Todd Haynes interview

[GaryAlan]

The Incredible Shrinking Star: Todd Haynes and the Case History of Karen Carpenter
Mary Desjardins
From: Camera Obscura
57 (Volume 19, Number 3), 2004
pp. 22-55

Todd Haynes and the Case History of Karen Carpenter
Mary Desjardins

Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (US, 1987)

Critics have consistently characterized the films of Todd Haynes within the terms of what B. Ruby Rich described in 1992 as the "new queer cinema"—films whose style displayed traces of "appropriation and pastiche, irony" and a social constructionist understanding of history. Not surprisingly, most of these critics, as well as Haynes himself, have sought analytical explanations for his directorial choices in relation to the generic (the woman's film, the star biopic), authorial (Douglas Sirk, Rainer Werner Fassbinder), and theoretical (theories of narrative, identification, repression) antecedents cited in his body of work. In other words, Haynes's authorship is constituted in the repetition of his particular citations of past forms. The ironic recontextualizations of these forms evidence a social constructionist historiography and assert Haynes's directorial agency as resistant to the norms of conventional cinematic representation and spectatorial identification.
This essay does not seek to overturn these models of authorship or those of the new queer cinema. It will examine the construction of Haynes's authority as it emerged from the material practices that produced and surrounded Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (US, 1987), a film biography cowritten with Cynthia Schneider of the singer Karen Carpenter, who died of anorexia nervosa in 1983 at age thirty-two. This forty-three-minute, 16mm film using dolls to enact the life of the 1970s singing star was not Haynes's first work, but it was the one that authorized him as a promising director of alternative cinema. Film festivals and critical reviews, in sites ranging from local city newspapers to Art forum and the Village Voice, served as the vehicles of Haynes's ascension as director. But his decision to shape the narrative around the placement of a number of Carpenters songs also resulted in a legal battle (lost by Haynes) with A & M Records and the Carpenter family over the question of who was authorized to represent Karen's life and her voice. Defining Haynes's emerging authority at this time only in the contexts of his trajectory to critical fame or of his legal troubles with Superstar, however, would prove insufficient in answering key questions about Haynes's authoring choices that produced a particular version of Karen Carpenter's life within its historical and cultural context. For that reason, this essay will explore the degree to which Superstar affirms and reproduces the norms of conventional cinematic representation and spectatorial identification—even as its citations of the woman's film and star biopic deploy irony, distanciation, and hybridization to question and critique those norms. A major contention of my article is that Haynes's self-conscious recontextualizations of generic conventions of the woman's film and the star biopic, as well as his infamous use of dolls, do not necessarily result in an escape from either the fantasy potentialities or epistemic foundations of those genres, which promise the recovery, the plentitude, of the biographical subject. The film's threat to A & M Records and the Carpenter family plausibly came as much from its forceful evocation of this desired plentitude (expressed through the voice) as from its parodic critique and the illegal soundtrack.
The generic, cultural, and historiographic work that Superstar performs, and the constraints in which it operates, are made clearer by comparing and contrasting the film not to one of its antecedents but to one of its successors, The Karen Carpenter Story (dir. Richard Carpenter and Joseph Sargent, US, 1989), the made-for-television movie authorized by the Carpenter family. It could be argued that the films should be discussed together if for no other reason than that the subsequent television movie offers the Carpenter family's version of Karen's life that was produced once Haynes's version had been legally silenced through their efforts. However, I argue that the films share remarkable similarities in their contexts as biopics: they were released during a period in which there was an explosion of media-produced biographies (and sometimes attendant controversies), and they share similar representational challenges.

 

[Jeff]

Chris May would Tod Haynes be on your list of interviewees? I think some perspective ...his anyway, could be quite fascinating.

