I can picture Williams as an incredible prima donna. I’ve always thought he was overrated (including his Star Wars work.) I much prefer James Horner’s music.
Actually, Horner is a mga-MEGA prima donne—he’s known for yelling at players in the orchestras. He also was criticized for directly ripping off Jerry Goldsmith in a couple of his early scores (not ‘influenced’ or whatever, but note-by-note steals) and claimed he never even heard of Jerry Goldsmith, which is hilarious because he dated Goldsmith’s daughter a couple of years before.
Williams has had his moments—Randy Newman laughs about how he got WIlliams worked up just by telling him how much a drummer in the orchestra was being paid (like Williams should begrudge a guy a living)—but a friend had dinner with him a couple of times and said he was very nice and polite to my friend, who was a nobody in the business.
Whatever I may think of Williams’s scores (some good, most just blah), he did something amazing with Star Wars. While I love some of Horner’s music (Brainstorm, the two Treks, Bobby Jones), he steals. A lot.