Diane Warren on Trying to Make Her Most Personal Soundtrack Song Also Her Most Universal

There’s a funny motif in Bess Kargman’s documentary “Diane Warren: Relentless” when it comes to its subject’s enthusiasm about her own work: seemingly every time Diane Warren — one of the most successful songwriters in the history of pop music, with chart-topping hits by everyone from Aerosmith and Chicago to Brandy, Celine Dion, and Toni Braxton on her resume — finishes writing a song, she tells whoever’s within earshot that it’s the greatest song she’s ever written.

The refrain becomes a running joke in the movie, which entertainingly and affectionately chronicles Warren’s life and work. Ironically, however, when it comes to the original song Warren created for “Relentless,” the cliché is true — “Dear Me” really is one of the best songs she ever wrote, a rousing and infectious pop anthem that’s as deeply personal as it is broadly appealing.

Its Oscar nomination once again places Warren — a 17-time nominee who has never won, though she did receive an honorary Oscar in 2022 — in the awards conversation, which the songwriter acknowledges is amusingly meta given that one of the subjects in “Relentless” is her often commented-upon track record at the Oscars.

“It’s the coolest thing,” Warren told IndieWire, noting that she’s still always amazed when a song she writes receives awards recognition or becomes a hit. “There are so many ways a song can go wrong, that when it goes right I say, ‘Oh, wow. How did that happen?’ I’m always surprised and I’m always grateful.” Although Warren has written dozens of songs for feature films, including classics like “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” from “Mannequin” (repurposed last year to hilarious effect in “The Naked Gun”) and “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” from “Armageddon,” the task for “Relentless” was unique: to write a song about herself for a movie about herself.

“This was so different,” Warren said. “When I write a song for a movie, I try to write a song that I want to hear that ties it up emotionally. But what am I going to write for a movie about me?” Ultimately, Warren took the same approach she usually does and looked to the story Kargman’s film told for inspiration. “You can see in the movie that I was a fucked up kid and was bullied. I decided to write a story to that young kid who felt like the world was against her and that no one understood her. I wanted to write her a love letter that said everything was going to be okay.”

‘Diane Warren: Relentless‘Courtesy Everett Collection

While the song “Dear Me” is written from a very specific perspective and aimed at the young Diane Warren who “felt bad all the time and sat in my room and got my guitar and started writing, and that made me feel a little better,” it’s also designed to speak to anyone struggling who needs to see the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s an approach Warren has taken on other movie theme songs like “Because You Loved Me” from “Up Close and Personal,” which was inspired by her father but phrased in a manner that made it convincing as a love song for Michelle Pfeiffer and Robert Redford.

That song taught Warren the lesson that a great song can mean something different to everyone who hears it, and “Dear Me” is meticulously calibrated to extrapolate universal feelings from its writer’s personal experience. “I hope kids can listen to the song and, no matter what they’re going through, realize that they’re going to be okay,” she said, adding that she wrote the song’s sweeping ending first so that she could build toward an anthemic climax. “I was thinking people would want to sing along, because there’s a lot of ‘Dear Me’ out there. Bullying is a thousand times worse now with the internet. And you can’t even see it.”

The key to a great movie song, as Warren sees it, is coming up with something that both feels integral to the film and can stand apart from it. “Of course, the first thing is that the song has to work for its particular movie,” she said. “But I never want to make it just for that movie. I thought ‘Dear Me’ had the potential to transcend the movie — to be the most personal song I’ve ever written for a movie, but also the most universal. Because we’ve all had hard lives.”

A great deal of the song’s impact comes from its performance, a heartfelt and wrenching interpretation by Kesha that might come as a surprise to fans who know the singer primarily for her infectious pop songs about sex and partying. Finding the right singer is one of Warren’s favorite parts of the process, and one she sees parallels to in filmmaking.

“I’m a casting director,” she said. “When I write a song for a movie, it’s like another character, and the singer has to be authentic to the movie.” Warren has known Kesha for years and intuitively felt she would respond to “Dear Me.” “I knew that she had a hard life, and I felt that if we were the same age we would have been hanging out and cutting school together. I know what a great vocalist she is, and I just had a feeling the song would resonate with her.”

Warren’s affinity for movie music goes back to her childhood, when as a little girl she was transported by songs like the theme for “Born Free.” Although she didn’t consciously set out to write songs for movies, she did attend film classes in college, almost as a fluke. “My dad would support me if I went to college, so I went to CSU for one or two years,” she said, remembering that she would sit in the back of the room writing songs while listening to lectures on film history and filmmaking. “Watching all those movies, maybe I did learn something in school. Who knows? I think I just love stories and love to get inspired by them.”

In spite of her success and accolades, Warren says she still feels as driven as that college student writing in the back of the classroom. “When I sit down to write, I still feel like I’ve never had a hit song,” she said. “My rearview mirror is cracked. I only see what’s ahead and I still have a lot to prove to myself, because I want to keep getting better. I want to write better songs. I worked for three hours yesterday just to get one line right. The rest of the song was easy, but that part just wasn’t. That’s why I keep writing songs. I want to get it right.”