Danette Christine is one of those magical people who carries an atmosphere of joy and celebration with her. She has a contagious smile, a quick, easy laugh, and a face you can look at all day long. We met last April when the film, A Single Woman, was in the very last throes of post-production and Danette was the music supervisor. Among her various and sundry credits, Danette creates the musical ambiance for Air Force One.

Jeanmarie Simpson: What is your background in music? Were you musical from day one as a child?

Danette Christine: I don’t know if one is gifted as a child, though I think my girls are brilliant musicians…. 

I was a really athletic, fearless kid -– into dance, gymnastics, and used to walk on the cinder block fences behind people’s houses to school when I was in first grade. I think about my daughter, who is in first grade, doing that and I’d have a heart attack…but I thought I was pretty coordinated. Music, though, was always a big obsession. My dad set up a hi-fi in the backyard, and I would dance every day to my records and choreograph stuff. Neighborhood kids would join me, and I’d play one record and learn one dance for, like, a month -– my brothers are saints, actually -– every day for month they’d have to listen to me needle-drop 10 or 20 bars of some tune over and over and over while we’d practice our dances…

I didn’t really understand records much. I thought that all 45 singles that were on the blue Motown label were The Jackson 5, and since Diana Ross sounded kind of like Michael at the time, it proved my theory. The Temptations were my favorite. I also loved The Kinks, which are kind of a long way from Motown, but their songs were very lyrical, and then they would write headbanger stuff that made me feel like a muppet, so it worked for me.

I really thought I had had the worst musical life when I was in Junior High, because that’s when all the prog rock stuff like Jethro Tull, Kansas, and Boston came out — leisure suits, guys with polyester shirts with scenes of rainforests on them…thank god I discovered Elvis Presley. He had just died, and my dad had some of his records. Ironically, you’d think the next steps would be Chuck Berry, Hank Williams, blah blah, but instead, my dad started sharing his Rosemary Clooney and Stan Getz records with me, and I just went into a time warp…found Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, the whole big band era. I found this stuff comfortable and charming and very grown-up, which is what I wanted to be.

I got a couple of professional dancing gigs right out of high school, which was pretty much the era of Michael Jackson (again), so needless to say I was this dancer/athlete at the dawn of new wave, and I was so in my groove. I got a fake ID and never drank or did drugs but would dance in clubs all night without stopping, like I was running a marathon. Punk music was so free and the disco clubs where so exhibitionist…I was perfectly happy in both worlds. The great thing about punk is that I started playing instruments. I didn’t pick one, I just played crappy guitar, drums, bass, recorder…it all felt very accessible and musical when all the songs are in one key…

I wrote songs and went to UCLA. I was a really good student and studied poetry with a mission to be a songwriter. I got in a lesbian punk rock band and dressed like a man, played in the women’s bars, and sang songs about girls doing me wrong. It was really fabulous, though I am not gay. I enjoy being around women but, like all good punk rock bands, we spontaneously combusted.

I was in another band with some girlfriends called The Tearjerkers, and we had a local following. I learned to play bass in that band. When we broke up, I got a job at USC and got into the Thornton School of music without an audition. Because I worked in the Film School, I ended up scoring a handful of student films. I really loved writing scores for Orchestra -– it’s a total rush, and I know why composers starve to death to do what they do. I formed my own band, The Secret Circus, and kept working with the young filmmakers I met in college, and I worked at the film studios to learn more.

JS: What is it that a music supervisor does, exactly?

DC: It’s a little different on each film, but essentially, you are there to guide the music through the film. Often there’s the bookeeping end of it, which is doing the licensing for the film or hiring a licensing firm (like Soundtrack Marketing) to license the music. You keep the music cues in order and deliver them to the filmmaker at the final cut so that all the performances get registered. And, of course, you find music that fits the film, find bands that fit the project, perhaps put together a soundtrack, if one is warranted… When you see a big budget film and wonder why they use music they do, there are not only creative agendas at work, but often the budget and deals dictate songs that end up in the film. A few bad compromises and you could have a very lousy soundtrack, so keeping the negotiations and the creative balance is important.

JS: How do you work in harmony with the composer?

DC: Since the composer is the work for hire (meaning the film company usually owns whatever he’s writing for this film), it’s cost-effective to give him the film. There will be scenes where you need a song, and score just isn’t the answer. If a composer disagreed with me, I’d say, “Okay, you’ve got a feeling about this, let’s go for it.” Usually, the director decides this more often than the music supervisor.

I don’t really clash. I’m a musician. I don’t really struggle with the dialogue too much. And when I do, it’s a good, fine struggle. Ego is a party of creative expression. It’s much easier to debate music and artistic vision than politics. People are willing to say, “I just know in my gut that this is right!” And that’s a perfectly acceptable reaction in the creative process.

