American Utopia
American Utopia, Spike Lee’s dazzling film of David Byrne’s 2019 Broadway rock show recalls the euphoria experienced while watching Jonathan Demme’s 1988 concert classic, Stop Making Sense.
Byrne, with silver hair and an ice-blue suit, singing and dancing on bare stage with 11 fellow musicians (who carry wirelessly amplified instruments to give them freedom to roam), has never been more of a showman or poetic rock star.
Lee shoots the show from hypnotic array of angles, bringing us so close to the performers. The movie contains songs about love, television, social-anxiety disorder, and, in one stunning sequence, police killing of African Americans.
It flows and builds, ending on an ecstatic walking-around-the-theater version of “Road to Nowhere,” which catches the spirit of an America torn between utopia and the abyss.
How long the two of you go back?
Spike Lee: David and I go way back. We just grew up really in the same era when art, music, independent film was happening here in New York City, when young artists could afford to live there, and we crossed paths many times. I knew that sooner or later I will be working with my brother right here. I just knew it was going to happen.
David Byrne: I remember seeing Spike’s first film, She’s Gotta Have It. This was in the eighties, and ever since then, we were kind of on parallel tracks. We would cross every once in a while, and more recently I got calls from Spike.” Come over. I’m doing something about Brazil.” He knew that I was fan of a lot of Brazilian music and culture. We did something about Michael Jackson. We kind of crossed paths. And it seemed inevitable that at some point the right thing was going to come along, and we were going to actually work together.
American Utopia on Broadway
Lee: The first time I saw the show was when they were still in Boston, before they came to Broadway. I got a great phone call from Dave. I didn’t know nothing about nothing. And he called me up. He said, “I got this thing. Are you interested.” I said, “When can I see?” He said, “We’re in Boston.” I said, “I’ll come on up.” I went up on a Saturday, so I can see two shows. Flew up that morning. It was a matinee and a show that night. Flew back to New York the next day, but from the get-go, I knew I wanted to be part of this. It was the music, the narrative, the choreography, everything I love.
Joy and political urgency
Byrne: At some point I felt that our country, and lots of other countries around the world … We’re coming in danger of rupturing, being divided, antagonistic, not being able to work together. All kinds of things are happening, and I thought, we’re really getting to a difficult place. And I felt that it became my obligation, my duty as a citizen I felt, to actually try and engage with this, try and respond to this. And I thought, I can’t just be an entertainer now. I need to entertain, but I also need to respond to what’s happening in the country I live in, and the world. I thought, we have to. We can’t ignore this anymore. We can’t just pretend that we’re just going to go out and have fun. We have to respond to this. And I thought, how can I do that? I have to do that in the show in a way that’s not preachy, that’s not telling people what to think. I worked on that and that’s what Spike saw, that we were working out the details of how to do that.
Lee: It really goes by the lyrics. David and I were talking about this. It’s become also like a slogan. Say their names. Let’s not forget these individuals who are no longer here in that physical sense. They’re with us spiritually. Say their names. Their loved ones will never see them again. Say their names. Let’s not let their murders be in vain.
What did that song mean to you?
Byrne: I heard that song a little before that. And to me, obviously it’s a political song, but it’s incredibly human and emotional. It asks you to remember these people as people, as human beings that lived on this earth and that not to forget them. It really touches a very basic human emotion in a way that I thought everybody can connect with that. It’s not dictating policy or partisan politics or anything. It says that, and then you can respond as a person politically to what you’ve heard. But I thought the way that this communicates these wrongs through a song, it was just extraordinary. I thought this is one of the best protest songs I’ve heard in a decade.
Powerful simplicity
Lee: Once I decided to join David with this great endeavor, I tried to see a show every week, so I become more familiar with the material. And every week I would go to David and say, “You heard about this person got murdered?” And it never stopped. It never stopped.
Challenge of turning stage show into film?
