The real Florence Foster Jenkins is a pretty fascinating figure, and the movie does a good job turning her overall tragic story into a feel-good PG-13 comedy that should play well with an older demo. When she presses a record intended for private distribution, copies of the recording get out, leading to airtime on the city’s classical radio stations and eventually a sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall.
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“I think that there’s a very human quality and I think there’s nearly nothing more human than failure”, he said.
The Los Angeles Times described Jenkins’ performance as the “most pathetic exhibition of vanity” ever seen.
And it’s a credit to Streep and to filmmaker Stephen Frears (Dangerous Liaisons, The Queen) that you will laugh at the absurdity of Jenkins’ situation – but never at the lady herself.
Along with the hilarity, there’s a deep vein of tragedy that runs through Florence Foster Jenkins. To support her passion for singing, Bayfield assembles a team that includes a well-paid top vocal coach and hires Cosme McMoon (a hilarious Helberg), a pianist who is completely caught off-guard by her flagrant lack of talent.
If the too-strange-to-be-made-up film telling of Florence Foster Jenkins’ life isn’t quite as good as its pedigree, it’s certainly not the fault of Meryl Streep.
Florence Foster Jenkins was born in 1868, the daughter of a wealthy family who was a child prodigy on the piano and performed for President Rutherford B. Hayes. But can St. Clair protect his sweetly naive wife from a dose of reality administered by New York Post columnist Earl Wilson (Christian McKay)?
Frears, working from a script by Nicholas Martin, asks questions but doesn’t go to a lot of effort to answer them. As one of her mocking yet devoted fans insists: “The lady is a lesson in courage, and that’s why we love her“. It’s hopeful”, she stressed, “even if you hear her breathing wrong.
The lowdown: A wealthy socialite with a bad voice believes she can sing opera. At the same time she’s dying of syphilis and St. Clair wants her to fulfill her dream of singing professionally, so he enables her and makes sure everyone around them does the same.
The Suffragette star has had many Valentino moments that have caused us to stop and take notice, including this black and white number she donned a year ago.
“Throughout my life, whenever I thought I’m dancing welI, I’m not.” he said. The truth is, you have no idea what was going on in her head. That said, there is plenty to learn from listening to Jenkins’ singing, namely that “you can’t just emote your way through”. Grant hits all the beats of a man torn between sheltering the woman he dotes on and living a second, less performative life.
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That about sums up Jenkins, who in the 1940’s performed hard operatic arias with ear piercing renditions in front of friends and specially selected audience members who would never let on that she can’t quite, to be charitable, hit the right notes.
