You mean a giant, humongous, AAA, big-budget motion picture like Pirates of the Caribbean only gave you two to three weeks to compose the score?
TL;DRZanelli explains that this was an unusual case: the film was already in final mix without a score, so Hans Zimmer's team of composers had about three weeks to write it, which he enjoyed.
Yes, well, that's an unusual circumstance. No, no. I think it's sort of well established. People know there was another composer on the project before, and that's what happened. So I get a call from Hans, who is now the second composer. The movie was on the final mix stage already. They were already doing the final mix, and they didn't have score. And Hans called me on a Saturday and said, you need to get to the studio. I almost did a Hans Zimmer impression and then I thought better of it. I used my own voice. You've got to get to the studio and watch this movie. We're starting right away. We're finishing in three weeks. You can't go to the Justin Timberlake concert. You're going to be working. And so I went to the studio with a whole gang, and it really was literally like Hans had this five-minute piece of music he'd written overnight, and he gave it to all of us. And then it was like, we just need to start writing music. Just go. And I sort of loved the chaos of that. It was really like being in the eye of a hurricane. Again, I had, I guess, that sort of clarity and focus. I was able to just put my head down and write music like crazy for those three weeks. And it's kind of nice to know when it stops. I know when I get to sleep again. Until then, I will work on Pirates.