Pablo Larraín’s ‘Maria’ Dominated By Angelina Jolie’s Committed, Rapturous Performance

Terrence McNally’s Tony-winning 1995 play Master Class is a fictional look at the tumultuous life of Maria Callas as she teaches a singing class in her final years. It’s a funny, heartbreaking play where the great diva muses on her fierce rivalries, her anger at a merciless press, and all the sacrifices she made for her music. Zoe Caldwell won a Tony for her performance. Patti LuPone replaced Caldwell and made the role her own. Faye Dunaway played it on the road (as did many other name actors) and was said to be smashing. Dunaway bought the film rights and spent years trying to get it made (and some of it was even shot)—almost going bankrupt—but she lost the rights to HBO. Then, it was announced that Mike Nichols would be directing Meryl Streep as La Callas. That was 10 years ago. Nichols has died and so, it seems, has the project. 

(A Franco Zeffirelli’s 2002 biopic, Callas Forever, starred Fanny Ardant. I have not seen it.)

I mention all of the above to show the great love and demand to turn the Callas play into a film. McNally’s play depicted a passionate, somewhat bitter but strong and humorous woman looking back and giving back. 

Chilean helmer Pablo Larraín’s sumptuous, haunting, but ultimately callous (sorry, I had to) new film Maria is set in Paris in the last week of the great soprano’s life. His Maria seems resigned to leave this world. She’s haunted by her past. Her passion is waning. Her anger is tempered. There are small signs of the diva she once was but only glimmers. 

“I’m in the mood for adulation,” she says announcing her decision to eat outdoors in one of the few moments of self involved spontaneity. 

Callas was a true opera legend. A singer with an extraordinary gift who was losing that gift. How does one deal with that kind of tragedy? Larraín’s decision is to wallow in it but from a distance. The film never fully engaged me nor was I truly much moved. 

I was however mesmerized and captivated by Angelina Jolie who is wholly believable as Callas. Jolie’s Maria is elegant, tortured and terrified she can no longer sing.  But she’s stymied by a narrative that rarely allows much insight beyond the fame cliche.

The script (by Spencer scribe Steven Knight) does little to illuminate the woman or the star. We are only given the expected “reimagined” bio-filmic tropes about fame and success. And love. There’s barely a whiff of humor or camp, which might have made the film less dreary. And no other character other than La Jolie is allowed much depth. Kudos to Alba Rohrwacher and Pierfrancesco Favino for making the most of their underwritten parts as her devoted caregivers. 

Tech aspects are exquisite across the boards from Ed Lachman’s stunning camerawork (Oscar-nominated last year for Larraín’s El Conde) to marvelous period production design by Guy Hendrix Dyas and costume design Massimo Cantini Parrini. 

Besides Jolie’s fully-committed, rapturous performance the other reason to recommend Maria is to hear Callas’s glorious vocals as interpreted by Jolie. As a culture, we’ve come to unjustly shun actors who don’t do their own singing, not realizing that the interpreting is an art from in and of itself. Jessica Lange mastered it as Patsy Cline in Sweet Dreams as did Marion Cottilard in La Vie En Rose. Audrey Hepburn didn’t have an opportunity since she was led to believe they would use her actual vocals in My Fair Lady. But her genius acting proved she was the only choice for the film version of My Fair Lady. But I digress, in defense of Audrey…

The complaint about biopics used to be that they spanned too much of the subjects entire lifetime trying to capture it all. Lately, and especially with Larrain’s bio-work, they are too concentrated in one time period so, even with the protagonist looking back, it isn’t enough to sustain interest or elicit enough empathy or compassion. 

Netflix scooped up Maria even before its Lido premiere.