Page "Tom Waits" Paragraph 14

In August 1980, Waits married Kathleen Brennan, a screenwriter, whom he had met while working on the set of the Francis Ford Coppola movie One from the Heart.

Brennan is regularly credited as co-author of many songs in his later albums, and Waits often cites her as a major influence on his work.

She introduced him to the music of Captain Beefheart.

Despite having shared a manager with Beefheart in the 1970s, Waits says, " I became more acquainted with him when I got married.

" Waits would later describe his relationship with Brennan as a paradigm shift in his musical development.

After leaving Asylum, the label released the first Tom Waits " Best of " album in 1981, a collection called Bounced Checks, notable for including an alternate, stripped down version of " Jersey Girl " and the otherwise unreleased " Mr. Henry ", as well as an alternate master of " Whistlin ' Past the Graveyard " and a live performance of " The Piano Has Been Drinking ".

During this period, Waits appeared in a series of minor movie roles, including a cameo role in Wolfen ( 1981 ) as an inebriated piano player, and his song " Jitterbug Boy " also appeared on the movie's soundtrack.

One from the Heart received its official theatrical release in 1982, with Waits appearing in a cameo as a trumpet player as well as receiving an Oscar nomination for Original Song Score ( eventually losing out to Victor Victoria, by Henry Mancini and Leslie Bricusse ).

This marked the first in a series of collaborations between Waits and Coppola, with Waits appearing in cameos in Coppola's movies The Outsiders ( 1983 ), Rumble Fish ( 1983 ), and The Cotton Club ( 1984 ), and a major role in Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Waits also contributed two songs to the documentary Streetwise ( 1984 ), " Rat's Theme " and " Take Care of All My Children ".