{"id":604951,"date":"2026-04-13T22:03:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T22:03:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/604951\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T22:03:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T22:03:26","slug":"the-best-thing-about-the-drama-is-its-deep-cut-soundtrack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/604951\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Thing About \u2018The Drama\u2019 Is Its Deep-Cut Soundtrack"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Taste Test<\/a><\/p>\n

\n What is \u201cgood taste\u201d anyway? Allow your favorite actor, musician, celebrity, or comedian to let you in on what they\u2019re watching, reading, and consuming.\n <\/p>\n

\n Photo-Illustration: by The Cut; Photos: Pier Carthew, Everett Collection, Shutterstock, JSBC\/Youtube\n <\/p>\n

One of the more unfortunate side effects of the never-ending discourse about The Drama\u2019s premise<\/a> is that it distracts from the film\u2019s true highlight: its music. The movie\u2019s soundtrack is a treasure chest of deep cuts \u2014 Scottish funk pop, Norwegian trip-hop, German underground folk \u2014 exquisitely selected by music supervisor Jemma Burns. My jaw dropped during the opening sequence, when soon-to-be-married couple Charlie (Robert Pattinson) and Emma (Zendaya) rehearse their first dance to \u201cI Want to Lay With You.\u201d It is an obscure \u201970s love ballad by the little-known folk singer Shira Small<\/a>, who recorded it as a 17-year-old Quaker boarding-school student. A few years later, she left music to pursue a career as a physician\u2019s assistant. Her raspy, soulful songs were rescued from the dustbins by archival record label the Numero Group, which reissued her album The Line of Time and the Plane of Now in 2022.<\/p>\n

The Drama\u2019s music only gets better from there. The moment I left the theater, I had DM\u2019d actress Sydney Lemmon<\/a> for the name of the dreamy cyberpop song her wedding-DJ character Pauline plays. (It\u2019s \u201cAgain,\u201d by Katie Fash, Fakethias, and Elusin, commissioned specifically for the film.) Then I started Googling for the full soundtrack playlist. I eventually realized I just had to speak with Burns directly. Over a video call on Thursday evening, she credited The Drama director Kristoffer Borgli for his openness: \u201cHe was very keen to use songs that aren\u2019t, I think he used the term \u2018part of the popular culture at large,\u2019\u201d she says. \u201cIt was a pleasure to be able to deep dive into the more unique songs that might have felt too odd for people with less broad music taste.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with \u201cI Want to Lay With You.\u201d I remember hearing it in The Drama and thinking, No way. I was curious to know how you discovered it. Was it through the Numero Group?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m very a big fan of Numero and love all their gorgeous private-pressing reissues. But I actually think a good friend of mine played that song for me. His name\u2019s Ben O\u2019Connor. He runs a really iconic Australian record label called Chapter Music.<\/p>\n

When Kris first briefed me on this scene, I put together a whole playlist of songs that had this quality of being incredibly sweet and slightly old-fashioned with a purity and an innocence about them that would then contrast with what happens next. The other main contender was \u201cOne Fine Summer Morning,\u201d by Evie Sands.<\/p>\n

Obviously, there are lots of reissue labels out there now, and there\u2019s things like NTS Radio, and that makes it easier for people to discover left-field old records. I saw a funny comment on social media where someone was complimenting us on the soundtrack and then said, \u201cBy the way, do you guys listen to NTS? I\u2019m pretty sure these are all part of the Breakfast Show staples.\u201d I mean, I think Charlie and Emma would definitely be NTS listeners.<\/p>\n

After the movie, I just sat on my floor listening to these magical old folk singer-songwriters like Shira Small \u2014 Karen Dalton and Kath Bloom, etc. \u2014 just to stay in the dream world of the opening sequence. When you get a prompt from someone like Kris, where does the research process take you?<\/p>\n

The first thing I do is go through my own music library. I\u2019ve got playlists with all sorts of themes, but you have to tag the hell out of them with the era and the country, because otherwise it just disappears. I get about 50 albums a day in my inbox. And then most music supervisors use the music-management platform Disco.<\/p>\n

If I feel like I\u2019m struggling and like I need more options, I\u2019ll ask friends to send over some tracks or reach out to a record label I know specializes in a particular sound.<\/p>\n

