Ralph Burns Filmography

All Dogs Go to Heaven

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Burt Reynolds, Judith Barsi, Dom DeLuise, Vic Tayback, Charles Nelson Reilly, Melba Moore, Loni Anderson

Synopsis: One of the most expensive of Don Bluth's animated cartoon features, All Dogs Go to Heaven was also among the most successful. Set in late-'30s New Orleans, the story centers upon a roguish German shepherd named Charlie B. Barkin (voice of Burt Reynolds), who is killed early in the proceedings by Read More

Bert Rigby, You're a Fool

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Robert Lindsay, Cathryn Bradshaw, Robbie Coltrane, Anne Bancroft, Corbin Bernsen

Synopsis: Tony award-winning British musical comedy star Robert Lindsay makes his first important American film appearance in Bert Rigby, You're a Fool. Lindsay, of course, plays the title character, a coal miner who dreams of becoming a big showbiz star. Only problem is, there's very little demand for Bert Read More

Sweet Bird of Youth

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Cheryl Paris, Elizabeth Taylor, Mark Harmon

Synopsis: Previously filmed in 1962 with Geraldine Page and Paul Newman in the leads, Tennessee Williams' Sweet Bird of Youth was restaged for television in 1989 by Nicolas Roeg. Elizabeth Taylor stars as Alexandre Del Lago, a fading, alcoholic, drug-dependent movie star. Mark Harmon co-stars as Chance Read More

In the Mood

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: Patrick Dempsey, Beverly D'Angelo, Talia Balsam, Michael Constantine, Betty Jinnette

Synopsis: This romantic comedy is based on a true story that happened in California in 1944. Sonny Wisecarver (Patrick Dempsey) is 15 year old who has an affair with his older neighbor Judy (Talia Balsam). The two run off and get married, but a stern judge has the union annulled. Sonny is hauled before the Read More

After the Promise

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Mark Harmon, Donnelly Rhodes, Mark Hildreth

Synopsis: Mark Harmon plays an itinerant Depression-era carpenter in the made-for-TV After the Promise. When his wife dies, Harmon is declared an unsuitable parent purely on the basis of his financial situation, and his four children are made wards of the Court. Fighting against the seemingly invulnerable Read More

The Christmas Star

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: Christmas Star is a two-hour whimsy assault, originally telecast December 14, 1986 on The Disney Sunday Movie. Ed Asner plays an escaped convict who adopts a stolen Santa Claus suit as a disguise. Several impressionable youngsters, believing Asner to be the genuine Santa, latch onto him. He Read More

Penalty Phase

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Richard Chaves, Peter Strauss

Synopsis: Tony Richardson, who in his days of prominence directed the Oscar-winning Tom Jones (1963), demonstrated in 1986's Penalty Phase that the intervening years did not dim his talent in the least. Peter Strauss stars as a liberal judge, in the midst of a re-election campaign. Strauss has been under Read More

Perfect

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: David Paymer, John Travolta, Jamie Lee Curtis, Anne de Salvo, Marilu Henner, Laraine Newman, Jann Wenner

Synopsis: Based on a series of Rolling Stone articles by Aaron Latham, this romance was set in the world of L.A.'s hip fitness scene. Rolling Stone reporter Adam Lawrence (John Travolta) comes to L.A. to write a story about a prominent businessman who's been arrested for drug dealing (shades of the John Read More

Moving Violations

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Neal Israel, John Murray, Jennifer Tilly, James Keach, Brian Backer, Ned Eisenberg

Synopsis: In this flat attempt at comedy by the director of the Police Academy series, Neal Israel, a brash Dana Cannon (John Murray, brother of Bill) lands in a crooked re-education school for delinquent drivers, run by Deputy Halik (James Keach, brother of Stacey). The objective is to lord it over the Read More

A Chorus Line

Crew: Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: Michael Douglas, Terrence Mann, Alyson Reed, Cameron English, Vicki Frederick

Synopsis: Broadway's celebratory musical about rejection makes it to the screen in a fizzless adaptation by Richard Attenborough that misses the whole point of the Broadway show -- i.e. the dancing and the dancers. Instead, the dancers become a limp Greek chorus for the dead love affair between a Read More

Ernie Kovacs: Between the Laughter

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Edie Adams, Melody Anderson, Jeff Goldblum, Cloris Leachman, Madolyn Smith

