Appreciating the Chazelle, Hurwitz combo
Damien Chazelle is a 32-year-old French-American director and screenwriter. He made his directorial debut with the musical Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (2009). However, it was his second feature film Whiplash (2014) that started to gain him some mainstream attention. Whiplash was nominated for Best Picture for that year’s Academy Awards.
Enter La La Land, an immensely encompassing musical drama full-length film that people either loved or hated. And yesterday, the film received additional post-release marketing, albeit in such a terrible manner.
Despite the fiasco, the film still managed to snatch five awards out of its 14 nominations—Best Director (Chazelle), Best Actress (Emma Stone), Best Original Music Score ( Justin Hurwitz), Best Cinematography (Linus Sandgren) and Best Production Design (David Wasco and Sandy Reyn- olds-Wasco). Chazelle is the youngest person in history to win in that category. And then there’s Justin Hurwitz. The core screenplay for La
La Land was done as early as 2010 by Chazelle, a drummer himself. According to an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Chazelle wanted “to take the old musical but ground it in real life where things don’t always exactly work out.” The concept was conceived and completed when Chazelle was still at Harvard University with his classmate Hurwitz. Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench was a trial of Chazelle and Hurwitz’s concept for La
La Land. After graduating, both moved to Los Angeles in 2010 and continued writing the script. In an interview, with The Guardian, Chazelle says the film pays homage and salutes creative people who move to Los Angeles to chase their dreams.
The year was 2010; we have an unknown filmmaking duo, a musical revolving on Jazz, and a bittersweet ending—no producer then wanted to take a risk. Chazelle and Hurwitz worked on Whiplash and it was released in 2014 to gain some traction. According to Chazelle, Whip
lash— which was still musically related—was an easier concept to sell. Post- Whiplash, the offers for budgeting came in. Both Chazelle and Hurwitz moved on but held to their convictions, never giving in to the pressure of producers’ wanting to fund the film but making huge changes (like replacing jazz music with rock). Two years later, La La
Land was released, earning $369 million with a budget of $30 million to make.
“I want to thank Justin (Hurwitz) who I have known since I was 17 for riding with me on this,” said Chazelle. Seemingly with a mission to take music itself into the foreground of entertainment, the Chazelle-Hurwitz pairing is one to look out for.