Jeff

 

[MissK]

The Incredible Shrinking Star: Todd Haynes and the Case History of Karen Carpenter
Mary Desjardins
From: Camera Obscura
57 (Volume 19, Number 3), 2004
pp. 22-55

Todd Haynes and the Case History of Karen Carpenter
Mary Desjardins

Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (US, 1987)

Critics have consistently characterized the films of Todd Haynes within the terms of what B. Ruby Rich described in 1992 as the "new queer cinema"—films whose style displayed traces of "appropriation and pastiche, irony" and a social constructionist understanding of history. Not surprisingly, most of these critics, as well as Haynes himself, have sought analytical explanations for his directorial choices in relation to the generic (the woman's film, the star biopic), authorial (Douglas Sirk, Rainer Werner Fassbinder), and theoretical (theories of narrative, identification, repression) antecedents cited in his body of work. In other words, Haynes's authorship is constituted in the repetition of his particular citations of past forms. The ironic recontextualizations of these forms evidence a social constructionist historiography and assert Haynes's directorial agency as resistant to the norms of conventional cinematic representation and spectatorial identification.
This essay does not seek to overturn these models of authorship or those of the new queer cinema. It will examine the construction of Haynes's authority as it emerged from the material practices that produced and surrounded Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (US, 1987), a film biography cowritten with Cynthia Schneider of the singer Karen Carpenter, who died of anorexia nervosa in 1983 at age thirty-two. This forty-three-minute, 16mm film using dolls to enact the life of the 1970s singing star was not Haynes's first work, but it was the one that authorized him as a promising director of alternative cinema. Film festivals and critical reviews, in sites ranging from local city newspapers to Art forum and the Village Voice, served as the vehicles of Haynes's ascension as director. But his decision to shape the narrative around the placement of a number of Carpenters songs also resulted in a legal battle (lost by Haynes) with A & M Records and the Carpenter family over the question of who was authorized to represent Karen's life and her voice. Defining Haynes's emerging authority at this time only in the contexts of his trajectory to critical fame or of his legal troubles with Superstar, however, would prove insufficient in answering key questions about Haynes's authoring choices that produced a particular version of Karen Carpenter's life within its historical and cultural context. For that reason, this essay will explore the degree to which Superstar affirms and reproduces the norms of conventional cinematic representation and spectatorial identification—even as its citations of the woman's film and star biopic deploy irony, distanciation, and hybridization to question and critique those norms. A major contention of my article is that Haynes's self-conscious recontextualizations of generic conventions of the woman's film and the star biopic, as well as his infamous use of dolls, do not necessarily result in an escape from either the fantasy potentialities or epistemic foundations of those genres, which promise the recovery, the plentitude, of the biographical subject. The film's threat to A & M Records and the Carpenter family plausibly came as much from its forceful evocation of this desired plentitude (expressed through the voice) as from its parodic critique and the illegal soundtrack.
The generic, cultural, and historiographic work that Superstar performs, and the constraints in which it operates, are made clearer by comparing and contrasting the film not to one of its antecedents but to one of its successors, The Karen Carpenter Story (dir. Richard Carpenter and Joseph Sargent, US, 1989), the made-for-television movie authorized by the Carpenter family. It could be argued that the films should be discussed together if for no other reason than that the subsequent television movie offers the Carpenter family's version of Karen's life that was produced once Haynes's version had been legally silenced through their efforts. However, I argue that the films share remarkable similarities in their contexts as biopics: they were released during a period in which there was an explosion of media-produced biographies (and sometimes attendant controversies), and they share similar representational challenges.

Sorry, this article is nothing but pseudo-intellectual gobbledygook.

 

[GaryAlan]

Commentary duly noted, MissK !
The above is, of course, a synopsis of the entire thirty page article.
Therefore, I am unable to judge its merits (if any);also, I am unable to access the entire piece.
Be that as it may, you may be correct!
Needless to say, if the only authorized Biopic that is available remains the CBS-TV Movie, then that
is certainly not a complete portrayal of Karen Carpenter. Musically, yes.
But, keep in mind, both movies are very similar in their use of Carpenters' music. (Thus, the legal quash of Hayne's movie).
Also, again, I have not watched Hayne's movie.
I have watched the CBS Biopic.
And, it is littered with inaccuracies.
Perhaps the same with Haynes.

 

[Jeff]

The "secret" kept me on the edge of my seat....to no avail per se.