Kris was just such an awesome collaborator. When I sent him the first playlist of ideas, he was so enthusiastic, and it was really fun to think, Aha, finally, I\u2019m working with someone who has the same sensibility and taste as me. I was very pleasantly surprised that he loved \u201cInside Out,\u201d the Jesse Rae song. It\u2019s the song Emma puts on when she\u2019s like, Oh, cheer up, and he\u2019s singing, \u201cDon\u2019t ever give up, baby.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

I was looking that song up on Spotify, and it only had a couple thousand streams. I saw the cover photo of Jesse Rae in the Viking hat and thought that maybe I\u2019d gotten something wrong.<\/p>\n

I honestly can\u2019t remember where I found it, but I\u2019ve had that song in my collection for years \u2014 and, to my surprise, even my more nerdy DJ friends didn\u2019t know it. It\u2019s a fun, gorgeous little tale: This Scottish guy comes over to America and befriends these legendary funk musicians \u2014 from the Zapp crew to Parliament-Funkadelic. They clearly hit it off, because some of them even went back to Scotland with him and recorded this album. You should really look up the music video. They\u2019re all standing on top of trains in kilts playing funk bass.<\/p>\n

How were you brought onto The Drama in the first place?<\/p>\n

I\u2019d worked with Square Peg before, which is Ari Aster\u2019s production company. I\u2019d worked with one of their producers, Tyler Campellone, on Beau Is Afraid. He just got me and was like, \u201cI think you\u2019re going to really hit it off with my buddy Kris.\u201d He was right.<\/p>\n

The most niche playlist that you\u2019ve had to make?<\/p>\n

Oh, goodness \u2014 I\u2019ve had to find things like lullabies from Kazakhstan.<\/p>\n

Something that people should understand about music supervision is that it\u2019s not just about having good taste \u2014 you have to be able to navigate almost every genre imaginable. I once had to track down Kurdish resistance songs, specifically from Iran. Suggesting music to directors is easier than the other way around. For this film called The Rover, directed by David Mich\u00f4d, I just got a link that said, \u201cCambodian pop song\u201d for the big opening sequence and had to figure out what it was and how to license it. I did manage to track it down \u2014 but that\u2019s the job.<\/p>\n

One of my favorite songs in recent memory is Smerz\u2019s \u201cYou Got Time and I Got Money.\u201d I\u2019ve literally said that I would get married just to slow-dance to that song. It\u2019s funny you put it in the sex scene when Emma slaps Charlie.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Well, I\u2019ve actually been a fan of Smerz since their very first EP. That track, to me, was easily one of the sexiest songs of last year. And it made sense for that moment \u2014 Emma\u2019s trying to reconnect with her partner, so of course she\u2019d put on the sexiest song she knows.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure you know, but there\u2019s this incredible groundswell of female Scandinavian artists right now, from Denmark\u2019s ML Buch to, well, the list is endless.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

A bunch of them came to play the Knockdown Center in New York last fall. It was Erika de Casier, Fine, Smerz \u2026\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kris is Norwegian, and we brought in a couple of Norwegian artists that he\u2019s friends with: Todd Terje and Fakethias. We commissioned Fakethias to do a song for our wonderful DJ character, Pauline. He brought in another incredible artist, Elusin, who\u2019s the singer who is bringing back that whole witch-house, Salem kind of sound, which makes me think that maybe we\u2019ve gotten to the point where, after indie sleaze, witch house could be the next genre.<\/p>\n

But it was great working with all these awesome smaller labels \u2014 from reissue labels like Numero and Stroom<\/a>, who are based in Belgium, to Stones Throw and Now-Again, the L.A.\u2013based reissue label run by one of the people who actually founded Stones Throw.<\/p>\n

And it was through them that I was able to get in touch with Kingpin Skinny Pimp. We only hear a couple of flashes of his music, but it\u2019s so immediate \u2014 it brings the vibe instantly. When Kris told me he was really looking for some early-2000s southern hip-hop, that whole cassette-era sound, my first thought was, Oh, God, how am I going to clear those songs or even track some of those people down? But fortunately, Eothen Alapatt, who runs Now-Again, is Madlib\u2019s business partner, and he\u2019s obviously one of the most respected figures in hip-hop, so he can connect me with pretty much anyone in that scene across the States.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s definitely a European sensibility to the film, I feel, and yet a lot of that is balanced with other influences. We\u2019ve got older European artists like Juliette Gr\u00e9co alongside the more modern artists we\u2019ve been talking about. That\u2019s one of the things that makes it stand out \u2014 the fact that it\u2019s probably more influenced by \u201960s French directors like Jacques Demy than something like When Harry Met Sally. And there\u2019s this constant fluctuation between that dreamy, old-world atmosphere and the cynicism and harsher reality that the contemporary characters are up against.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

