Pinar Toprak Scores ‘Lost City,’ Will Conduct for Billie Eilish at Oscars

variety.com:

Jon Burlingame editorIt’s a big weekend for composer Pinar Toprak. On Friday, her latest score, for Sandra Bullock’s lighthearted jungle romp “The Lost City,” will be heard by moviegoers; and on Sunday she will be onstage at the Dolby conducting the Oscar orchestra for Billie Eilish’s performance of “No Time to Die.”Details about Sunday are otherwise under wraps.

It’s said to be a new arrangement of the Oscar-nominated James Bond theme, and Eilish’s co-writer and sibling Finneas is expected to be onstage too.

Toprak couldn’t comment.As for “The Lost City,” Toprak’s lively, fun score hearkens back to the earlier era of “Romancing the Stone” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark” – a fast-moving adventure set in an exotic locale that features a big orchestra, a choir and hummable themes for places and characters. “There are so many genres and moods,” says the Turkish-born composer of “Captain Marvel” (which, at more than $1.1 billion worldwide, is the highest-grossing movie ever scored by a woman). “A big sweeping score that pays homage to all those types of films that I loved.”Directors Adam and Aaron Nee insisted on that approach from the start, Toprak says.

She was hired even before shooting began, which enabled her not only to demo themes for the directors but to visit the shooting location in the Dominican Republic last June.