Vic Mizzy, the songwriter who wrote themes for The Addams Family and Green Acres, has died at the age of 93.
The Addams Family made Mizzy a rich man. “If people only remembered me for the themes to The Addams Family and Green Acres, I wouldn’t care. Two snaps got me a Bel Air mansion,” he once said.Mizzy understood copyright in the 60s and held on to his copyright for everything he wrote, something unusually clever for the time.
When it came time to put down the theme for The Addams Family the studio refused to pay for singers so Mizzy did everything himself. “They had no theme,” remembered Mizzy. “So I wrote the music, told them it was going to start with ‘da-da-da-dum, snap, snap’ and that I visualized each character would have a separate take. I laid the music down, and then ended up directing the title sequence. The first thing I said to the actors was, ‘When you snap your fingers, do it in a bored way.’”
Mizzy also contributed to scores for Mr Ed, F Troop and Petticoat Junction.
His most recent work was for the soundtrack to Spiderman 2.
Vic is survived by his brother Sol, daughter Lynn Mizzy Jonas, husband Phil, grandson David and granddaughter Rachel. A memorial will be held at Eden Memorial Park (Sepulveda and Rinaldi) in Mission Hills, CA, at 11 a.m., followed by a nosh at Vic’s home, catered by Junior’s Deli, his favorite.
