NEW YORK — He's got Tonys and a Grammy. Now songwriter Robert Lopez is a little stunned that he might soon take home an Oscar.
"My only dream coming out of college was to get a show up in New York and having it reviewed," he says. "Quite honestly, I just wanted to be doing something in the theater that wasn't just for free."
Lopez, who helped create "Avenue Q" and "The Book of Mormon," is up for an Academy Award next month along with his co-writing partner and wife, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, for best song honors.
The songwriting duo's "Let it Go" from the "Frozen" soundtrack is one of four eligible to win, including Pharrell's "Happy" from the "Despicable Me 2" soundtrack, U2's "Ordinary Love" from "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom," and "The Moon Song" by Karen O. of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs for Spike Jonze's "Her." At the Oscars, Broadway star Idina Menzel will sing "Let it Go," as she did in the film.
Lopez and his wife recently got to meet some of their competition and were a tad intimidated. "It's a strong year and these are artists that we look up to and think of as rock stars. We don't think of us in the same league," he said.
At a photo shoot, Lopez and Anderson-Lopez posed beside Bono, Jonze, Karen O. and Pharrell. "We just felt like this couple that somehow wandered in and got to be in the picture," he says, laughing. "We felt like photobombers."
Others might disagree, pointing to the huge success of "Frozen," about a magically icy princess and her sister. It has earned more than $864 million globally and prompted many YouTube tributes. Disney is even in talks about adapting "Frozen" into a Broadway musical.
Before the Academy Awards ceremony, Lopez will be in the spotlight for another reason: He is one of the speakers at the third TEDxBroadway conference, which brings together producers, marketers, entrepreneurs, academics and artists to try to answer the question, "What is the best Broadway can be?" This year the annual gathering is set for Feb. 24 at New World Stages.
