Gus Van Sant’s Warhol Musical ‘Andy’ Surprise But Not Miracle


LISBON — Gus Van Sant is no stranger to experimental biographies: “Last daysKurt Cobain’s lyrical, almost dialogue-free meditation on the end of his life eschewed any tradition of the genre. Nevertheless, his first stage performance “Andy” inspired by Andy Warhol had its world premiere in Istanbul. Teatro Nacional D. Maria II This week in Lisbon may be Van Sant’s weirdest tribute to date.

For starters, it’s a musical. Warhol duets with the modernist art critic Clement Greenberg; Valerie Solanas sings inside the Factory with a gun in hand before she opens fire.

It’s a bold choice for a first-time theatrical film director, and 69-year-old Van Sant didn’t just contribute to the script. He is also listed as the stage designer and composer of “Andy”. (Paulo Furtado, a Portuguese musician who went through the legendary Tigerman, is known for the “musical direction” as well as the arrangement of most numbers.)

While “Andy” is an unexpected result, Van Sant has had a Warhol project for over three decades. In the late 1980s, he developed the scenario With Paul Bartel for Universal Pictures, in hopes of getting actor River Phoenix to play the lead role. The project was shelved after Phoenix died in 1993.

The invitation to return to the theater came from Lisbon’s artistic director, John Romão. Contemporary Arts Biennial (BoCA) continues until mid-October. While “Andy” is made entirely in English, the cast and crew are all Portuguese. After the first run ends in Portugal, “Andy” will tour Europe and stand in first place. Rome and Amsterdam.

Some tweaks can improve “Andy,” but let’s start with the obvious: Creating musicals is a craft. It would be a miracle to produce a good one on the first try. Even though the Virgin Mary takes the stage and jokes with Warhol, “Andy” is not a miracle.

While Van Sant has spent most of his film career circumventing the Hollywood rulebook, his approach here is relatively cautious. “Andy” has a clear narrative covering 1959 to 1967 and expected musical numbers for both soloists and small ensembles. There’s even an attempt at choreography in an early scene, though the band’s hip moves are less subtle when Warhol’s homosexuality is mentioned.

However, the relative conventionality of “Andy” reveals Van Sant’s inexperience with live performance syntax. The ins and outs give it away early. Designing believable transitions is a fundamental riddle of the theater, and “Andy” is a ripple as actors come and go uneasily.

Warhol is also a paradoxical subject for a musical. Songs have a way of revealing the spirit of a character, but it has been difficult even for scholars to parse out Warhol’s deliberately enigmatic personality. On stage, the transformation from the bespectacled, painfully shy Andrew Warhola to the high priest of Pop Art, wearing a bow tie and following Truman Capote, produces something like a whip. All of a sudden, The Factory becomes a hollow shell that treats its collaborators—including Edie Sedgwick—without sheer.

From this point on, Van Sant’s songs shy away from exploring his inner life, focusing instead on artistic controversies and one-off events like the shooting of Solanas. Musically, they’re pretty balanced and straight, lacking the tunes that could carry the action; perhaps an injection of the Velvet Underground, the band Warhol once directed, would have helped.

Surprisingly, the book also gives Warhol fairly little representation in his own career. The idea of ​​the soup can series belongs to his mother. Gerard Malanga Warhol’s only lover to appear on the show gives him makeup that allows him to match the New York underground scene. He is later portrayed as unlucky in the job of running the Factory.

Some scenes and lines are written by Warhol and Sedgwick.Merv Griffin ShowIn others, the characters fall victim to Van Sant’s clumsy expository dialogue. An authority on modernism, Greenberg may have despised Pop Art, but he certainly deserved better than singing “I’m an extraordinary man, I expect extraordinary things.”

Van Sant chose to work with a young, mostly inexperienced cast, and acting and singing in English is frankly a difficult task for many, despite their brave attempts.

The strongest overall performance comes from Helena Caldeira, who captures Sedgwick’s restless charm. As Warhol, Diogo Fernandes has less vocal range, but pulls both sides of Warhol. One of the strongest scenes sees the Virgin asking solemnly: “Do you think Pop Art is unholy?” As Mary, Caroline Amaral makes silly, great jokes, and the alternation between them suggests that leaning towards the weird may have turned “Andy” into a more Warholian proposition.

Another flash of bullshit comes to an end when Warhol reunites with Capote in heaven. (Capote promptly asks where the gay bars are.) There is a flamboyant, mind-blowing comedy lurking inside “Andy.” As of now, Van Sant lacks the theatrical tools to release it.



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