Alexandre Desplat

At 62 years old, Alexandre Desplat has this physical status:

Alexandre Michel Gérard Desplat (French: [alɛksɑ̃dʁ dɛspla]; born 23 August 1961) is a French film composer and conductor. He has won many awards, including two Academy Awards, for his musical scores to the films The Grand Budapest Hotel and The Shape of Water, and has received nine additional Academy Award nominations, ten César nominations (winning three), eleven BAFTA nominations (winning three), twelve Golden Globe Award nominations (winning two) and ten Grammy nominations (winning two).

Desplat has composed scores for a wide range of films, including low-budget independent productions and large-scale blockbusters, such as The Queen, The Golden Compass, Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 & Part 2, Little Women, The King's Speech, The Danish Girl, The Imitation Game, Moonrise Kingdom, Argo, Rise of the Guardians, Zero Dark Thirty, The Midnight Sky, Godzilla, Philomena, Unbroken, The Secret Life of Pets, Isle of Dogs, and The French Dispatch.

Early life

Alexandre Desplat was born in Paris. His father, Jacques Desplat, was a Frenchman originally from Sarlat-la-Canéda. His mother, Katie Ladopoulou, is a Greek poet originally from Athens. Desplat's parents had met in the United States while they were both students at the University of California, Berkeley. They married in San Francisco and returned to France, settling in Paris. Alexandre has two older sisters, Marie-Christine (also known as Kiki) and Rosalinda.

Desplat began playing the piano at the age of five. He later picked up the trumpet, before switching to flute at nine. Desplat's musical interests were wide, ranging from French composers as Maurice Ravel and Claude Debussy, to jazz and world music. He developed an early appreciation for film music, courtesy of the movie soundtracks his parents brought back from the United States. He began collecting Bernard Herrmann's Hitchcock soundtracks as a teen and eventually decided to pursue a career as a film composer after hearing John Williams's Star Wars score in 1977. Other early sources of Desplat's inspiration include the music of Maurice Jarre, Nino Rota and Georges Delerue.

Desplat studied at the Conservatoire de Paris under Claude Ballif. During this period, he also took a summer course under Iannis Xenakis. Desplat also studied under Jack Hayes in Los Angeles. After leaving the Conservatoire, the then 20-year-old Desplat joined a theatrical troupe, where he wrote and played music.

When recording the music for his first film, he met violinist Dominique Lemonnier, who became his favorite soloist and artistic director. They later married.

Desplat has worked on many films since the 1980s. His big Hollywood break came in 2003 with the soundtrack for the film Girl with a Pearl Earring, a drama set in 17th-century Delft exploring a fictional muse of Vermeer.

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Career

Desplat has written extensively for French cinema, Hollywood, and incidental music for over 100 films, including Lapse of Memory (1992), Un Perpetua (1999), Le Bruton (1995), The Queen (2004), Christopher Péché (1999), The Grand Budapest Hotel (2004), Part 1 (2006), Guy Fould (2001), The Rocket Brute (2004), The Emperor's (1994), Les Péchés Mortels (1995), Desmond (2000),

Desplat has created individual songs that have been featured in films by such artists as Akhenaton, Kate Beckinsale, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Valérie Lemercier, Miosotis, and Catherine Ringer. In addition, he has composed music for the theatre, including pieces performed at the Comédie Française. Desplat has appeared at recitals by the London Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Munich Symphony Orchestra. Desplat has taught Master Classes at La Sorbonne in Paris and the Royal College of Music in London.

He produced the scores for Philip Pullman's Golden Compass in 2007; Zach Helm's BAFTA nominated directorial debut; and Lust, Caution, Ang Lee. He performed for The Luzhin Defense, Girl with a Pearl Earring, Syria, Birth, Hostage, Casanova, and The Nest prior to these break-out performances.

He received the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score, Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Original Score, and the 2006 World Soundtrack Award for his film The Painted Veil. He received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Original Score for The Queen in 2007, and received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Original Score for The Queen in 2007. In addition, he received the Golden Berlin Bear for Best Film Music in The Beat that My Heart Skipped. Desplat received his second Oscar nomination for David Fincher's Curious Case of Benjamin Button in 2008. Desplat received his third Oscar nomination and a BAFTA nomination for Fantastic Mr. Fox in 2010, both of which were won by Michael Giacchino for Up.

Desplat has composed music for Largo Winch, based on Belgian comic; Gilles Bourdos in English; Anne Fontaine's Coco avant Chanel, based on designer Coco Chanel's life; Un Prophète reuniting him with director Stephen Frears; and The King's Speech, which earned Desplat his fourth Oscar nomination; and The Royal Prince's Speech, directed by Chris Weitz; and The Queen's Speech, directed by Willie

Desplat began writing the music to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in early 2011. After his work on the Part 1 soundtrack in 2010 "enchanted everyone in the control room," he reunited with producer David Yates, who gave Desplat the opportunity to score the second part. In 2011, Desplat's soundtrack sequel to the 2008 film Largo Winch was released and was well-received. Desplat's 2011 projects included The Tree of Life, directed by Terrence Malick (which he actually recorded in early 2010), A Better Life, La Fille du Puisatier, George Clooney's Carnage, and the French film company StudioCanal's logo.

With Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, the Florent Emilio Siri-directed biopic Cloclo, and DreamWorks Animation's Rise of the Guardians, Desplat began in 2012. Rust and Bone, Zero Dark Thirty, and Argo were among his 2013 awards, including Oscar, Golden Globe, and BAFTA nominations.

Jean Ferrandis, Flautist Jean Ferrandis, and the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire conducted by John Axelrod opened in France in June 2013, Desplat's first Concerto for Flute & Orchestra premiered in France. His Trois Etudes for piano, written for pianist Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang Lang's debut in the United States in October 2013, with pianist Gloria Cheng performing his first in the United States in October 2013. He received his sixth Oscar nomination for his role in Philomena, his fourth film co-production with director Stephen Frears.

Desplat would judge the jury at the 71st Venice International Film Festival on June 23, 2014, according to the festival's 71st founder. During 2014, he wrote five major scores, with The Grand Budapest Hotel winning him his first Academy Award. His score for The Imitation Game had been also voted in, and his victory against another of their own composition had been the first time a composer had won for another of their own scores since John Williams' victory in 1978 (beating Close Encounters of the Third Kind) and only the seventh time overall (Alfred Newman, Bernard Herrmann, Max Steiner, Miklos Rozsa, and Johnny Green are the only other composers to win this).

Desplat will produce Rogue One, the first anthology film of the new Disney Star Wars films, on March 16, 2015, according to the company. In September 2016, he stepped down due to the film's reshoots and was then replaced by Michael Giacchino.

He received his second Academy Award for The Shape of Water in 2018 and unveiled a new piece for solo flute performed by Emmanuel Pahud.

Desplat was nominated for Best Original Score at the BAFTA Awards in 2022.

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