“I want to write something new, something extraordinary and ...

Luhrmann, as he did with “Romeo + Juliet” and “Moulin Rouge!,” has once
again taken a classic story and incorporated popular contemporary music with
period score, making the audience’s experience of the film as rich and full, and as
timeless, as possible.
“Fitzgerald forged new ground, gaining both fame and notoriety for
referencing this new and explosive sound called jazz in his work, actively telling story
via the immediacy of pop culture,” Luhrmann relates. “As I’ve done in the past, I
wanted to bring this tale into the present day, while respecting the time in which it
takes place, because no matter how hard one tries we’ll never quite understand
what it felt like—what jazz was in 1925.”
Fitzgerald coined the term “the Jazz Age,” and the phrase encapsulated so
much more than just the music of the era—it was about being modern, it was about
youth culture, and it represented the energy of the time: the Roaring Twenties. As
such, Luhrmann wanted the music to be a reflection of our time, while still helping to
tell this classic story.
Anton Monsted, executive music supervisor and co-producer on the film,
says, “The soundtrack to ‘The Great Gatsby’ had to meet everybody’s expectations,
because on the one hand it’s a heartrending love story about a broken dream, but
it’s also a story known so much for its parties and its excessive, decadent world. We
knew it needed to include bombastic, loud, exciting party music—hip-hop, music of
the streets—as well as music that expresses the tragic romance and a love that can
never be fully realized.
“I think Baz certainly identified very early on that to listen to jazz music and to
enjoy jazz music in the early 1920s was somewhat to flirt with danger,” Monsted
continues. “So, finding a translation to the times that we’re living in and to the times
that our audience is living in…that was probably our big musical discussion and our
big music challenge.”
Their discussions turned to hip-hop, which has its roots in jazz. “You know, jazz is
African-American music, and it’s storytelling music,” says Luhrmann. “Both of those
musical forms were about pure, absolute self-expression.”
There could be no one better to collaborate with Luhrmann on his concept of
the music than rapper and producer extraordinaire Shawn “JAY Z” Carter, who
ultimately served as executive producer on “The Great Gatsby” as well as a
contributor to the soundtrack.
25