Nqutu Road, Hillcrest, is as far from Hollywood as you can get. No dayglo decadence here. Nothing outrageous. Just a lush, quiet, country garden – and a pair of coo-ing doves over there.
My coffee is being poured by a man who’s on first name terms with people like Meryl Streep and Jake Gyllenhaal, a man who rubs shoulders with the likes of U2 and Paul McCartney.
His name’s Paul Hepker, and if that doesn’t immediately ring a bell, think of the Oscar-award winning movie Tsotsi. Paul co-wrote the musical score for this. . . and the equally big award winner Rendition. Oh, and every time you tune into Deadliest Catch or Ice Road Truckers on the Discovery Channel, among others, you’ll also hear his music.
Now a green-card holding American, who lives in LA, Paul’s on holiday in Hillcrest to catch up with family, but has been on a self-confessed “mid-life walkabout” for several months. As you read this he’s on his way back from Kilimanjaro, and recently returned from a month in Hawaii and another in Australia (“horrible place – like Christmas in Margate in the 80s!”).
“I’ve just been writing songs and replenishing my energy,” he grins. He’s also supposed to be prepping himself to climb Kilimanjaro, but “for the past few weeks it’s been more about drinking beer and chilling than anything else!”
I’m not sure what I’d expected this famous composer/musical director to be like. I’d read his biog – apart from being musical director of Pretoria and Cape Town National Theatres (think biggies like Rocky Horror Show and Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat), performing and recording with greats like Shirley Bassey and Miriam Makeba, touring with Johnny Clegg, and co-composing the musical score for Tsotsi, RenditionThe Bird Can’t Fly and (a Dutch/SA film collaboration) – and anticipated he might (deservedly) exude some arrogance. What I didn’t expect was such a self-effacing, unassuming and nice man.
With his trademark hat, an “End Poverty 2025” T-shirt and jeans, he’s the epitome of the laidback muso-at-home.
What was it like when Tsotsi won the Oscar, I ask? ”Incredible! We never expected the film to be such a hit. I was living in LA when (Tsotsi director) Gavin Hood and his wife Janine came over (I’d known her since we were teenagers) and he was talking about this script he was writing. So one day I suggested I and my buddy Mark Kilian write the musical score for it, and it took off from there. We had no idea how huge the movie would become.”
They were astounded when Tsotsi won both the Audience and Critics’ awards at the Edinburgh Film Festival and won a few other smaller festivals. Then came the Toronto Festival. “We were up against biggies like Brokeback Mountain and Thank You for Smoking . . . amazingly, we got the highest score in the festival’s history and won the coveted People’s Choice Award, which blew everyone away!”
And then the Oscars. That moment, he says, “was a long way from the little boy who played barefoot in the mud in Salisbury, Rhodesia. If you’d told me, when I was a child, that my future included this moment, I’d never have believed you.”
Yet clearly the signs were there, because I learn that when the family moved to Jo’burg when he was about 11, he was already something of a prodigy. “My folks bought a piano when I was four, and I obviously showed an aptitude for music because they sent me for lessons.” He studied under the late Dr Adolph Hallis (who wrote musical scores for several early Hitchcock films) and won a musical scholarship to Michaelhouse.
He laughs. “Ironically, when I started there, the music teacher left and was replaced by someone who wasn’t a pianist, so that slowed down the advancement of my classical training a bit.” The upside was he became proficient in other instruments. “I played in the school band, learned the clarinet, the drums, fiddled around on bass . . .”
He studied at UCT, Wits, played and directed lots of supper club shows in Johannesburg, with top names like Vicky Sampson and Yvonne Chaka Chaka, joined Juluka/Savuka and toured for a couple of years, before old mate Mark Kilian called from LA.
“He said ‘come on over’, so I did. My first break was being hired as the composer for a new Discovery Channel series, Crash Files. The production company, Original Productions, went on to use me for a bunch of shows – including Deadliest Catch ( nominated for 13 Emmy Awards). They’re all played to death on Discovery and syndicated worldwide.” And naturally, every time the programmes air, he gets royalties.
Paul sips the last of his coffee: “While on my sabbatical I’ve been writing some good stuff, and before returning to LA, if I make it back from the mountain, I will be doing some recording with the guys from Just Jinjer. . . Also, Gavin Hood is planning another movie and wants his old crew back, so hopefully that’s in the pipeline. I truly believe my best is yet to come.”
Of that, I’ve no doubt.
Useful info: Listen to Paul Hepker’s music at www.paulhepker.com