Documentarian Laurent Bouzereau has made a name for himself as the chronicler of Steven Spielberg's oeuvre. He shifts focus here with an impeccably produced and revelatory full-length documentary slash interview with cinema icon Faye Dunaway. The resulting film is sympathetic but unsparing, matching the raw honesty of Faye herself, but echoing the evident love and admiration of her son.
We begin with all the disparaging cliches. Faye is difficult, volatile, and the woman Betty Davis said she couldn't be paid enough to work with again. