True Stories 49: 20s—The United States vs. Billie Holiday

Last week we looked at the film Respect, made about the life of singing star Aretha Franklin. I mentioned that it was a relatively traditional biopic—one that told the story in a chronological fashion and told most of Franklin’s life story.

The United States vs Billie Holiday [2021] by Suzan-Lori Parks, focuses on the part of Billie Holiday’s life where she was targeted by the government for her involvement with drugs. So the stories about these two singers are vastly different—one is about her conquering the forces against her and one is about being caught by the forces against her.

Billie Holiday’s life was, of course, vastly different from Aretha Franklin’s. One thing, though, that both of them had in common, was making unfortunate choices where it came to men.

Take a look at the trailer for the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USi-ppCfxEA

Clearly, Holiday had a lot of demons to overcome. The men in her life, the drugs, the government sting operation—lots of negatives. So the film does show us those thing that are working to bring her down. And though we do hear her sing, we don’t really get to see her inner feelings for the music that she sings. We see an inordinate amount of the trouble in her life and, for me, not enough of her. Who was she? What made her singing resonate so with people? What were the emotions behind it that made people want to hear her? And what was in her heart, her soul?

Sometimes—well, most of the time, really—a film takes a stand, a point of view, on who someone was, on what their life was all about. But it’s important to realize that anybody’s life is not all about just one thing. That’s what’s missing here. The focus was so heavily on the government sting and the drugs that we miss getting to know Holiday on an elemental level.

This is something to consider if you’re heading off to write a true story. After all, if you’re writing about a person, that person had a myriad of sides to their life and their character. Ask yourself how you can show all of those sides. Will a different structure allow you to do that? Flashbacks, flash forwards, memories, internal monologues? What will your audience need to get inside this character and understand their hopes, dreams, fears, desires…

Writing is all about making choices. When you’re writing about real people, real events, the choices you make on how to tell their story seem to me particularly important—because there was a truth to those lives, those events, and however you choose to tell their story, that truth should be a part of your process.

Truth? Can we ever really know it? That’s a question we’ll continue to explore next week when we take a look at Spencer.

Copyright © Diane Lake

21May23

Email Diane a question to Diane@DianeLake.com