What are your own personal movie tastes?<\/p>\n

I mean, if we\u2019re talking about contemporary directors, I\u2019m completely obsessed with Alice Rohrwacher, Joanna Hogg, and Kelly Reichardt. I studied film, so the list goes on.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the last new movie that you\u2019ve watched?<\/p>\n

Sir\u0101t. Have you seen it?<\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t, but I heard that there\u2019s an amazing club aspect to it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s so wild. I have no idea how they made that film. The director is obviously very involved in this particular desert-rave scene because it\u2019s so authentic and so mind-blowing, but the location\u2019s just insane. It\u2019s clifftop roads in the middle of the desert. Kangding Ray\u2019s score doesn\u2019t sit in the film. It is almost like its own character.<\/p>\n

Are there other top film soundtracks for you?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Phantom Thread is probably one of my all-time favorite scores and films. I also love directors like Yorgos Lanthimos, and films like The Lobster and Joanna Hogg\u2019s The Souvenir. Those are recent examples where the use of music really surprised me \u2014 it can be so abrupt, even challenging at times. Challengers, too.<\/p>\n

What is your general media diet?<\/p>\n

I watch a lot of contemporary cinema, but I also try to watch as many weird old films as possible just to mix it all up. I can\u2019t be highbrow all the time. I also love a Japanese dating show, like Is She the Wolf? Or there\u2019s a Chinese one called Are You the One and there are 40 women standing and one man has to come out and pitch himself to all of them, and it\u2019s brutal and hilarious. Podcast-wise, I love The Rest Is History. I\u2019ve ended up listening to a multipart series on the demise of the Plains Indians.<\/p>\n

To what extent were you exposed to Zendaya and Robert Pattinson\u2019s music tastes?<\/p>\n

With Zendaya, I didn\u2019t necessarily have as much feedback about her music taste, but I had to be very conscious of what a cultural icon she is and how synonymous she is with certain aesthetics, whether it\u2019s from Euphoria or other productions. But I\u2019ve worked with Rob on several projects, and he chimed in at some point and said, \u201cWould this character really be a karaoke guy, though?\u201d It\u2019s a valid point. Ultimately, the actors are the ones that are really inhabiting these roles, so any of these points we take.<\/p>\n

With Rob\u2019s karaoke comment, what was he referring to? What role was that?<\/p>\n

Oh, sorry. That\u2019s for an upcoming film that we\u2019re actually working on at the moment.<\/p>\n

What are you personally enjoying listening to right now?<\/p>\n

There are two releases of the last few months that I\u2019ve been a little obsessed with. One of them is actually Flea\u2019s album, particularly the cover of Flea playing the sweetest jazz-trumpet version of a Frank Ocean song. It\u2019s obviously something that he\u2019s been gearing up to do for however many decades, so he\u2019s sort of pouring everything into it, and you can really hear that. The other artists that I\u2019ve been quite obsessed with, who I\u2019ve seen live recently is Water From Your Eyes.<\/p>\n

Yes. Oh my God.<\/p>\n

I just think they\u2019re one of the coolest bands to emerge from America in recent times, honestly. I\u2019m sometimes not super interested in music that\u2019s very referential of eras from my youth, because I already lived it. But I feel like they are a wonderful mash-up of all different sounds from early \u201990s rave music to grunge to shoegaze. They\u2019re obviously very clever. They just bring it.<\/p>\n

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.<\/p>\n

Related<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Taste Test What is \u201cgood taste\u201d anyway? Allow your favorite actor, musician, celebrity, or comedian to let you…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":604952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[64,63,2331,134,5296,344,136,998,195119,188745],"class_list":["post-604951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-culture","tag-entertainment","tag-interviews","tag-movies","tag-music","tag-qa","tag-taste-test","tag-the-drama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=604951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/604952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=604951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=604951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=604951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}