Bale, at that point, as the most powerful person on the set and a bonafide Terminator fan, I would have taken steps to have McG removed for passing up the chance to have Brad’s cues.
I’m here only for my beloved Ann Dusenberry 😺who I have favored all my life as a pet favorite. I did not know she was married to this man tho. I know no one will ever read this, and it’s deep into the night..so I am essentially talking to myself lololol..I did love the score to Terminator so long ago…that was wonderful.