 

[GaryAlan]

Columbia University Press Blog:
"Amidst all of the creative uses of copyrighted material reused in video art, there is one well-known example of a piece of experimental video that was suppressed by copyright holders: Todd Haynes’s 1987 film Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story. In the film, Haynes used Barbie dolls to tell the life story of popular singer Karen Carpenter, who had died a few years earlier from complications of an eating disorder and abuse of medication. Carpenter’s family was sensitive to an exposé about her life, and her brother and collaborator, Richard, sent cease-and-desist letters to Haynes, complaining of music copyright infringement. Superstar used several complete Carpenter songs as well as segments of songs by Elton John, Gilbert O’Sullivan, and the Carpenters.
Accounts of the film’s legal troubles differ slightly. At one point Mattel sent Haynes material about its Barbie patents and trademarks, but the company never seems to have sent a formal cease-and-desist letter or brought any legal action. Haynes and his producer knew that music copyright would be stickier. They worried about the legal liability of using the songs on their soundtrack, and they initially attempted to secure permission for the use of the Carpenters’ music. When permission was refused, they discussed fair use with several lawyers. None, however, thought that the use of entire songs qualified as fair use. As Haynes tells the story now, he decided ultimately that he was making a film for a community in which permission was not necessary. Significantly, he learned his fair use lessons.
Haynes eventually released the film as an “unauthorized” biopic. Richard Carpenter allowed the film to be shown at festivals for several years, and he may very well have continued to allow Haynes to screen it for a small underground community. After the video began to achieve cult status, however, Richard Carpenter and the Carpenters’ music label, A&M, sent the cease-and-desist letters to Haynes, demanding that he curtail distribution of the film. Rather than go through an expensive trial, Haynes agreed. By that point, however, the film had a growing reputation and attempts to suppress it only made it more desirable and more popular as a bootleg. As censorship so often does, Richard Carpenter drew attention to the thing he wanted to conceal.
The fair use chapter of Haynes’s career continues to be exaggerated and misreported. Magazines and newspapers regularly refer to Haynes’s lawsuit, when he carefully avoided a lawsuit, and critics often blame Mattel for the suppression of the film rather than Richard Carpenter and A&M. In her widely read critique of corporate branding in the 1990s, No Logo, for example, journalist Naomi Klein cites Mattel’s legal action against Superstar as a classic example of growing corporate censorship. And in interviews, Haynes has confirmed that people often think that Mattel and not A&M placed legal pressure on him. Like Klein, media scholar Kembrew McLeod highlights Superstar’s legal troubles with both Mattel and A&M as typical of works whose suppression has chilled cultural production and exemplified the growing privatization of culture.
Superstar is a very rare instance from the 1980s and 1990s in which a work of experimental film and video has been suppressed by copyright law, even by a simple cease-and-desist letter. Through the circulation of a mythic story, avant-garde filmmakers internalized the permission culture growing around them."

Source:
http://www.cupblog.org/?p=5960

 

[newvillefan]

Haynes eventually released the film as an “unauthorized” biopic. Richard Carpenter allowed the film to be shown at festivals for several years, and he may very well have continued to allow Haynes to screen it for a small underground community. After the video began to achieve cult status, however, Richard Carpenter and the Carpenters’ music label, A&M, sent the cease-and-desist letters to Haynes, demanding that he curtail distribution of the film. Rather than go through an expensive trial, Haynes agreed. By that point, however, the film had a growing reputation and attempts to suppress it only made it more desirable and more popular as a bootleg. As censorship so often does, Richard Carpenter drew attention to the thing he wanted to conceal.."

Richard and A&M shot themselves in the foot here. By trying to surpress it, they gave it even more of an iconic status, instead of leaving it alone to die a natural death. It's dreadful.

 

[Chris May]

Chris May would Tod Haynes be on your list of interviewees? I think some perspective ...his anyway, could be quite fascinating.

Jeff

I'm sure he would be a great interview! Incidentally I put the show on hold immediately following my interview with John Bettis, as a new marriage (November 7th to be exact) and a lot of writing (arranging/orchestrating) for Christmas took a bulk of my time. Still trying to figure out what the next project will be in terms of the radio gig

 

[Jeff]

Congratulations Chris! I saw some beautiful pics of the blessed event. Many years of health and happiness to you and your lovely bride!

Jeff

 

[Chris May]

Congratulations Chris! I saw some beautiful pics of the blessed event. Many years of health and happiness to you and your lovely bride!

Jeff

Thanks Jeff!! It was definitely a crazy and busy year - music directing, a new marriage, a radio show etc but certainly a productive one!

 

[Guitarmutt]

Congratulations Chris. May 2015 be a wonderful year for you!

