RadioActive
For Amazon Prime’s “Radioactive,” Russian-born, Paris-based composers Evgueni and Sacha Galperine underscored the story of 19th century scientist Marie Curie (Rosamund Pike) with a startling sound of analog synthesizers and early 20th century electronic instruments like the theremin and Ondes Martenot.
Director Marjane Satrapi didn’t want the old-fashioned “biopic classical music with full orchestra,” says Evgueni. “She wanted something new and modern.” The discoverer of radium was “ahead of her time, not only as a scientist but also as a woman. She was like a person of the next century,” and the electronic score helps to suggest that.
But, he adds, a standard orchestra was also necessary for a handful of scenes that “give us some connection to the past. And also, in a very pragmatic way, to give the audience something familiar.”
Evgueni Galperine & Sacha Galperine