James Dooley (b. Aug 22 1976) is a graduate of New York University where he majored in Music Composition. Upon completion of his degree, he moved to Los Angeles to study the art of film composing with such prolific scoring legends as Christopher Young, Elmer Bernstein and Leonard Rosenman.
He joined Media Ventures (now Remote Control Productions) in 1999 and began collaboration with the world-renowned Hans Zimmer both as his Chief Technical Engineer on Gladiator and as an additional composer, arranger and orchestrator on such notable features as The Da Vinci Code, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, The Ring, Tears of the Sun, King Arthur, Ridley Scott’s Hannibal and Black Hawk Down.
James also worked on several animated feature scores such as Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, Madagascar, its spin-off penguins short A Christmas Caper and the academy-award winning Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.
In terms of solo ventures, Dooley’s most ambitious projects to date have been an original score to Simon West’s remake of the box-office record breaking, cult-classic-thriller When a Stranger Calls, and composing the complex, interactive scores for best-selling videogame titles such as SOCOM 3: U.
S. Navy Seals and U.S. Navy Seals: Combined Assault. He also fully scored the German animated release Urmel aus dem Eis (“Impy’s Island”), and DreamWorks Animation’s musically acclaimed and Oscar-contending short First Flight.
He has recently provided music for episodes of ABC’s hit new weekly television series, “What About Brian”.Dooley’s music can also be heard in the theatrical trailers for Elf, Man on Fire, the Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter: the Goblet of Fire, and most recently the Spider-Man 3 full theatrical trailer, so far one of the highest-rated and exposed of 2006.
Known for his interest and expertise in many mediums and genres, James’ projects also include many well known commercial spots, sports programming ventures, and the ground-breaking documentary Mars Underground, for which he donated proceeds to the Red Cross national disaster relief effort.
Dooley is currently working with Fred Savage on the sequel project to the Eddie Murphy family hit, Daddy Day Care.