Jon Burlingame

I love the headline on the print version of my Variety story about French composer Alexandre Desplat — the 2014 Oscar winner for The Grand Budapest Hotel — and his four alternately dramatic and delightful scores for major films this year: “The Hardest-Working Man in Score Business.” Desplat created a fun jazz backdrop for The Secret Life of Pets; a powerful, evocative dramatic score (including a piano piece actually played by Alicia Vikander) for The Light Between Oceans; a dark and moody Americana ambiance for American Pastoral; and a clever ’40s-jazz flavor for Florence Foster Jenkins. He even convinced Meryl Streep to sing (on key, unlike the real Ms. Jenkins) on that last one!