Baby Doll (1956)

Composer(s):
Kenyon Hopkins

Released in:
1956

Reviews

DON'T PANIC! The steam you're seeing is coming from the CD--not your player.
by filmfactsman (August 7, 2005)
Much like Alex North’s "A Streetcar Named Desire", Tennessee Williams’ "Baby Doll" inspired an alternating sensual/dramatic score by a composer new to Hollywood, Kenyon Hopkins. Hopkins was a product of the 'new" Hollywood of the declining studio era, and, like North and Elmer Bernstein ("The Man with the Golden Arm"), he creatively fused elements of jazz and contemporary pop with orchestral scoring. "Baby Doll" remains a landmark blues/jazz/orchestral soundtrack to the classic (and very controversial at the time) movie. Hopkins supplies dramatic score for full orchestra, flavored by sultry sax. Trademark Hopkins signature melds powerful symphonic material, steamy jazz into vibrant experience, resulting in a fresh, exciting, often sensual and humorous score for the unique black comedy/drama. The drg CD re-release of the 1956 Columbia mono LP is packaged in it’s infamous-at-the-time cover art featuring a still virginal but sexually precocious Carroll Baker. A decade later, Hopkins (in his Verve years) would return to familiar ground with his parallel score for Tennessee Williams’ "This Property is Condemned" (1966) starring a very sexy Natalie Wood.

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