Dooley completes work on DreamWorks' A Christmas Caper

By M&C News Sep 21, 2005, 1:40 GMT

Composer James Michael Dooley has completed work on the animated short film for DreamWorks, "A Christmas Caper" starring the scene-stealing penguins from the hit film "Madagascar." This short will air before the upcoming feature 'Wallace and Grommit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit' for which he provides additional music. Both animated films hit theaters worldwide this fall. Dooley previously teamed with Hans Zimmer on the hit film, 'Madagascar.'

Dooley has also completed the score for the PS2 title ;Socom 3: US Navy SEALs.; The recording was done at Air Lyndhurst Hall at George Martin's Air Studios. The score was recorded over 2 days with a 70 piece orchestra. In addition, Dooley has partnered with CDBABY.com to donate the proceeds from sales of 'The Mars Underground' soundtrack to the Red Cross as part of the national disaster relief effort.

The New York native joined Media Ventures in 1999 and collaborated with award-winning composer Hans Zimmer both as his Chief Technical Engineer and as a composer. Dooley applied his technical skills on films ranging from comedies such as Barry Levinson's 'An Everlasting Piece' and Penny Marshall's 'Riding in Cars With Boys' (starring Drew Barrymore) to blockbusters such as Ridley Scott's 'Gladiator', John Woo's 'Mission: Impossible 2', and Michael Bay's 'Pearl Harbor.' He has participated as an additional composer, arranger and orchestrator for Hans Zimmer and Klaus Badelt's feature films including 'The Time Machine' as well as Ridley Scott's 'Hannibal,' 'Black Hawk Down,' and 'Matchstick Men.'

On the small screen, he has scored several TV documentaries for ESPN ('Citation', 'Greatest Games', 'Richard Flowers'), National Geographic ('Ascent', 'Dean Kamen'), and The History Channel ('The Louisiana Purchase'). He scored the award winning short film 'Untitled: 003 Embryo,' and the award winning Western, 'Agua Dulce.' He has provided scores for other shorts including 'Area 52' for the Sci-fi channel, Kevin Susman's 'Papal Cab' and the Sundance Film Festival selection, 'Bit Players.'