Next month, the art-rock eminence and former Talking Heads leader David Byrne will release Who Is The Sky?, his first new solo album in seven years. That's not the only thing that he's got going on. Variety reports that Byrne has also written and produced a bunch of songs for a new Netflix animated film called The Twits. It's an adaptation of Roald Dahl's famously bleak 1980 children's novel about two real assholes, and it's apparently a musical, with David Byrne songs.
According to Variety, David Byrne and Hayley Willams recorded a new duet called "Open The Door," which will be the end-credits song for The Twits. Williams, who just released 17 new tracks of her own, appears on Byrne's new LP Who Is The Sky? Last year, Williams' band Paramore covered the Talking Heads' "Burning Down The House," and Byrne repaid the favor by covering Paramore's "Hard Times." Byrne and Williams wrote "Open The Door" together. Byrne won an Oscar for his 1987 score for The Last Emperor, and he got a Best Original Song nomination for "This Is A Life," from Everything Everywhere All At Once, in 2022. So there's at least some chance that Byrne and Williams will get another nomination soon.
Byrne also wrote and produced three more songs for The Twits: "We’re Not Like Ev’ryone Else," "Lullaby," and "The Problem Is You." They'll be performed by the movie's cast, which includes Natalie Portman, Emilia Clarke, Margo Martindale, and Johnny Vegas. It's directed by Phil Johnston, whose previous effort was 2018's Ralph Breaks The Internet. Here's what Byrne says about the enterprise in a statement to Variety:
This was a fun project. Like other Roald Dahl books, this one has its share of dreadful characters -- this time two of them are front and center. Kids (and adults) love that they can vicariously imagine their own worst impulses played out, harmlessly, in a punky fun story. So when I was approached to write some songs for this movie I immediately said, "Let me give it a try and see if you like what I come up with."
And here's what Hayley Williams says:
Being a part of this movie is like one pinch-me moment after another. My favorite Roald Dahl book growing up was The Twits. I’m drawn to learning about twisted characters like Mr. and Mrs. Twit and the Wormwoods from Matilda. The way Phil [Johnston] and Daisy [May West] adapted the original story was really exciting to me, as was the animation style. It feels like a cautionary tale -- and also a really lovely depiction of chosen family and community, which is one of my favorite topics. I owe David Byrne for pulling me into the music for this. It was so fun and so surreal starting a song from scratch with him.
The Twits arrives on Netflix 10/17.
