British Musical Composer :Leslie Bricusse

Leslie Bricusse was among the most prolific and popular songwriters of the
postwar era, authoring numerous hits for both the stage (Stop the World--I
Want to Get Off, The Roar of the Greasepaint--The Smell of the Crowd) and
the screen (Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Dr. Doolittle). Bricusse
was born January 29, 1931 in London, and while attending Cambridge
University served as president of the school's famed Footlights Revue Club,
co-writing, directing and starring in his first two musical shows, Out of
the Blue and Lady at the Wheel. In 1954 he was tapped to appear in An
Evening with Beatrice Lillie, concurrently writing the film musical Charley
Moon; one song from the picture, "Out of Town," became a UK Top 20 hit for
star Max Bygraves, and earned Bricusse his first Ivor Novello Award. In 1961
he earned a second Novello for "My Kind of Girl," a Top Five smash for Matt
Munro. That same year Bricusse and songwriting partner Anthony Newley
travelled to New York to write the musical Stop the World--I Want to Get
Off; premiering in London that summer, the production was a smash hit,
launching the instant classic "What Kind of Fool Am I?" as well as the
favorites "Once in a Lifetime" and "Gonna Build a Mountain."
Bricusse collaborated with Cyril Ornadel on the follow-up, 1963's Pickwick,
which generated the hit "If I Ruled the World"; he reunited with Newley a
year later for The Roar of the Greasepaint--The Smell of the Crowd, which
failed to match the success of Stop the World but nevertheless yielded the
popular favorites "Who Can I Turn To?" and "A Wonderful Day Like Today."
Also in 1964, Bricusse and Newley contributed the lyric to John Barry's
title theme for the James Bond classic Goldfinger, a hit for singer Shirley
Bassey; four years later, Bricusse and Barry again collaborated on the theme
for the Bond entry You Only Live Twice. In the interim, he wrote the
screenplay and score for the musical fantasy Dr. Doolittle, which starred
Newley and Rex Harrison; though judged a box-office failure, the film did
earn its author an Academy Award for his song "Talk to the Animals."
Bricusse also earned an Oscar nomination the following year for his score to
Goodbye, Mr. Chips, repeating the trick in 1970 for Scrooge. Most successful
of all was 1971's movie hit Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, which
featured "The Candy Man," a pop chart-topper for Sammy Davis, Jr. the
following year.

Bricusse and Newley returned to the stage for The Good Old Bad Old Days,
which in addition to its title song featured numbers including "I Do Not
Love You" and "It's a Musical World." Bricusse kept an uncharacteristically
low profile during the mid-1970s, finally resurfacing in 1978 with
contributions to Superman: The Movie and The Revenge of the Pink Panther; in
1982, he won a second Oscar for his score to Blake Edwards' Victor/Victoria,
written with composer Henry Mancini. Subsequent Oscar nominations include
1986's "Life in a Looking Glass" (from That's Life), 1990's "Somewhere in My
Memory" (Home Alone) and 1991's "When You're Alone" (Hook). In 1989 Bricusse
received the Kennedy Award for excellence in British songwriting, and was
also only the fourth Brit inducted into the American Songwriters' Hall of
Fame (behind Noel Coward, John Lennon and Paul McCartney); also in 1989, his
musical Sherlock Holmes opened in London, albeit to negative reviews. In the
fall of 1995, his score to Victor/Victoria was adapted for Broadway, and
like the original film starred Julie Andrews; Jekyll and Hyde followed in
the spring of 1997.