Synopsis: Physically, the gangling, long-necked Jeff Goldblum is all wrong for the role of fabled TV comedian Ernie Kovacs (1919-1962) but you tend to forget this as Goldblum expertly reenacts some of Kovacs' most famous comic bits. No Kovacs bio would be complete without such scenes as the mustachioed Read More

The Muppets Take Manhattan

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Jim Henson, Frank Oz, Dave Goelz, Steve Whitmire, Richard Hunt, Art Carney

Synopsis: Jim Henson's Muppets find themselves in Manhattan yearning to get a musical on Broadway in this charming film that also chides show business and its foibles. Kermit the Frog has just put together a successful variety show at Danhurst college (probably somewhere between Amherst and Dartmouth), and Read More

Side Show

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: In this made-for-TV movie, a teenage boy runs away from home and joins a circus, discovering that his new life is not exactly what he thought it would be. When the boy is the witness to a murder, he must struggle to keep himself out of the killer's way. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide Read More

The Phantom of the Opera

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Maximilian Schell, Jane Seymour, Michael York

Synopsis: This 1983 TV adaptation of Gaston Leroux's 1908 novel Phantom of the Opera was the fourth film version of the vintage chiller--and the one with perhaps the highest rate of digression from the original novel. This version is set in Budapest (where it was filmed) rather than Paris, obliging scripter Sherman Yellen Read More

National Lampoon's Vacation

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Anthony Michael Hall, Imogene Coca, Randy Quaid

Synopsis: Far superior to its sequels, National Lampoon's Vacation chronicles the trials and tribulations of the Griswolds (Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Dana Barron, and Anthony Michael Hall) as they trek cross-country in search of fun and recreation at the mythical WallyWorld theme park. Along the way Read More

Star 80

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Songwriter

Actors: Mariel Hemingway, Eric Roberts, Cliff Robertson, Carroll Baker, Roger Rees

Synopsis: Director Bob Fosse's fact-based tale of Playboy centerfold Dorothy Stratten's short life and gruesome death focuses less on Stratten (played by Mariel Hemingway) than on her husband/manager, sleazoid pornographer and all-around failure Paul Snider (Eric Roberts, ideally cast). He sees the young Read More

My Favorite Year

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Peter O'Toole, Mark Linn-Baker, Jessica Harper, Joseph Bologna, Bill Macy

Synopsis: Richard Benjamin's directorial debut is an engaging slice of nostalgia, purportedly based on an incident in life of Mel Brooks. Mark Linn-Baker stars as Benjy Stone, junior writer on the popular 1950s TV comedy/variety series The King Kaiser Show. Kaiser (Joseph Bologna)'s guest star this week is Read More

Kiss Me Goodbye

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Sally Field, James Caan, Jeff Bridges, Paul Dooley, Claire Trevor

Synopsis: Robert Mulligan directed this Americanized re-make of the successful Brazilian comedy Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands. Sally Field stars as Kay Villano, a lonely widow of three years who can't forget the memory of her dead husband, Jolly (James Caan). Jolly was a selfish and unfaithful Broadway Read More

Pennies from Heaven

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Steve Martin, Bernadette Peters, Christopher Walken, Jessica Harper

Synopsis: Adapted from Dennis Potter's landmark British TV miniseries and relocated to the United States during the Depression, Pennies from Heaven dramatizes how popular songs both shaped and reflected the thoughts of people living through economic (and emotional) hardship. Arthur Parker (Steve Martin) is Read More

Annie

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Albert Finney, Carol Burnett, Aileen Quinn, Ann Reinking, Bernadette Peters

Synopsis: This family classic is adapted from the Broadway musical, which was based on the comic strip Little Orphan Annie. During the Great Depression in New York City, a plucky red-haired scrapper named Annie (Aileen Quinn) is the voice of hope for her fellow orphans who live under the supervision of Read More

Golden Gate

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Richard Kiley

Synopsis: Golden Gate revolves around a San Francisco-based newspaper empire run by a family named Kingsley (it could just as well have been "Kane," since the family was based on you-know-what Frisco-based publishing dynasty). Richard Kiley, the cold and commanding Kingsley patriarch, suffers a heart Read More

Baryshnikov on Broadway

Crew: Musical Arrangement

Urban Cowboy

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: John Travolta, Debra Winger, Scott Glenn, Madolyn Smith, Barry Corbin

Synopsis: "You a real cowboy?" John Travolta traded disco for a mechanical bull in this adaptation by James Bridges and Aaron Latham of Latham's article on Western nightlife. Texas country boy Bud (Travolta) moves to Houston to work on an oil rig with his Uncle Bob (Barry Corbin), and he swiftly becomes Read More

