If billionaire Elon Musk is hoping that people don’t pay attention to an upcoming documentary about him that he once called a "hit piece," he may not like the news that a legendary singer wrote an original song for that film and that it could be among the songs nominated for an Academy Award.
Elon Musk Biopic Gets Song
The Alex Gibney-directed film about Musk is set to be released later this year and will feature a new song from legendary Talking Heads frontman David Byrne. The film is one of many in the works about the billionaire.
"Let me Sell You a Dream" is the name of Byrne’s original song for the documentary "Musk," according to a new report from Variety. The song was co-written with Academy Award nominated composer Daniel Pemberton.
The song plays during the 235-minute documentary and will be able to qualify for the "Best Original Song" category of the Academy Awards based on fitting the necessary criteria.
Pemberton has worked on films like "The Trial of the Chicago 7" and "Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse" previously, receiving a nomination for the song "Hear My Voice" for the former.
Byrne is the frontman of the Talking Heads, a group best known for songs like "Psycho Killer" and "Burning Down the House."
"I was thrilled when David agreed to write and perform the final song in the film," Gibney said. "I am a huge fan of his."
Gibney said Byrne "dug deep into the sayings of Musk himself" for the lyrics of the song.
"I asked for good quotes from the Martian, and found more of them online. I’m sure he loves dropping these wild statements, and those became the lyrics. All his own words. No editorializing. Straight from the man’s mouth to mine," Byrne said.
Byrne was previously an Academy Award winner for "Best Original Score" for his work on the 1988 film "The Last Emperor."
"Musk" is set to premiere at the Venice International Film Festival on Sept. 8, followed by a showing at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 14. The film will hit theaters on Oct. 16.
Gibney calls the film a "definitive and unvarnished examination" of Musk.
Other Musk on Film in the Works
Director Darren Aronofsky is working on the adaptation of the official Musk biography from Walter Isaacson for the big screen. Isaacson followed Musk around for years and had exclusive access to his life.
The film rights were scooped up by A24, with no actor currently attached to play Musk.
Musk will be portrayed in the upcoming film "Artificial" about OpenAI. Musk will be played by Ike Barinholtz. That film is set for a world premiere on Oct. 5 at the New York Film Festival and is expected to hit movie theaters later this year.
BBC released a documentary series earlier this year on Musk, a follow-up to their 2022 series on the billionaire. The update episodes looked at Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and the billionaire’s growing entry into politics, events that happened since the 2022 series.
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