Lee: It wasn’t me alone. I have a great, great DP, Ellen Kuras. We wrote together many, many times. And the way she sees images is incredible. Ellen and I saw the show several times before we filmed it and we wanted the camera to be a participant, a part of the choreography. It wasn’t as like setting up nine million cameras stationary, just shoot, just record and put it all in the editing room. No. There are specific shots that were choreographed to the choreography, and I think that’s what makes it really brought alive than just … Mr. Byrne here did not ask me to record the show. He’s no asking … That ain’t what …
Byrne: I could have hired a company to do that.
Lee: He wanted me to do what I do, not just set up static cameras, just shoot the show, then put it together in the edit room. No, we don’t roll like that.
Choreography?
Byrne: The choreographer’s name is Andy-B Parson, and I’ve worked with her before and Chris and Tendayi that you mentioned are both trained as dancers, but they’re also both great singers, which is kind of rare, kind of rare. She could teach them her very peculiar, in a specific kind of movement, which comes from … Like put your hand around that brim of your hat, and this is a movement from … I don’t know what they all are. This is from an Okinawan folk dance. This is from this. This is whatever. And she put them all together and they were just incredible. And I’m up there singing and sometimes … It wasn’t until I saw the film that I realized some of the stuff that they were doing, because I had never seen the show.
Lee: They’re behind him. There was one thing that David denied me. I kept going Annie-B, the choreographer saying, “Can’t we spit another one of these?” And she said, “Spike, I want it to, but he just won’t do it.” I said, “Please Annie. Get it on your knees. Anything. I just need one more.” And he said, “Ain’t going to happen.” I left it alone after that.
Bringing that band together?
Byrne: I wanted to try and have all the band untethered, wireless, and that meant that I could have everybody move anywhere on the stage. And I could clear the stage of all the risers and microphones and instruments and all that kind of stuff. I thought, the technology’s here. We can do this now. I mean, just barely. It’s a lot of technology. I forget how many. It’s like 50 wireless channels, whatever. It’s just like, we had a special person that just took care of the wireless. We had to learn how to do that, especially the percussion section, the drum and percussion section. Amazing players. They play as if it’s one person on a kit, but it’s actually six people putting all that together. And it sounds like one person, but at the same time you have the feeling, you have this feeling that it’s not just one person, it’s six people all working in perfect unity.
Lee: It’s almost like they’re breathing together, right? Would you say that?
Byrne: I wouldn’t be surprised if they actually are breathing together.
Lee: We’re just a few weeks now from the US election. There is a direct call to register to vote in the film. And the film is so much about trying to have a different vision of America than the very divided one we’ve seen over the last four years. What are your hopes for the film? People will be seeing this in the lead up to the election. What do you hope this does kind of shift people even a little bit?
Lee: I think that as artists, you can’t always predict how you want your audience to respond. How are they going to respond? Are they going to respond? You just got to believe in your artistry and just put it out there and, hope for the best. I really do hope that people who were on the fence, maybe there’s a chance they see this film. “You know what? I’m going to register to vote.” That they were so moved by this piece, and also taking in all the things that are happening in the world, and know that this is not some, rinky-dink thing. This is urgent. There’s an urgency here for the future, not in the United States, but of the world. I hope that they respond.
Byrne: I’m hoping that the people see the film, they will have that feeling of, “Yes, we can do this. We can pull together and do this. We’re going to vote.” There’s a lot to do. There’s a lot of work to do. What you see in the film is people working together and you go, yes, we can do that.
Opening night film at the Toronto Film Fest
Lee: And I’m sorry that your government has banned the Toronto Blue Jays to Buffalo, New York. Buffalo is not where you want to be. Just let me tell you, but leaving that aside, I always think about … Because I travel. Before the pandemic, I traveled, and to many different countries, and I asked people, what do they think about the United States under this guy? And with the exception of Mexico, you guys are our neighbors. I know they’re Canadians looking at what’s happening in the United States of America saying WTF.
Long history with Toronto?
Byrne: Last time I was up, we were doing some shows and I visited Ward’s Island, which I had never been to before, which I thought, oh this is … I felt like I’d just escaped the city. This is really incredible.
Lee: I saw the movie, Escape From New York. I never saw the movie, Escape From Toronto