Cartoon Brew Pick: ‘Is That All There Is?’ By Josh O’Caoimh

If there’s a go-to song for times of personal or global stress, it has to be Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller’s haunting “Is That All There Is?,” memorably performed by Peggy Lee in the late 1960s and here reimagined by Irish singer Mary Coughlan.

The lyrics recount house fires, circus spectacles, love’s triumphs and losses, and the ever-present specter of mortality. Josh O’Caoimh’s mixed-media music video captures these vivid vignettes — and the bittersweet tension they evoke. His serene landscapes and intimate framings convey an aching isolation that doesn’t beckon despair, but instead invites us to drink, dance, and make the very most of this unpredictable ride.

Coughlan lives just up the road from O’Caoimh in Wicklow, Ireland, and generously brought him on board her ambitious Mirrors project — a full reimagining of Peggy Lee’s 1975 Leiber & Stoller album. “Early on, Mary shared pages of notes for each track and the context behind them,” O’Caoimh told Cartoon Brew. “I made animatics for both ‘The Case of M.J.’ and ‘Is That All There Is?’ before committing fully to the latter.

Further notes from the filmmaker on the production:

The music video features three animation techniques: traditional hand-drawn animation (TVPaint) over oil-pastel backgrounds, digital 3d animation (Blender), and rotoscope. It felt natural to use a separate style for the monologue segments, but I only embraced 3d later in production after being satisfied with early tests. Visually, I was deeply inspired by Edward Hopper’s work — his paintings often depict isolated figures lost in thought. When storyboarding, I’d thumbnail compositions and see how they paired with Mary asking the question: ‘Is that all there is?’

O’Caoimh is an Irish animation filmmaker and a graduate of the National Film School at the Dún Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology (IADT). His previous film, The Fall of the Ibis King, premiered at the 78th Venice International Film Festival, qualified for consideration at the 2023 Academy Awards, and won best animation at the Irish Film & Television Awards.