Often the director’s vision requires something that has some a connection to the real world, and the composer probably cannot provide that. In the case of A Single Woman, we were blessed with two songs by Joni Mitchell: “Woodstock” and “The Circle Game,” and we used these two songs almost as mantras throughout the movie to set a repetitive tone of how the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. This worked brilliantly because of what those songs say and what they mean to music and culture in the 20th century. No composer could create the power that came with those songs. By doing this mantra, Johnny Wilson, the composer, didn’t do as much of the score. But we worked very well together and actually had a lot of fun reinventing these two simple songs in many of the music cues. We actually played a lot of the “score” together. He ended up making a profound power statement with his Native American score that played against the subtext of the story.

There are exceptions to this. I mean, when John Williams scores a film, you often feel his brilliant largess from the opening overture, and once you’re in his musical world, a director may never want to leave. I’d love to work with him –- Xerox his orchestra charts, manage a session… I’m one of those people who goes every year to his Hollywood Bowl show just because it’s BIG FILM EXTRAVAGANZA. To me, he’s as musically iconic as The Beatles but in an invisible way…

JS: Have there been some dramatic clashes, in your experience? Do you have any fun stories about your experiences working with other creatives?

DC: Well, I’m no Phil Spector, so I’ve neither produced the greatest records ever made, nor have I wielded a gun at anybody who didn’t see things my way. I’m a middle child, peacemaker, team player. Don’t get me wrong — I don’t always agree with the director on music cues, but I like the process of trying to first see her vision, then, if I think it’s not the best the film can be, I’ll offer alternatives, and I work pretty hard to sell my case. I did an independent film called It Is What It Is with Billy Frolick, who is a funny guy –- he was one of the writers of Madagascar. He really wanted “Good Riddance” from Green Day is his little indie film. Though I thought the song worked, it was very, very expensive to license, and I thought it kind of put a limiting date stamp on the film. I think he wanted that date stamp –- like the music in The Breakfast Club, but I thought the moment also offered a great opportunity to find a new song that spoke to the future instead of the past. I did everything I could short of going to Berkeley and kidnapping Mike Dirnt and taking his place. I tried to get the song for Billy. It was his vision for his film. But the timing wasn’t right for the band (and the money was small), and I could respect that. Of course, if they had, they’d probably have five songs in Madagascar, but then, maybe that’s not their vision either. In the end, we used an L.A. singer/songwriter who had a very lyrical and emotional song, and though it wasn’t famous, it gave some sweetness to a witty film with lots of attitude and humor.

I’ve never been afraid to speak my mind, but I think the collaborative process is more interesting than my solitary vision. I like projects where my knowledge and expertise are a necessary component, but I like collaborating. I get out of the house and collaborate with artists to make something that not only shapes the world but shapes me from the inside out.

JS: What’s the weirdest thing that’s ever happened in your professional life?

DC: Having John Dolgen (the former head of Paramount Pictures) call me and thank me for the Christmas card I sent him. The beauty of life is that weird things happen. Isn’t that what we live for?

I’d say being hired to produce the music played on board Air Force One during the Bush administration is up there… I mean, I am very careful never to send e-mails where I say things like “Dude! That record is the bomb.” He’s a born-again Christian, and I discovered a lot of pretty good Christian rock from that job. But seriously, it’s a very interesting music-selecting job for such a unique clientele. Everything needs to be high brow and low brow and formal and relaxed…and that’s not even getting into politics. It’s very interesting. I’m looking forward to spinning music for our President-Elect, I can tell you!

On the scale of the music industry, I don’t know if I have weird stories. Maybe auditioning for Mike Ness of Social Distortion to be his bassist, because I have a brutal fear of needles and never dared to get a tattoo…

I love freaks and I’m not sure I’d refer to any of my freaky friends as weird. I worked on a gorgeous film called Baby Luv for a cult film director named Robert Carroll. He directed a film called Sonny Boy which was banned by MGM after it was released for being so disturbing. I worked with him and he never told me about Sonny Boy. He and his wife were wondrously soulful people. We connected musically, and Baby Luv was a joy to make. But then I asked him if we could have a screening of his banned film. Keith Carradine plays a transvestite trailer-trash mother. I cried. I thought it had such emotion and it made me feel so human! One of my all-time favorite books is Geek Love by Katherine Dunne. I suspect my barometer for weird is pretty non-existent.

JS: What’s next for you? What are you doing now?

DC: I’m looking for another interesting project to contribute musical expertise. I am interested in working with more corporate clients -– music branding. I’m also currently volunteering in a Spanish immersion Title VII school teaching Latin music. I am hoping that, with the infusion of Gustavo Dudamel into our city, our multi-racial kids will learn to play music and express themselves through music that isn’t either Euro-centric or banal pop music. I want to get it in their bones while they’re still growing.

I still do international airlines inflight entertainment. I like the international world of music. Latin America has tremendous regional music, and I’m pretty well versed in what’s going on there and hope to be doing a project with a Middle Eastern client soon.

For the holidays, I will go to New York and jam with friends in Harlem where I made some friends who play some phenomenal gospel music. That’s my idea of church…