Musical notes coursed through his blood, recalls a friend.
The late Marvin Hamlisch (1944-2012) was an American composer whose melodic songs and iconic scores for Broadway plays and Hollywood movies earned him a slew of prestigious prizes — four Grammys, four Emmys, three Oscars, three Golden Globes, a Tony Award and a Pulitzer Prize.
Who hasn’t hummed The Way We Were or Nobody Does It Better ? And how successful would The Sting and A Chorus Line have been without his sweet, complex and accessible melodies?
Nearly two years after his untimely death at the age of 68, he is fondly remembered in Dori Berinstein’s lively documentary, Marvin Hamlisch: What He Did For Love, which was recently broadcast on the PBS’ American Masters series.
The film is a joyous compilation of interviews with Hamlisch, culled from television shows, and of reminiscences from friends and associates like Melissa Machester, Carly Simon and Quincy Jones. They remember him as a generous, kind-hearted, funny, brilliant man who was wholeheartedly devoted to his craft.
A prodigy who was accepted to the Julliard school at six, he was the son of Austrian Jews who had the foresight to leave Austria before it was swallowed up by Nazi Germany.
Trained to be a concert pianist in the mould of Vladimir Horowitz, Hamlisch turned his enormous talents to the musical theater and never looked back. To him, all music was equally valuable.
Berinstein traces traces his formal career to his role as a rehearsal pianist for the Broadway play Funny Girl, starring the irrepressible Barbra Streisand. Invariably, he was happiest sitting at a piano and creating music.
After The Way We Were, one observer says, he joined the pantheon of great American composers.
Hamlisch’s score for The Sting, which was instrumental in the revival of ragtime music, catapulted him to stardom. At the 1974 Academy Awards, he won three Oscars for The Sting.
The score he wrote for The Chorus Line broke many of the rules of the Broadway musical and raised his profile to new heights. But unable to sustain his success, Hamlisch entered a period of “suffocating despair.”
During this dispiriting interval, he found his true love in the person of Terre Blair, a vivacious blond to whom he proposed after their first meeting. (They had spoken for countless hours on the phone).
Hamlisch comes across as a hugely personable and immensely talented man whose lust for life was limitless. As his wife says, tears welling up in her eyes, he was in the midst of one of his most fertile periods on the eve of his death.
He died much too soon, leaving behind friends who miss him and associates who admired him.