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‘Fly Me to the Moon’ Composer Daniel Pemberton: ‘I Was Trying to Capture Nostalgia for a Time That Feels Very Distant Now in America’

Composer Daniel Pemberton on scoring Greg Berlanti's "Fly Me to the Moon" and finding Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum's love theme with strings.

Greg Berlanti’s rom-com with Scarlett Johansson as Kelly Jones, a Madison Avenue marketing genius hired to sell the moon to the American public and Channing Tatum as Cole, the NASA director in charge of the Apollo 11 launch behind America’s first moon landing meant Pemberton could incorporate different musical strands “from the fun aspect to the romantic couple element, and then NASA and a kind of Americana nostalgia,” says the English composer whose credits include “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.” One of the most fun elements in Pemberton’s score is his sneaky theme for Moe Berkus (Woody Harrelson), the mysterious White House emissary who comes up with the plan to shoot a fake moon-landing sequence just in case the real one fails. “I wanted it to feel big and lush, with lots of strings on a strong, simple melodic line,” Pemberton says, noting that he rarely gets the opportunity to write a memorable theme “with heart and a lack of cynicism.”

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