LA Comic Con 2024 Interview: Composer Darren Fung

Music can make or break a film. You can see plenty of examples on YouTube when people do things like have “Yakity Sax” (aka the Benny Hill theme song) playing over other scenes. As such, the composer is a vital part of the creative process.

When I was at LA Comic Con last October, I attended Impact24’s panel “Post-Production Workshop: Behind-the-Scenes of Film and TV”. After, I had a chance to interview the panelists about their creative process.

Darren Fung is a Canadian composer now in Los Angeles. Among his works include the music for the film The Silent Planet. Fung described it as “a kind of cool sci-fi psychological thriller.”

The panel’s description stated that “Panelists will showcase a scene from their projects and walk you through their creative process.” As such, I first asked how much influence Fung has over the final score and what it sounds like versus how much is given to him and directed at him.

“In an ideal situation, they hire you because they want your sound, right? They want you to work on it,” he started. “Jeff [St. Jules, the director] and I have worked together for almost 20 years. So he knows my sound, and that’s very much at the forefront when he’s working on something. We have a relationship where if I think, ‘Hey, I have another idea for this. What do you think about this?’, that I feel comfortable bringing it to him. But at the end of the day, it’s his film, right?”

He described an example the panel had included regarding a scene from the movie. “I thought we should bring the music all the way to the very end, and he’s like, ‘No. I get it, but you know what? If we end the music on the final shot, we’re going to feel like everything’s settled. If we end it here and we have diegetic wind blowing across, we’re just going to feel that discomfort. We’re going to feel like she’s not comfortable where she’s at.’ So there’s back and forth that we go through, where we haggle, we negotiate, and things that I feel strongly about, I’ll say, ‘Have you considered this?’ Sometimes you win and sometimes you don’t.”

I next delved into style. Each composer has their own, after all. In the interview, I gave the example that John Williams really likes to use the brass section while Bear McCreary tends to focus on drums and percussion. I asked him what he felt made his style his?

“I mean, at risk of sounding really cliché, what makes my music sound like my music is me,” Fung said. “I’m an orchestra guy. My joke is I started playing piano like all good Chinese boys. I started playing piano when I was three, and I wrote my first piece of music for orchestra when I was fifteen. So, even when I’m not writing for orchestra, I think that the idea of writing for different instruments, different sounds, and amongst different frequencies that pull the idea of balancing out everything sonically: that comes from an orchestral background.”

He continued. “I’m really big in themes and melodies. I think that—and this is not a value statement or a judgement statement—but I think a lot of scores have kind of gone toward more about textures. But here’s more than one way to skin a cat. My big thing is just really about good old-fashioned themes that stick in your head, and I think that’s what makes my music my music—those good old-fashioned themes.”

Whenever I interview writers, as a writer myself, I want to know what they do to avoid getting burnt out and keep the work fun.

“So, I play hockey,” he said. “I’m terrible: I am terrible at it. I’ve got two left feet. I learned as an adult. But having that one night a week where you say, ‘You know what”? I know I’m behind, but I gotta go and just stretch my legs, do something else for a bit.’ I think distance is a good thing when you can afford it. Because when you can’t afford it, you gotta really push hard. The other thing that I would say is, my family is obviously very important to me. And I’m just trying to keep things in perspective.

“We’re making movies: we’re writing music for movies or television. And there are some things that are really important. Obviously there are going to be times where you’re going to say, ‘Hey kids: sorry, I can’t make it to that,’ but you try to keep those as the exception, not the rule.”

Another thing I like asking as a fellow creative is how long it (typically) takes to complete a project, keeping in mind it obviously varies on the project. “It does. It does vary from project to project,” Fong said in response. “I think it takes a little while to get the creative machine spinning up. To give you an idea: I just finished a five-minute trailer that took me probably about a week and a half to do. Whereas at other times, it would take a week to do an episode of television. It takes time to get that thematic material, the palette, and that’s the hardest part, I think.”

He continued, “So, if you’re looking at, say, a feature film, if I have four to six weeks, that’s a great comfortable time frame. Anytime less than that, you start really feeling like you’re making creative compromises. The other thing I’ll say is that having too much time is also a curse, too. But I really think that just being able to have that creative incubation time is probably the most important thing.”

Of course, as many writers also experience, knowing when something is done—being able to walk away from it without further fiddling—is also a difficult part of the process. I asked him if he experienced that at all, considering it’s his livelihood. “I think as a composer, there’s two parts of it,” Fong said. “I mean, every composer is different, but there’s the writing the music, and then there’s the producing the music. I think writing: I’m pretty satisfied when I’m done writing it. But then producing the music, you have to kind of pick and choose your battles. I work with an engineer, April Tucker, who’s fantastic, because she’s very good about putting things in perspective. If we’re going to pick and choose our battles, let’s pick and choose the battles where the music is a real focus. So to answer the question, I think from a writing perspective, it’s easy for me to be able to say I’m done writing. But then from a producing standpoint, it’s really easy to nitpick at a lot of things, and very oftentimes, as composers, the writing and the production stuff gets blurred.”

I asked him what advice he’d give to himself when he was first starting out: what lessons he’s learned since joining the industry. “It’s not the financial ups and downs that are going to get you,” Fong stated, “it’s the emotional ups and downs. The financial ups and downs will take care of themselves. It does suck when you’re 20 and you have to call home and ask for money. But I think the thing is understanding just how to regulate yourself emotionally.”

He continued, “The other thing I’ll say is I feel very strongly about valuing the team that you work with and honoring those relationships. But what I’ll say to emerging composers: don’t be a jerk, because this is very much a relationship game, and you need to be able to again. If you’re not a good hang, if people don’t want to hang out with you, they probably don’t want to work with you either.”

While he was obviously there to promote The Silent Planet, I asked Fung what he was working on next. “So right now, I’m doing some production music library stuff,” he said. “I’m doing a little short documentary right now for a producer friend in China. And I just finished off a little trailer for a doc series. Everything’s a little bit slow right now in LA, so we’re just kind of waiting to see where everything lands.”

You can find out more information about Darren Fung at his website, Stinky Rice Studios. Additionally, you can watch the full LA Comic Con panel on Impact 24’s YouTube channel.

My interviews with the other two panelists, Shelly Westerman and Payton Koch, can be seen here.

Author: Angie Fiedler Sutton

Angie Fiedler Sutton is a writer, podcaster, and all-round fangirl geek. She has been published in Den of Geek, Stage Directions, LA Weekly, The Mary Sue, and others.

She also produces her own podcast, Contents May Vary, where she interviews geeky people about geeky things. You can see all her work (and social media channels) at angiefsutton.com.

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