One day Steven told me I should meet his friend George Lucas. Lucas, Williams recalls, managed to convince himself that Star Wars would be a flop. What I didn't realize was that all aspects of the public would be entranced by it. Joseph Campbell taught me more about the film than I ever realized while I was working on it, why it had such resonance. Now, of course, Lucas is producing a new trilogy, a prequel to the Star Wars films.
Production is scheduled to begin a year and a half from now.
In the meantime, there is plenty to do. Right now he is busy writing the score to Seven Years in Tibet , in which Brad Pitt plays the German mountaineer Heinrich Harrer, who became a tutor to the Dalai Lama when he was a child. I've already written about 20 minutes of music for that. I'm very pleased that Yo-Yo Ma has agreed to join us to record a special cello part in the score. Work is also under way on Amistad , the story of a famous rebellion on a slave ship in 1830.