The lion king

At one point during the part-concert film, part-documentary Hans Zimmer & Friends: Diamond in the Desert, super-producer Jerry Bruckheimer refers to Hans Zimmer as “the greatest living film composer in the world.” Zimmer, present when such flattery is offered, does not exactly nod in agreement, but nor does he laugh it off. While there are those who would argue that John Williams or Howard Shore have as great a claim to such a title – to say nothing of the equally influential Danny Elfman, Michael Giacchino or Alan Silvestri – there is one incontrovertible reply. Zimmer has a two-and-a-half hour movie dedicated to him and his work, showing in one-off engagements in theaters worldwide at the moment – and the rest of them don’t.

Amid much hype and excitement last year, Sir Elton John, that most consistently busy of rock ’n’ roll stars, announced that he was going to retire from touring so that he could spend more time with his young children. Yet John has been nothing if not productive — and his definition of “retirement” has been more elastic than most seventy-seven-year-olds. In the last year alone, since he played his final full concert in Stockholm on July 8, 2023, he has participated in a major documentary, Elton John: Never Too Late, for which he has written a new song, performed at a high-profile international business event at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London last month and now has seen his latest musical, Tammy Faye, transfer to Broadway.

The death of the great actor James Earl Jones, at the robust age of ninety-three, has been marked with tributes from every walk of society, not least the acting profession. There were many remarkable things about Jones’s career, from his being the last surviving member of the cast of Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove to his many and varied Shakespearean roles, all of which he excelled in (save, perhaps, Mark Rylance’s misguided attempt to cast him as a superannuated Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing at the Old Vic in London in 2013, which was critically ridiculed). Yet the reason why he has a fame and repute far beyond just about any other actor of his generation is simple: he was the voice of Darth Vader.