Florence Foster Jenkins | Stephen Frears | August 12, 2016
Florence Foster Jenkins isn’t your normal inspirational story. The new film from Stephen Frears is about the true story of Florence Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep), a popular New York heiress and socialite, who somehow manages to sell out a performance at Carnegie Hall, despite the fact that she is actually a horrible opera singer. Frears’ picture is half comedy/half inspirational tale, although there’s no miracles at work with Jenkins’ singing pipes. She doesn’t miraculously become a good opera singer over night, despite her wishes, but the story is about her determination to do what she loved, proof that sometimes having a passion for something can win out over talent.
We’re so used to stories about underdogs who take on the impossible and somehow overcome to odds to miraculously prove all the naysayers wrong. Then there’s Florence Foster Jenkins. When we meet her early on during 1940s Manhattan, she’s putting on performances to her friends and supporters, most of whom had been paid to show up and support her in droves by her husband St. Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant). He pays people to show up and act enthusiastically during her performances, and pays off critics handsomely in order to keep up the illusion to Florence that she is truly a talented singer – all this while returning to his Brooklyn home to his mistress Kathleen (Rebecca Ferguson).
What starts out as a harmless way to keep Florence happy ends up spinning out of control. With the addition of struggling pianist Cosmé McMoon (Simon Helberg), Florence starts to play more shows, and although some audience members are wise about the charade that Bayfield is spinning, one of her recordings ends up making it to the radio and finds an odd bit of success on the air, especially with the troops. To the horror of seemingly everyone but Florence, she ends up selling out Carnegie Hall (faster than even Sinatra).
Although about Jenkins, a great deal of emphasis is spent following Bayfield, and his struggle to share his time between Kathleen, as well as Florence, who he does love, but is unable to partake in a sex life with after her first husband left her with syphilis. He gets in way too deep while pushing Florence’s opera career, and by the time she’s on the Carnege Hall stage, there isn’t any web left for him to spin. McMoon’s arrival adds a new element to the entire project, as he is completely befuddled by how bad Jenkins’ singing voice is, and is embarrassed to be seen sharing the same stage as her during performances, but he’s getting paid too handsomely to argue. What matters more, musical authenticity, or being able to pay your rent?
Upon our introduction to Florence, Nicholas Martin’s script portrays her poor singing voice as something to laugh about. But later on we are made to feel sympathetic towards her and asked to admire her for her willingness to get up on the stage and to perform out of love for music. It’s a mixed message and the tone of the film feels unbalanced as a result, but Frears’ charming direction swayed me as we arrived closer to the stories conclusion.
Of course, the always magical Meryl Streep remains great as Florence, pulling as much depth as you could ask from this character, treading a fine line of comedy and tragedy. Streep is actually a very talented singer (see Into The Woods and Ricki and the Flash), and of course finds a way to be good at consistently singing bad here. Meanwhile, Hugh Grant is up to the task in charismatic fashion as Bayfield, in one of his best performances during the 2nd half of his career. Hopefully we can get more performances like this from Grant 2.0, who deserves a McConaughey-level career renaissance. Then there’s the breakthrough performance of Simon Helberg, best known as a part of The Big Bang Theory, he offers a hilarious breakthrough performance that will hopefully land him some more prominent future roles in Hollywood.
Florence Foster Jenkins isn’t a story that will change the game, but you can’t help but be won over by the delightful performances and the sheer heart of it all.
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