Liberace: Behind the Music. The Television Movie

 

LIBERACE: BEHIND THE MUSIC

Liberace, once hailed as Mr. Showmanship, is now hardly remembered, his larger-than-life persona fading away like the last notes of a piano. His museum in Las Vegas, once a must-stop on any visit to Sin City, is closed. Liberace: Behind the Music was made a year after the entertainer's death. A bit opaque on Liberace's private life, and with some unintentionally funny moments, Liberace: Behind the Music is still entertaining viewing.

Bookended with his long-desired performance at Radio City Music Hall, Walter Valentino Liberace (Victor Garber) is driven by a desire for success. Lee as everyone calls him comes from the humblest of backgrounds. In his early days, he supports himself not by playing piano at weddings like he tells his beloved Mama Frances (Maureen Stapleton) but by playing whorehouses and dive bars. Lee is a surprisingly shy man despite his on-stage flamboyance. He is, for example, very upset when he loses his virginity to a female singer that he met at one of the clubs he performs.

This ambivalence and insecurity are something that his older brother George (Michael Wikes) does not struggle with. He manages Lee's career, but steps aside for Seymour Heller (Saul Rubinek), who takes him to great heights. Mama Frances likes Seymour, but she detests Joanne (Macha Grenon), a local girl who goes to their church and appears to take a shine to Lee. A stumbling romance between them starts, much to Mama Frances' displeasure. Eventually, she turns out to be something of a gold-digger, breaking Lee's heart.

Also breaking Lee's heart is his fraught relationship with his father Salvatore (George Touliatos), who walked out on them years before. Add to that his other fraught relationship with Scott Thorson (Michael Dolan). Lee loses his father to dementia, his beloved mother to old age, and his male friend to drugs. He also loses, despite his misgivings, Seymour, though they do reconcile, and Seymour rebuilds his friend's career. Facing his own health troubles, Lee has only his newest partner Glenn (Shawn Levy) and Seymour to tend to him before Liberace's death.

Liberace went to his grave either denying or hiding his homosexuality. Given his speaking voice, his mannerisms, his flamboyance and overall demeanor, I doubt anyone would have been shocked if Liberace had come out. He was a case of knowing without having to openly say it. Behind the Music does not spell out Lee's sexuality in neon lights, but it does not hide it either. I do wonder though if David Lambert's screenplay leaned in on some stereotypes. 

You have for example the domineering mother disapproving of her favorite child's relationships with women. Every time Joanne comes around, Frances has this look of almost jealousy. There is another quick scene where Seymour reads to Lee angry letters from fans suggesting that his marrying Joanne is tantamount to betraying his mother. It might have been true, yet having people openly object to a man marrying a woman because it would mean leaving his mother is a strange reaction from people who thought Liberace was straight.

Victor Garber was himself closeted when he played this almost openly gay man. His performance is curious insofar as his voice was fine but he looks nothing like Liberace. It comes across more as an impersonation than a performance. He does have a good, quiet moment near the end when he learns of Rock Hudson's death. Removing the wig that hides his thinning hair, Garber gives Liberace a look of horror at the news. "Why would he tell people?", he tells Glenn. That statement could be read as Lee's shock that Hudson would reveal his AIDS diagnosis, his homosexuality, maybe both. There is just a mix of sadness and despair in this scene that is quite moving.

However, for most of Behind the Music, Garber seems more focused on capturing the mannerisms and voice than in showing the man behind the music. In one particularly and I figure unintentionally creepy moment, Lee has a lecherous look on his face when Thorson comes to his house that is quite off-putting. I figure Garber and director David Greene were going for conflicted. They ended up making Lee look almost as if he is about to force himself on the allegedly naive young man. 

Stapleton made Frances Liberace into a loving though misguided figure. She has a great moment when she faces her former husband, the look of horror and anger blending well. Whether cooly dismissing Joanne or comforting Liberace after his first sexual encounter, Stapleton never made Frances into a villain. She was just a mother who loved deeply if not well. Rubinek, through no fault of his own, ended up looking like Jiminy Glick at the end of the television movie. That was a bit distracting, but on the whole he did a good job as the loyal agent. Dolan probably had the worst of it. He went from lost, almost innocent figure to a drugged-out loon rather quickly. 

I understand that Behind the Music used actual footage from Liberace's Las Vegas performances. It does give one a taste of how over-the-top these shows must have been. To be fair, Liberace never shied away from being delightfully ostentatious. One of his famous quotes, after all, was, "Too much of a good thing is wonderful". 

Liberace: Behind the Music is not the definitive take on the life of this piano man. What made him so insanely popular, what made him memorable enough to have at least three biopics made about him, is not present in Behind the Music. Still, Liberace: Behind the Music may serve as a good primer to this most flamboyant of figures. 

1919-1987

6/10