The actor Jonathan Bailey has revealed that he not only stars in Jurassic World Rebirth, but also played a clarinet solo on the official score.
The Bridgerton star called his musical cameo “a highlight of my career”.
“The nerd in me erupted like Vesuvius,” the actor, who is playing a palaeontologist named Dr Henry Loomis in the latest instalment of the hit science fiction franchise, told host Jimmy Fallon on the Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
Bailey explained that while he was performing Richard II in London, Rebirth director Gareth Edwards told him they would be recording the new score, which would also incorporate some of John Williams’ iconic original, close to where he was working at the time.
“So I was like, brilliant. I’m going to go over to Abbey Road Studios, and he let me in, and I sat with my mate at the top,” he said, adding that he got “goosebumps” from watching the “105-piece world-class orchestra”.
“As the week progressed, I came back, and I was like, ‘Can I bring my clarinet?’ I played the clarinet in school. and on the Friday, they said, ‘Look, you can come.’ And I just wanted to play one – like, even if it was one slightly sharp note, in the John Williams score, it would have been my dream come true,” the Wicked star said.
“And I came, and I ended up playing the clarinet with John and Gareth, who were the clarinetists, and I played on the John Williams score.”
Bailey ended up impressing composer Alexandre Desplat to the point where he was asked to stay and play with the orchestra, and even do the clarinet solo, which the actor said he declined, not wanting to do so around “world-class musicians”.
However, another solo came up, and Bailey thought he would “regret that for the rest of my life” and agreed to do it.
“Again, a clarinet solo came up, and [Desplat] said, it's now or never. And I just went, ‘Okay, let's do it.’ And I ended up playing the theme of Dr Henry Loomis, the character I play, in a Jurassic Park film, on the clarinet, which is in the score. It's the greatest story ever.”
Bailey went on to explain that he was “given a plastic clarinet by my granddad” in 1993, the same year the first Jurassic Park film premiered.
“It just shows that if you find something you love and you commit to it, you never know how it comes full circle. But honestly, it was so emotional,” he said.
In Rebirth, Bailey is joined by Scarlett Johansson, who plays a former mercenary leading a group of scientists on an expedition to extract dinosaur DNA for a groundbreaking medical breakthrough. Rupert Friend, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Mahershala Ali, Luna Blaise, and David Iacono also star.
The film also marks the return of David Koepp as writer, rejoining the franchise for the first time since the original and its 1997 sequel.
Jurassic World Rebirth is set to release in theatres on 2 July.
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