 

[Chris May]

Congratulations Chris. May 2015 be a wonderful year for you!

Well thank you!

 

[GaryAlan]

Banned in 1990, 'Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story'
Lives On in Bootlegs and a UCI Prof's Book
By Matt Coker Thursday, Aug 20 2009
Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, a 43-minute video first distributed in 1987 that you are not supposed to see, although plenty of people and more still do. A settlement between filmmaker Todd Haynes and Karen’s brother and performing partner Richard Carpenter over the unauthorized use of the Carpenters’ music in the experimental video has criminalized Superstar’s sale and distribution since 1990. But bootleg copies still circulate, you can watch it for free right now on the Internet; its easy availability allowed Entertainment Weekly to have no qualms placing Superstar at No. 45 on the “Top 50 Cult Films of All-Time.”
The documentary about anorexia nervosa and female body issues within a proto-Behind the Musichas been a women’s-studies favorite for years. Superstar’s unusual storytelling devices, no-budget resourcefulness and outlaw status helped launch Haynes’ Hollywood career and made bootleg videos must-sees for film majors—even in these days of DVDs, Blu-ray and YouTube. The video has been written about in books about forbidden cinema, food in film and, of course, the same-titledSuperstar: The Karen Carpenter Story by Glasgow School of Art lecturer Glyn Davis.
It also inspired the new book Inherent Vice: Bootleg Histories of Videotape and Copyright by Lucas Hilderbrand. It occurred to the assistant professor of Film and Media Studies at UC Irvine that all the issues raised by Superstar could be addressed separately in a book exploring the aesthetic and legal innovations of analog home video. Sure enough, Inherent Vice’s “Grainy Days and Mondays: Superstar and Bootleg Aesthetics” chapter touches on all the issues found elsewhere in the 320-page book: copyright, fair use, aesthetics, degradation and distribution—illegal and otherwise.
“The whole book project came out of that close case study of Superstar,” Hilderbrand says. “It inspired my thinking in all those directions, but it is also a pretty singular case. There are other films that have been banned that have found followings, or other works that have had cult communities emerge through tape circulation, such as Heavy Metal Parking Lot. The perfectness and singularity of Superstar made it difficult to find comparable case studies, so I decided to find instances that were radically different to suggest a range of possible models.”
Inherent Vice was several years in the making, with Hilderbrand’s research taking him to New York, Nashville and immigrant-owned video shops throughout Orange County.
Critics dismissed the music by the Carpenter siblings as too sugary-sweet at a time when the Beatles were imploding, hard rock had drowned out the groovy sounds of the ’60s, and disco and punk were just around the corner. But the Carpenters were the biggest-selling group of the 1970s, with 10 singles that would eventually become million-sellers. As such hits as “(They Long to Be) Close to You,” “We’ve Only Just Begun” and “Superstar” piled up, Karen was lured away from her drum kit and persuaded to stand at a microphone at center stage while someone else kept the beat. Her reluctance to front the act, a lack of influence in selecting what she would sing, and the strict demands of Richard and their parents have been widely reported as contributing to her feeling she had little control of her life.
Many speculate that Richard took legal action against Superstar not because of the unauthorized use of the Carpenters’ music (despite what the language in the lawsuit says), but because he was angered over the ugly portrayal of his family and the intimations about his personal life. A year before the Superstar settlement was reached in 1990, CBS aired the made-for-TV movie The Karen Carpenter Story, which boasted having Richard as executive producer and contributor of an original song, “Karen’s Theme.” But when later asked on a fan site if he was pleased with the TV movie, Richard replied, “Heavens no, I was not pleased. It’s not a good film. One of the biggest mistakes I ever made was agreeing to cooperate in the making of it.” He has been fiercely wary of film and documentary projects about the Carpenters ever since.
......" much of Superstar’s appeal to “its forbiddenness, or at least, that’s the allure before people see it. But it’s pretty rare among cult films in that it’s actually a great film, and it always seems to hold up and live up to the hype. I’ve never shown it or loaned it out without the viewers totally loving it.”


Entire Article (six pages) Here:
http://www.ocweekly.com/2009-08-20/news/superstar-karen-carpenter-lucas-hilderbrand-irvine-youtube/

 

[Chris Mills]

If nothing else, Todd's film was an interesting way to tell a story, wether that story factual or not......would love to know what Karen thinks about it.

