Mix ’70s Rock, Scorsese and Jagger
With its mixture of grimy reality, nostalgia for 1970s New York and a throbbing rock ’n’ roll soundtrack, the new HBO drama “Vinyl” feels like a Martin Scorsese movie.
That is no accident. Mr. Scorsese, the Academy Award-winning filmmaker, is an executive producer of the series and directed its twohour pilot episode.
Should that pedigree feel insufficient for a narrative about bad behavior, existential crises and the redemptive power of music, Mr. Scorsese is joined on “Vinyl” by Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones, who is a fellow executive producer on the series, which has its debut on February 14.
With Bobby Cannavale as the protagonist ( Richie Finestra, a beleaguered record- label executive), a cast that also includes Olivia Wilde, Ray Romano and Juno Temple, and an aesthetic that mixes fictional characters with actors playing real- life music stars like David Bowie, Elvis Presley and Lou Reed, the series is ambitious, expensive and — to its creative team — the closest proposition to a sure thing this side of a Led Zeppelin reunion.
Terence Winter, the head writer on “Vinyl,” said that when he was invited to participate in the project, “I remember pitching it to myself and going, ‘All right: Martin Scorsese. Mick Jagger. Rock ’n’ roll. I don’t care what it is — there’s no way I wouldn’t watch this.’ ”
To succeed, “Vinyl” will have to fulfill the promise of its sexy subject matter and its superstar producers. And it will have to find a coherent, compelling narrative in a heartfelt if abstract idea about how music defined people’s lives in that era.
As Mr. Scorsese explained recently at the Television Critics Association press tour, to have grown up with rock ’n’ roll means “you see life around you played to that music.”
The goal for “Vinyl,” he said, is “that music becomes part of the narrative, but the whole narrative is like a piece of music.”
For Mr. Scorsese, music has been a persistent element in his features, as well as his rock documentaries like “The Last Waltz” (about the Band) and “Shine a Light” (about the Rolling Stones).
“Vinyl” was originally planned as a movie, called “The Long Play,” that Mr. Scorsese and Mr. Jagger had been developing since at least 2000, and which would have followed characters in the music business over several decades and cultural eras.
Mr. Wi nter, an Emmy Award- winning producer of “The Sopranos” who was also in charge of “Boardwalk Empire,” was among the screenwriters who worked on “The Long Play.” But in 2008, he said, “The world economy dropped out, and suddenly the phone stopped ringing.”
“The studio was like, ‘Eh, this is maybe not the time to do a threehour epic period piece,’ ” said Mr. Winter, who also wrote “The Wolf of Wall Street” for Mr. Scorsese.
Taking his example f rom “Boardwalk Empire,” HBO’s costly Prohibition- era gangster drama, Mr. Winter reshaped the rock project as a cable-TV pilot.
Mr. Romano, the comic star of “Everybody Loves Raymond,” plays Richie’s record- label partner Zak Yankovich. He said that when he submitted his audition tape to Mr. Scorsese, the response he got back was, “He’s never heard of you.”
“I’m not that pompous to think everybody has to have heard of me,” Mr. Romano said with a chuckle. “It just seemed a little odd.”
Still, said Mr. Romano, “It ended up being a blessing. He didn’t have any preconceived notions of me.”
No one would comment on production costs for “Vinyl,” which uses enough music that HBO plans to release a soundtrack album for each episode.
For Mr. Jagger, the ongoing production of “Vinyl” has been his introduction to one of very few showbiz experiences he has never had before, and a continual lesson
A TV series evokes the music scene in a declining city.
in how much to be involved in the process.
“You’re not going to spend every minute of your life on this — that’s not your job,” he said. “But it’s your baby, and you don’t want to give it away. Without getting to be obsessive, you have to keep your hand on the tiller.”
(One further reason for Mr. Jagger to keep an eye on “Vinyl”: His son James is an actor on the show, playing the frontman of an unseasoned proto-punk band.)
Mr. Winter said that “Vinyl” had been another chapter in Mr. Scorsese’s cultural education, too, in learning how to apply a rock fan’s ear to a visual medium and bring his cinematic skills to television.
By focusing on the 1970s, Mr. Jagger said, the series could depict a thrilling, uncertain time in music, when a declining metropolis provided a crucible for punk, disco and hip-hop.
“New York was broke,” he said. “You’ve got a lot of poverty, a lot of rich people and a lot of disparity — all these scenes going on against a background of quite tough and grimy cityscapes.”
Also, Mr. Jagger added: “I forgot about the silly clothes. Some of them were ridiculous, and some were kind of sharp.”