Alan Anthony Silvestri (born March 26, 1950) is an American composer and conductor born in New York City, New York. He has been working in film and television since the mid 1970's.
He is best known for his work with Robert Zemeckis, having composed the scores to everything directed by him (with the exception of the pilot to 1993's short-lived Johnny Bago) since Romancing the Stone in 1984.
Films scored by Alan Silvestri include(listed in release order):
- The Doberman Gang (1972)
- Romancing the Stone (1984)
- How Did You Get In? We Didn't See You Leave (1984)
- Summer Rental (1985)
- Back to the Future (1985)
- The Clan of the Cave Bear (1986)
- The Delta Force (1986)
- Flight of the Navigator (1986)
- Predator (1987) (his material for this for the sequel was adapted by John Debney for 2010's Predators)
- Outrageous Fortune (1987)
- Overboard (1987)
- Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
- Mac and Me (1988)
- My Stepmother Is an Alien (1988)
- She's Out of Control (1989)
- The Abyss (1989)
- Back to the Future Part II (1989)
- Back to the Future Part III (1990)
- Young Guns II (1990)
- Predator 2 (1990)
- Ricochet (1991)
- Shattered (1991) (1991)
- Soapdish (1991)
- Father of the Bride (1991) and its sequels (1995, 2020)note
- Death Becomes Her (1992)
- The Bodyguard (1992)
- Sidekicks (1992)
- Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (1992)
- Cop and a Half (1993)
- Judgment Night (1993)
- Super Mario Bros. (1993)
- Grumpy Old Men (1993)
- Blown Away (1994)
- Forrest Gump (1994) (also his only Academy Award for Best Original Score nomination to date)
- Richie Rich (1994)
- The Quick and the Dead (1995)
- Grumpier Old Men (1995)
- Judge Dredd (1995)
- The Perez Family (1995)
- Sgt. Bilko (1996)
- Eraser (1996)
- The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)
- Volcano (1997)
- Contact (1997)
- MouseHunt (1997)
- The Odd Couple II (1998)
- The Parent Trap (1998)
- Stuart Little (1999)
- Reindeer Games (2000)
- What Lies Beneath (2000)
- Cast Away (2000)
- What Women Want (2000)
- The Mexican (2001)
- The Mummy Returns (2001)
- Lilo & Stitch (2002)
- Maid in Manhattan (2002)
- Stuart Little 2 (2002)
- Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life (2003)
- Van Helsing (2004)
- The Polar Express (2004) (received a nomination for Academy Award for Best Original Song)
- Night at the Museum and its sequels (2006, 2009, 2014)
- The Wild (2006)
- Beowulf (2007)
- G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009)
- A Christmas Carol (2009)
- The A-Team (2010)
- Marvel Cinematic Universe:
- Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
- The Avengers (2012)
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
- Avengers: Endgame (2019)
- Flight (2012)
- The Croods (2013)
- Ready Player One (2018) (2018)
- Welcome to Marwen (2018)
- The Witches (2020)
- Pinocchio (2022)
His TV work includes:
- Amazing Stories ("Go To The Head Of The Class," directed by Robert Zemeckis)
- CHiPs (many episode scores from season two onwardsnote , and rearrangement of John Parker's theme)
- Manimal (all the episode scores, but not the pilot score or the series theme - both by Paul Chihara).
- Starsky & Hutch (three episodes)
- Tales from the Crypt (seven episodes, including three directed by Zemeckis)
- T.J. Hooker ("A Child Is Missing")
- Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey (although he was initially signed to just write the theme music, he wound up scoring all 13 episodes; Silvestri received his first Emmy nominations for the theme and his score for the first episode, winning both)
His work provides examples of:
- Associated Composer:
- The composer of choice of Robert Zemeckis.
- He's composed for three out of the four Avengers films (Avengers: Age of Ultron was handled by Danny Elfman, meanwhile).
- Credits Medley:
- The Back to the Future sequels utilize this. As an example, Part III features a suite with the film's Western theme, the love theme, and the train theme sandwiched by the main theme of the series.
- The theatrical release of The Abyss was the first James Cameron film (but not the last) to feature double-column/speeded-up end credits on account of all the people involved, so Silvestri's end credit suite features "Finale," a lot of "Bud On The Ledge" and the ending of "Back On The Air" (the music for Bud and the aliens heading to the surface) without the choir. When it was released on video, it had a slower and one-column only roll which therefore lasted much longer, and had a much longer suite to match made up of "Finale," "The Pseudopod," "Resurrection," a reprise of the first part of "Finale" (for the spire rising scene), and the excerpts from "Bud On The Ledge" and "Back On The Air."
- Deathly Dies Irae:
- In Avengers: Infinity War, as Thor is explaining to the Guardians of the Galaxy how many Stones Thanos has and where he needs to go for the rest of them. As he mentions the Soul Stone, dies irae plays as the camera cuts to Gamora, foreshadowing her death, sacrificed by Thanos to gain the Stone.
- In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the four notes are played several times in succession, each time by a different instrument, as Judge Doom reinflates his newly exposed toon form, just before he then reveals his identity as the killer of Eddie’s brother and tries to murder Eddie too.
- Feelies: The vinyl release of Silvestri's score for Who Framed Roger Rabbit, released for the film's 30th anniversary, came with a replica of Roger's love letter to Jessica written over Marvin Acme's will.
- Leitmotif:
- Forrest Gump has a theme for running
. - Marvel Cinematic Universe examples:
- In Captain America: The First Avenger, Silvestri's score contained a leitmotif not only for Cap and Hydra but also for the Tesseract, which can be heard when Red Skull is preparing to leave the Evil Lair to bomb the world.
- In The Avengers, Silvestri's leitmotif for the now-lost Tesseract forms the first few notes of the score during the opening monologue. Three leitmotifs introduced in this score include that of The Avengers, which backs most of the main score, one for Black Widow, and one for the Helicarrier.
- Back to the Future examples:
- The theme plays whenever something epic is happening.
- "Mr. Sandman" appears to be the theme song of 1955 Hill Valley or something. It's played when Marty first enters the 1955 town square in both Part I and Part II, something which inspired us to name a trope after it.
- The theme
- Who Framed Roger Rabbit has themes for Roger, Jessica, Eddie Valiant, Judge Doom, and the Toon Patrol.
- Forrest Gump has a theme for running
- One-Woman Wail: Blown Away opens with "Prince's Day", a wail-like reprise of the Irish song "Though Dark Are Our Sorrow" rearranged by Silvestri and sung by a soprano boy (instead of a woman) with an Ethereal Choir in the background. Thomas Moore originally wrote the lyrics.
- Recycled Trailer Music: Silvestri's theme from MouseHunt was used in the live action The Cat in the Hat film trailer and for the A Christmas Carol (2009) trailer, as well as many others. And then it was actually reused (in the film itself) in Fred Claus.
- Screen-to-Stage Adaptation: A musical based on Back to the Future was in development with Silvestri writing songs and Robert Zemeckis producing, but quietly fell into
Development Hell until 2020. - Theme Music Withholding: Despite including nearly all the Avengers and having its plot centered around the Avengers as a team splintering, the music in Captain America: Civil War doesn't contain the Avengers theme, and Avengers: Age of Ultron has it rejigged, but not included in its original arrangement until the end credits. It wasn't until Avengers: Infinity War that it was heard in its full glory during the actual film.