 

[Geographer]

But it’s pretty rare among cult films in that it’s actually a great film, and it always seems to hold up and live up to the hype.

And this, my friends, is exactly what is wrong with higher education today. And what are parents spending on tuition at UCI?

 

[GaryAlan]

And what are parents spending on tuition at UCI?

Forbes:
University of California, Irvine
At a Glance

• Student Population: 27,479
• Undergraduate Population: 22,216
• Student to Faculty Ratioa: 19
• Total Annual Costc: $53,382
• In-State Tuitionc: $13,149
• Out-of-State Tuitionc: $36,027

 

[GaryAlan]

Off-Topic, brief reply to:
(Geographer) "...what is wrong with education today " (?)

Some one who had begun to read geometry with Euclid (circa. 300 BC),
when he had learnt the first theorem,
asked Euclid,
"What shall I get by learning these things?"
Euclid called his slave and said,
"Give him threepence, since he must make gain out of what he learns."

Serenus, quoted by Stobaeus, Florilegium, ed. A. Meineke, Vol. IV (Leipzig: Teubner, 1857),
tr. by Sir Thomas Heath, A History of Greek Mathematics, Vol. I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1921;

 

[Don Malcolm]

As always, great research, Gary. You're always coming up with interesting material to keep the discussion flowing!

Late to it, but heartiest congratulations and best wishes to Chris May in "taking the plunge" into connubial bliss. I wonder if you guys played a certain Carpenters song at the reception??

I think it would fascinating to talk with Todd Haynes at this time--so many years after making the film. I do hope that he would have found a way to be more sympathetic to Richard. The "frenzy of renown" clearly takes its toll in many ways, and while Karen was victimized by it as badly as it's possible to be, Richard hasn't been spared its sting, either. Those types of reflections from the filmmaker would be miost interesting to read.

 

[Mike Blakesley]

Incidentally I put the show on hold immediately following my interview with John Bettis, as a new marriage (November 7th to be exact) and a lot of writing (arranging/orchestrating) for Christmas took a bulk of my time. Still trying to figure out what the next project will be in terms of the radio gig

I'm glad I happened upon this note...I was wondering why there were no newer episodes! Congratulations on all the great happenings in your life, Chris, and I'm sure you're looking forward to whatever comes next. (Kids maybe!)

 

[Nikifor Blavatsky]

For the life of me, I do not see why this "amateurish" and "ridiculous" (both great adjectives, btw) film gets so much attention. Even the animation is awful. I think it is because it plays to the "myth" that Richard and Agnes are/were evil and that is why Karen died. It's an incredibly intellectually lazy telling of Karen's life. But to some, it's the ONLY explanation no matter what the real truth is.

No. It is marvellous.

 

[mr J.]

For the life of me, I do not see why this "amateurish" and "ridiculous" (both great adjectives, btw) film gets so much attention. Even the animation is awful. I think it is because it plays to the "myth" that Richard and Agnes are/were evil and that is why Karen died. It's an incredibly intellectually lazy telling of Karen's life. But to some, it's the ONLY explanation no matter what the real truth is.

Well said,Geographer. I've never seen this film-and never wanted to.But,from the information that I have on it,I'm surprised it's getting any media attention today-considering that the film is full of fictionalized scenes and innuendo.Todd Haynes was evidently trying to push an agenda.

I seen it. It's terrible! I can't believe that it garners this much attention. People really think this is an actual representation of what really happened? Are you kidding me? It's a lame attempt to dramatize the shallow negative stereotypes surrounding Karen's death serves only to perpetuate the myth that the family "killed" Karen. To be taken as a serious, quality dramatization of the events is completely rediculous. I'm surprised Richard and his legal team even dignified this amatuerish effort with a response.

Richard's response was a copyright infringement lawsuit-which he won in 1990.Distribution and public exhibition of the film has been banned since then.

 

[mr J.]

