Video: Danny Elfman on "Dark Shadows" Score

In the last few weeks, while the film has been shooting in the UK, Danny Elfman has been experimenting with some of the musical elements for his score for the adaptation of Dark Shadows.

MTV News asked the composer about his work so far on the project.

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"It’s still very early, they’re not even done shooting. I just sent them some stuff so they can play with it while they’re editing," Elfman said about his progress on Shadows at the premiere of Real Steel, the score for which he also composed. "I think it’s just going to be fun. You can tell from Johnny Depp’s hairstyle right off the bat, it’s like, ‘Oh wow, that’s different.’ It’s [set in] the ‘70s, it’s going to be fun."

"I think this will be a little wilder than 'Edward Scissorhands,' but I don’t know. I really don’t know what to expect until it’s done."

Elfman also said that he and Burton had discussed the use of a smaller-scale orchestra, perhaps to emulate the music for the original TV series and classic motion pictures involving vampires and other gothic monsters. Elfman did something similar for his iconic music for The Nightmare Before Christmas. But Elfman stated that nothing has been set in stone yet.

"I think we might keep it small. That was Tim’s first thought to make it very small, but having said that maybe we’ll make it big. Things can change between now and then."

FearNet also asked Elfman if the film's score would include the theme from the original television series.

"We had this discussion with Batman," said Elfman, "[about] whether we wanted to incorporate the TV theme. And Tim said, ‘No, don't do that.' And on Planet of the Apes, once again, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; that was a big one – "Do we incorporate it in?" "No." So I'm just guessing that he's gonna say no again, that he's gonna want to develop his own language and dialogue for this."

"Having said that," Elfman laughed, "who knows? You may just hear a theramin!"