It's a difficult and serious question without doubt.
I can't comment on the MJ film; not my thing. Adjacently, though, I consider that Richard Wagner wrote some of the most sublimely beautiful music in existence, but he's not somebody I'd invite over for dinner.
That is a difficult question that can’t be generalized. We internalize people we don’t know but admire as if they were dear friends - and when they disappoint, it is hard to bear, let alone reconcile with our image of them.
Does artist = art? is the question I think about a lot! My favorite book on this subject is Claire Dederer's Monsters. Among the musicians she discusses are Wagner and Miles Davis, but all examples from other arts help understand something about this. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/589194/monsters-by-claire-dederer/
A fascinating article on an important theme, which I expect will be with us for quite some time. There's one other dimension to the fan dilemma that I have thought about. The kind of adjacent fan - the person who loves the music but knows/cares very little about the creator(s). My dad was this kind of a person; he lived in San Francisco and saw all the greatest jazz musicians perform there, and even hung out and had drinks with some of them, but fundamentally knew nothing about their lives. I have a similar relationship with the music of Earth, Wind, and Fire. I love their music, but know nothing about them as people or a band. To that fan, to have a scandal emerge is like having a submarine surface out of nowhere. You weren't worshipping them, you weren't pinning their music onto their biographical narrative, you weren't hanging on their lyrics because often they had none. The submarine is simply a killjoy, and while I'm not condoning it, I can understand why the adjacent fan might prefer to pretend it wasn't there; they haven't lost a hero, but have gained a possible villain.
There is a lot to think about and unpick here in terms of our expectations as listeners (which I have to think more about and maybe come back to) but to focus purely on the idea of biopics for a second, there are very few artistically successful films that present the lives of creative people as pageants. Hurdles are cleared, achievements are registered (usually against the grain of popular and / or critical opinion) and hearts are won leading ultimately to validation, though often in the face of personal tragedy. Predictable star-vehicle exercises in impersonation for the most part that tell us very little.
The films in this genre that really work for me tend to focus more on process, on the smaller biographical details and the inner workings of the creative mind. Which is why I think the recent Springsteen film will only grow in terms of reputation (especially when compared side to side with A Complete Unknown) and, in a decade or so, people will claim to have loved it at first sight and that they consider it a small masterpiece. Which is obviously not how it has been received.
Ditto perhaps the Bob Marley movie from a couple of years back which also at least tries to let some of the contradictions and personality / behavioural failings show through the stuff of legend and myth.
There are pageant music movies that do work, off the top of my head "The Buddy Holly Story" for one "The Runaways" for two, but, outside of music, the greatest arts related biopics of them all are to my mind John Maybury's woozy and impressionistic "Love Is The Devil" and Peter Watkins' docu-style "Edvard Munch" from the mid 70s. Perhaps we need more of that kind of intricacy and warts n all intimacy when telling our musician stories.
It is also worth bearing in mind that representing the lives of performers in film is always going to be a hard task. The recent Elvis concert film tells us more about the man than any number of biopics could and this from a director who has taken a run at both approached. Sometimes we might just let the music and musician speak for themselves, forget the ventriloquism, and leave the study of those great lives to the realm of closely researched biography presented over hundreds of pages rather than via a couple of hours of celluloid.
Completely agree - musical biography is difficult at the best of times (how does one speak about music??), but especially complicated by the fact that as you say, the biography/biopic is in itself a piece of art that is created with artistic considerations in mind. I also love the warts and all depictions that are focused on process and allow more depth, really getting into what creative lives are in all their complexity - but I also understand why they're not the most commercial option...
Totally get that. There were many times when reading Quartet when I was simultaneously casting the film / tv drama of these composers' lives but they always seemed to come out akin to something like the BBC "Howard's End" meets "Their Finest". It's all much richer on the page and with the actual music for reference. Painters / visual artists are perhaps that bit easier to do justice to in the movies and the art itself offers various frames of visual reference that are far less tangible in music.
It's a difficult and serious question without doubt.