I will attempt to locate the journal article which compares and contrasts the two extant Biopics.
(Someone 'out there' actually did academic research , and published, on the topic!).
I only recall one line of the journal article. saying: There were more truths to the Haynes movie than the Official CBS movie.
Keep in mind, I have never watched the Haynes Movie--simply no desire to do so.
Of course, I watched the CBS movie upon its first airing--I enjoyed the music, that's about it.
Family dynamics being what they are, I would never venture into those muddy waters.
Career-wise, however, events which surrounded the duo are a bit easier to ascertain, though, still ambiguous.
As for Album Made In America, Fan Club Newsletters clearly describe that Richard Carpenter had to decline
three separate pressings before he settled upon one, mentioning two other technical problems which held up production,
(Newsletter#70, June 1981); thus, there were problems sonically with the album. It is described in the newsletter.

The problems with the MIA pressings in early 1981 weren't sonic-it was the quality of the vinyl LP.

In the early 80's,record labels were switching to less-expensive lightweight flexible vinyl LP's,which were made with mostly recycled vinyl-as opposed to earlier vinyl LP's that were pressed from thicker "virgin" vinyl.

The sound quality of the light flexible vinyl LP's obviously wasn't as good-and that was the issue that Richard had with the early MIA test pressings.

 

[GaryAlan]

From Carpenters Reader, 2012, pages 283-284:
Interview with Haynes,
"...I think sometimes style preceded purpose and content. We need to know why we're looking at the past, and what
we are trying to learn from it, and ultimately how it is informing the present."
"...Superstar...a scripted pseudo-documentary... a different example of so-called truths, that you, as a viewer, have to
weigh against each other....The Carpenters provided a perfect dialectic, almost a before and after--a purity (before) and despair (after)."
"Karen Carpenters' voice...gets all the more beautiful...You listen to it, and you can't stop."
And, this:
The best films you can't see (2002)
So why do so many shorts get into trouble? "For a short film to get shown, it has to go really far to get special attention," explains Christine Vachon, the renowned producer of Haynes's films who helped him with Superstar and gets a special thank-you on the film. "Superstar was clever, well-done, and provocative in a way you were going to remember. You can't deny that Todd has tremendous compassion for Karen Carpenter in the film, and Richard Carpenter jumped to the conclusion that the movie was making fun of his sister when it wasn't."
Haynes had, says Vachon, "no idea" that he would incur the Carpenter family's wrath when he crafted his labor of love over two summers at college. Nor did he realize that Superstar would bring him his first taste of global fame. "The film has legendary status," adds Vachon.
And:
Since being banished from release, Haynes’ film can only be viewed via bootleg videos. But in a way, “Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story” is the ultimate bootleg must-have. Its “banned” status has given it a level of notoriety that none of Haynes’ subsequent films ever enjoyed. People want to see this film because they’re technically not supposed to see it. The retro interest in the Carpenters has also helped dramatically. By (sic.) 1983 , Karen Carpenter’s star had seriously waned, and even by the time Haynes first showed his film the Carpenters were viewed as 70s kitsch. Yet for better or worse, a belated revived interest in the duo’s music has deified Karen Carpenter with other doomed pop and rock icons who willfully destroyed their bodies and spirit when the pressures of stardom proved too heavy to burden.
Read more: http://www.filmthreat.com/features/840/

 

[GaryAlan]

Quoted from Haynes, Interview 2004---
(Book ,Chapter One pp.3-16, The Misery The World is Made Of, 2013 Rob White, University of Illinois Press):
" ....Haynes' explained Superstar as a challenge to this vague orthodoxy--'We wanted to redeem Karen
Carpenter's image and felt that she was a victim of not only an eating disorder, but an incredibly...invasive
family drama...Even (after her passing) she was still being controlled by her family, And, it just seemed like
there was no escape, and we wanted to do our little movie out of our desire to make you cry for Karen."

Source:
http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/75rrn8xx9780252037566.html

 

[GaryAlan]

