Round Midnight (film)

Round Midnight
Theatrical release poster by Steven Chorney
Directed byBertrand Tavernier
Screenplay byDavid Rayfiel
Bertrand Tavernier
Colo Tavernier (French language translation)
Based onDance of the Infidels
by Francis Paudras
Produced byIrwin Winkler
Starring
CinematographyBruno de Keyzer
Edited byArmand Psenny
Music byHerbie Hancock
Production
companies
Little Bear
PECF
Distributed byWarner Bros.
Release dates
Running time
133 minutes
CountriesUnited States
France
LanguageEnglish
Budget$3 million[1]
Box office$10 million[2]

Round Midnight is a 1986 American musical drama film directed by Bertrand Tavernier and written by Tavernier and David Rayfiel. It stars Dexter Gordon, with a soundtrack by Herbie Hancock. The title comes from Thelonious Monk's 1943 composition 'Round Midnight, which is featured in this film in a Hancock arrangement.

The protagonist jazzman, Dale Turner, is based on a composite of real-life jazz legends Lester Young (tenor sax) and Bud Powell (piano). While the film is fictionalized, it is drawn directly from the memoir/biography Dance of the Infidels written by French author Francis Paudras, who had befriended Powell during his Paris expatriate days and on whom the character Francis was based. [3][4]

Gordon was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor and won a Grammy for the film's soundtrack entitled The Other Side of Round Midnight in the category for Best Instrumental Jazz Performance, Soloist. Hancock won the Academy Award for Best Original Score. The soundtrack was released in two parts: Round Midnight and The Other Side of Round Midnight.

  1. ^ "AFI|Catalog".
  2. ^ "Autour de minuit (Round Midnight) (1986) - JPBox-Office".
  3. ^ KOENIGSBERG, LARRY (8 March 2004). "Book Reviews". Dance of the Infidels: A Portrait of Bud Powell. All About Jazz. Retrieved 18 April 2014.
  4. ^ Ratliff, Ben (December 17, 1997). "Francis Paudras, 62, Patron Of Jazz Pianist Bud Powell". New York Times. Retrieved 18 April 2014.