Make Me an Offer

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Synopsis: This TV movie, directed by Jerry Paris (a regular on The Dick Van Dyke Show), traces the rise of a young real-estate agent in southern California. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide Read More

First Family

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Conductor

Actors: Gilda Radner, Bob Newhart, Madeline Kahn, Richard Benjamin, Bob Dishy

Synopsis: Gilda Radner, Bob Newhart, and Madeline Kahn star in this comedy. The farce sends up an idiotic First Family in the persona of a bumbling president (Newhart), his semi-alcoholic wife (Kahn), and his oversexed daughter (Radner). Satirizing the artificial, formal speech of real-life First Families Read More

All That Jazz

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Roy Scheider, Jessica Lange, Ann Reinking, Cliff Gorman, Leland Palmer, John Lithgow

Synopsis: "It's showtime!" In this part film à clef, part musical phantasmagoria, director/choreographer Bob Fosse takes a Felliniesque look at the life of a driven entertainer. Joe Gideon (Roy Scheider, channeling Fosse) is the ultimate work (and pleasure)-aholic, as he knocks back a daily dose of Read More

Movie, Movie

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: George C. Scott, Barbara Harris, Eli Wallach, Trish VanDevere, Red Buttons

Synopsis: This spoof of a "typical" double-feature bill of the 1930s is introduced by George Burns, who explains that we're about to see two classic films produced by the legendary Warren Brothers. The first, "Dynamite Fists," is a black-and-white takeoff of such boxing dramas as Golden Boy. Harry Hamlin Read More

New York, New York

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Conductor, Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: Liza Minnelli, Robert De Niro, Lionel Stander, Barry Primus, Mary Kay Place

Synopsis: Martin Scorsese combined the splashy atmosphere of the old studio musical with an unromanticized marriage story in his valentine to Hollywood and the Big Band era. On V-J Day 1945, newly minted civilian saxophonist Jimmy Doyle (Robert De Niro) meets USO singer Francine Evans (Liza Minnelli) at a Read More

Lucky Lady

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Gene Hackman, Liza Minnelli, Burt Reynolds, Geoffrey Lewis, John Hillerman

Synopsis: During the Prohibition era, Walker (Burt Reynolds) and Kibby (Gene Hackman) run a liquor smuggling operation in Mexico; they team up with Claire (Liza Minnelli), a cabaret entertainer who has an "in" with several big-time nightclub owners. Complications ensue when both men fall in love with Read More

Piaf

Crew: Composer (Music Score)

Actors: Brigitte Ariel, Pascale Christophe, Pierre Vernier

Synopsis: This film biography of the French torch singer Edith Piaf (1915-1963) was made simultaneously with a French and English soundtrack. Piaf (Brigitte Ariel) grew up on the streets of Paris and was a bawdy, powerful character. This film chronicles her rise to vocal pre-eminence, and highlights her Read More

Lenny

Crew: Composer (Music Score), Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: Dustin Hoffman, Valerie Perrine, Jan Miner, Stanley Beck, Gary Morton

Synopsis: Adapted by Julian Barry from his own Broadway play, Lenny manages to be both brutally frank and highly romanticized in detailing the short life and career of influential, controversial stand-up comedian Lenny Bruce. The chronology hops, skips and jumps between Lenny (Dustin Hoffman) in his prime Read More

Mame

Crew: Musical Arrangement, Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: George Chiang, Lucille Ball, Robert Preston, Bea Arthur, Kirby Furlong, Bruce Davison

Synopsis: Lucille Ball stars in this film version of the hit Jerry Herman Broadway musical, which featured an electrifying performance by Angela Lansbury. As Patrick Dennis' plucky and resilient Auntie Mame, Ball's low-pitched, growling moan of a voice (a spine-chilling reminder of the sound of Linda Read More

Cabaret

Crew: Musical Direction/Supervision

Actors: Liza Minnelli, Michael York, Joel Grey, Helmut Griem, Marisa Berenson, Fritz Wepper

Synopsis: Originally a 1966 Broadway musical, this groundbreaking Bob Fosse musical was in turn based on Christopher Isherwood's Goodbye to Berlin, previously dramatized for stage and screen as I Am a Camera with Julie Harris as Sally Bowles. Fosse uses the decadent and vulgar cabaret as a mirror image of Read More