And, More:
http://stylusmagazine.com/articles/a_kiss_after_supper/superstar-the-karen-carpenter-story.htm
"Superstar is a case in point. Counter to the no-fi aesthetic found by Haynes’ use of Barbie Dolls as the principal actors, Superstar’s score plays out with a crisp and clean delirium. The music provides the tragic backbone for Karen Carpenter’s fall into anorexia nervosa. And, because of the movie’s reliance on The Carpenter’s music, coupled with the unflattering portrayal of Richard Carpenter, you’ll never be able to rent it from Blockbuster. While Superstar opened to considerable attention on the film festival circuit when released in 1987, Richard Carpenter blocked the distribution of the movie—on the non-copyright usage of the Carpenter's songs. As such, the movie’s innovative use of music was also its demise.
A dramatization of The Carpenters’ fall sounds like the makings of a TV movie, but Haynes uses the story as an incisive launch-point to engage in serious issues of body image within contemporary society. The whimsical and kitschy songs of The Carpenters provides a surprisingly appropriate complement to the movie’s selection of images. Like the faces of Barbie Dolls, the blank messages of The Carpenters’ songs are given a new voice. While not apparent at first, Haynes finds a power in his take on Brecht’s alienation effect. The Carpenter’s music not only provides a strange document of the pair’s private struggles in Superstar, but also appears to openly contradict it. The viewer is instead forced to evaluate the words of the music, given the torrent of internalized images. It’s within this constant barrage of imagery, based less on upholding the illusion of reality, that The Carpenter’s music can finally be displayed as more than radio fodder.
Haynes balances in both fictional and documentary styles as he engages in body image issues, mixing Barbie re-enactments with footage of news events surrounding The Carpenters’ story. Included is the crowning of Miss America of 1970, Pam Eklred. While used as a primer before The Carpenter’s popularity in the film, the nod plays as a nice joke when used as an introduction for “Close to You” sequence within Superstar. The use of Eldred’s image posits mayhem associated with body image as the beauty queen had to be evacuated to safety while entertaining soldiers (an event commemorated in Apocalypse Now). When placed together with “Close to You”, the song’s innocent romantic notions of love and attraction are re-worked. Haynes gives physicality to these emotions, forcing The Carpenter’s music to be evaluated in terms of how these emotions play out within society.
This parallel between “Close to You” and society continues with the montage of the song. While the song’s idyllic lyrics sound out of place during any period of time, the song’s montage appropriately follows The Carpenter’s rise to fame. Haynes pairs the prototypical ���success’ shots with footage of Cambodian bombing missions. The effect is chilling. Against the banal lyrics of “Sprinkled moon dust in your hair of gold / And starlight in your eyes of blue”, and a plodding piano line, Haynes uses a Bruce Connor music-image associative technique to give the mish-mash of Barbies and Vietnam a dizzying effect. Rather than sweet delicate nothings, Karen’s voice sounds bare and disturbingly calm. Introduced as a “smooth-voiced girl from Downey, California, who lead a raucous nation smoothly into the Seventies", her deep alto twists the words from their innocuous origins into a deeply satirical context when juxtaposed against America’s divide on Vietnam.
Haynes uses a similar device for his visual rendering of “On Top of the World”. Beginning with a rotating world, and graphically matched onto a disco ball, the song’s buoyant thrust quickly dissipates into a barrage of Ex-Lax, salads and ice tea. Mimicking Superstar’s narration, describing an anorexic’s “reward or high which accompanies and rewards her denial of food”, “On Top of the World” is transformed from an iconography of the fleeting into the profoundly disturbing. Like the repeated shot of Karen stepping onto a scale, marking her fall into anorexia, the song’s whimsical love is materialized into a confronting assessment, the music becoming an expression of the disease’s complicated nature.
With each musical sequence, Haynes strengthens the idea that The Carpenters music carries layers of irony, with overly produced and manufactured sound becoming a metaphor for the misunderstandings of Karen’s family toward her troubles. With every gleeful and hopeful tinkering piano melody throughSuperstar, Karen Carpenter’s deep voice sounds further and further out of place. Songs like “Rainy Days and Mondays” and “This Masquerade” cement this concept, with melancholy vocals that are only glossed over in the musical arrangements, culminating in Karen’s cardiac arrest. As the stew of Carpenter’s songs blur together, the layered sullen wails of Karen are set against a barrage of insipid minor melodies.
Superstar challenges the reading of The Carpenter’s music. For the criticisms of The Carpenters, (such as using a manipulatively smooth sound—noted by a music critic midway through the movie), Haynes provides enough compassion for Karen Carpenter to complicate superficial readings. In her sultry and deep voice, Haynes re-imagines the romantic tales of Karen. Instilling an irony into songs that carry no literal weight, Superstar reinvigorates The Carpenter’s music, which is no small feat. "