I can't comment on the MJ film; not my thing. Adjacently, though, I consider that Richard Wagner wrote some of the most sublimely beautiful music in existence, but he's not somebody I'd invite over for dinner.
That is a difficult question that can’t be generalized. We internalize people we don’t know but admire as if they were dear friends - and when they disappoint, it is hard to bear, let alone reconcile with our image of them.
This made me think really hard about my connection to musical artists. This hit really close to home for me!!
Does artist = art? is the question I think about a lot! My favorite book on this subject is Claire Dederer's Monsters. Among the musicians she discusses are Wagner and Miles Davis, but all examples from other arts help understand something about this. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/589194/monsters-by-claire-dederer/
A fascinating article on an important theme, which I expect will be with us for quite some time. There's one other dimension to the fan dilemma that I have thought about. The kind of adjacent fan - the person who loves the music but knows/cares very little about the creator(s). My dad was this kind of a person; he lived in San Francisco and saw all the greatest jazz musicians perform there, and even hung out and had drinks with some of them, but fundamentally knew nothing about their lives. I have a similar relationship with the music of Earth, Wind, and Fire. I love their music, but know nothing about them as people or a band. To that fan, to have a scandal emerge is like having a submarine surface out of nowhere. You weren't worshipping them, you weren't pinning their music onto their biographical narrative, you weren't hanging on their lyrics because often they had none. The submarine is simply a killjoy, and while I'm not condoning it, I can understand why the adjacent fan might prefer to pretend it wasn't there; they haven't lost a hero, but have gained a possible villain.
There is a lot to think about and unpick here in terms of our expectations as listeners (which I have to think more about and maybe come back to) but to focus purely on the idea of biopics for a second, there are very few artistically successful films that present the lives of creative people as pageants. Hurdles are cleared, achievements are registered (usually against the grain of popular and / or critical opinion) and hearts are won leading ultimately to validation, though often in the face of personal tragedy. Predictable star-vehicle exercises in impersonation for the most part that tell us very little.
The films in this genre that really work for me tend to focus more on process, on the smaller biographical details and the inner workings of the creative mind. Which is why I think the recent Springsteen film will only grow in terms of reputation (especially when compared side to side with A Complete Unknown) and, in a decade or so, people will claim to have loved it at first sight and that they consider it a small masterpiece. Which is obviously not how it has been received.
Ditto perhaps the Bob Marley movie from a couple of years back which also at least tries to let some of the contradictions and personality / behavioural failings show through the stuff of legend and myth.
There are pageant music movies that do work, off the top of my head "The Buddy Holly Story" for one "The Runaways" for two, but, outside of music, the greatest arts related biopics of them all are to my mind John Maybury's woozy and impressionistic "Love Is The Devil" and Peter Watkins' docu-style "Edvard Munch" from the mid 70s. Perhaps we need more of that kind of intricacy and warts n all intimacy when telling our musician stories.
It is also worth bearing in mind that representing the lives of performers in film is always going to be a hard task. The recent Elvis concert film tells us more about the man than any number of biopics could and this from a director who has taken a run at both approached. Sometimes we might just let the music and musician speak for themselves, forget the ventriloquism, and leave the study of those great lives to the realm of closely researched biography presented over hundreds of pages rather than via a couple of hours of celluloid.
Completely agree - musical biography is difficult at the best of times (how does one speak about music??), but especially complicated by the fact that as you say, the biography/biopic is in itself a piece of art that is created with artistic considerations in mind. I also love the warts and all depictions that are focused on process and allow more depth, really getting into what creative lives are in all their complexity - but I also understand why they're not the most commercial option...
Totally get that. There were many times when reading Quartet when I was simultaneously casting the film / tv drama of these composers' lives but they always seemed to come out akin to something like the BBC "Howard's End" meets "Their Finest". It's all much richer on the page and with the actual music for reference. Painters / visual artists are perhaps that bit easier to do justice to in the movies and the art itself offers various frames of visual reference that are far less tangible in music.
Very strong article, that i'll be mulling over for a while. Thank you.