David Bowie. David Sitek. Scarlett Johansson.
The list sounds like part of a childhood game. Now: Which one of these things doesn’t belong?
But Johansson, who proved she could carry a tune in “Lost In Translation,” and who showed her chops at the Coachella festival last year on-stage with the Jesus and Mary Chain, fits in just fine with the curious rock ‘n’ roll crowd. Her debut album, Anywhere I Lay My Head, is slated for release May 19, and Bowie and Sitek, from Brooklyn-based TV on the Radio, helped piece it together.
The album is a collection of Tom Waits covers sung by Johansson, with the exception of one original. Though the concept is invitingly bizarre, Johansson’s transition to music is part of a Hollywood habit that’s ebbed and flowed for the better part of half a century.
Right now, it’s flowing.
“At a certain point, if a star gets big enough, they think they can try this out,” said Ty Burr, a movie critic for the Boston Globe. “They have a brand, and brand is extendable – so who cares if they can’t sing?”
There’s Billy Bob Thornton, who debuted in 2001 with Private Radio, a collection of traditional country rock songs, and Minnie Driver, whose first release, Everything I’ve Got In My Pocket, came out three years later. On her sophomore record, Seastories, released last summer, Driver enlisted alt-country icon Ryan Adams. Soon after, indie act Coconut Records released an album called Nighttiming. The band is led by actor Jason Schwartzman. And just last month, Zooey Deschanel unveiled the album Volume One with singer-songwriter M. Ward. It was their debut under the moniker She ‘ Him.
“In a certain way, it’s an added credibility for the audience they’re trying to appeal to,” Burr said. “It’s a way to blow off steam on another project, and it simultaneously lets them show they’re artistically broad.”
In the past, Burr said musicians have typically been the ones to cross over, like Frank Sinatra, whose voice carried him to fame in the swing era of the 1940s before he broke into film about 10 years later. And though it’s still more common, shortly after World World II, actors began to try their hand at music. Because the studio system broke down around this time, actors whose careers had once been strictly controlled were represented by agents and thus had more freedom to pursue a number of creative projects.
Then, Robert Mitchum, a prevalent film noir actor of the ’50s and ’60s recorded the Caribbean style record Calypso – Is Like So . . . in 1957.
Now, it’s Jared Leto, who fronts 30 Seconds to Mars; Juliette Lewis, the roaring lead-singer of rock outfit Juliette and the Licks; and Johansson, as well as others.
“Generally, when you hear that an actor is putting out a record, your first impulse is to laugh, because, if they’ve spent all their time building up a body of work as an actor, why do they want to all of a sudden try to convince us they can sing, too?” Burr said. “Unless a good voice was part of their appeal as an actor to start with.”
For some actors, vocal training and experience are part of their stage and film careers, said Ava Lawrence, a Northeastern music industry professor.
“With many actors, they’re talented in so many different ways, it just depends on what way they hit it that we know them,” she said, citing Catherine Zeta-Jones.
Although Zeta-Jones hasn’t released an album, Lawrence said, she won an Academy Award for her role in the film-musical Chicago and began her career on stage, where her singing voice helped distinguish her as a young talent.
“There’s legitimacy there behind her singing,” Lawrence said. “And if they can sing, maybe it’s not such a big deal [for them to jump into the music industry].”
On a Wednesday afternoon, on her WRBB radio show, sophomore Diana Dubuque played a song called “Sentimental Heart” off the new She ‘ Him album – it’s a record she enjoys, she said, though she doesn’t usually listen to bands fronted by actors.
For Dubuque, a physical therapy major, it’s somewhat frustrating that film celebrities who cross into the world of music don’t necessarily have to pay their dues.
“Since they have the experience in the first place, and the money and the connections, it’s easy to get an in with the recording industry, and independent bands have to build up [their musical careers] on their own instead of relying on others to hand them things,” she said. “It’s not right, but it’s understandable.”
For Lawrence, repackaging an actor as a musician doesn’t seem like such an easy task, and comes with its own set of challenges – particularly, how to make a familiar face seem new and exciting.
“Everybody may not have the persona that could cross over and be successful,” she said. “People just go both ways, and it depends on who they are and how they’re presented to the public.”
Burr, whose personal standards for actor bands transcends a hit or two, was careful to separate the credibility of actors’ musical forays from the relative ease with which they’re given the opportunity to record, and are thrust into the public eye.
“All it means is an actor is pre-sold. The industry knows it can sell this thing,” he said. “Whether they’re better or worse musicians than someone who is struggling has nothing to do with marketing. Sure, it’s frustrating, but my suggestion for someone who wants to be a musician? Become an actor.”
