Documentaries

Watched "The Greatest Night in Pop" on Netflix, the doc on how "We Are The World" came together.

Thought it was good. Went in with high expectations as a lot of folks were gushing over it. Not sure it was that great, but I enjoyed it. It was a lot more Huey Lewis than I expected, but it was 1985.

 

I laughed at the part when the experimented with Swahili and Waylon Jennings pulled what might be the original “fuck this. I’m out.”

 

I came away from the WATW doc thinking similar things: Huey Lewis is clearly the best of the group in a Best Guy to Have a Beer With category, and agreed on Springsteen. Seemed as genuine in the day-of doc footage as he was in the interview segments.

One more: my musical theatre daughter did a teen ensemble thing in NYC several years back, and Cyndi Lauper was one of the honorees of the thing they were performing. This is 5ish years ago. Cyndi drops by the kids rehearsal and just hangs, watches and does an impromptu Q&A. Completely unplanned. I mean, a lot of kids only knew her for Kinky Boots. But my daughter said she was the best. Just encouraging. Said, "Art is the best thing we do. Keep making art."

 

Just finished the two-part Steve Martin documentary on Apple. Loved it.

I’ve been a big fan as long as I can remember. The course of his career is fascinating and this tells it well. His private existence is something I knew little about.

 

Madonna didn't really blow up huge until the end of 1984 with "Like a Virgin." Lauper was at the tail end of a boffo debut album and Whitney Houston was a year away from breaking out.

There were quite a few female solo hitmakers of the time on the record, including Tina Turner, Diana Ross, Dionne Warwick, and Kim Carnes.

 

There was a media outlet that did a 20-minute feature on Action Park, or Traction Park, that I think spurred the idea for the HBO series.

 

"OJ: Made in America" is now on Netflix.

 

Highly recommend the Jim Henson documentary on Disney+. Really well done and lots of nuggets that I didn’t know.

 

The Henson doc was very good. Appreciate how it wasn't a total fluff piece -- it did talk about Jim's fracture with his marriage and devoting too much to work.

The Beach Boys doc (also on Disney+) was underwhelming. Much more of a glorification piece. Barely went into the fracture of the group (the Mike Love faction vs. Brian Wilson). Briefly touched on Charles Manson, but nothing on Brian's personal issues. For some reason, it also stopped short of the group's Kokomo-era rebirth, and the deaths of the other two Wilson brothers.

 

Also talked about how he didn't do enough to take care of himself (working too much) and apparently died when he could've been treated and been OK.

One of craziest things to me was the absolute VIOLENCE of the early Muppets, when they were doing the D.C. show. Cartoon violence of course, but really struck me funny.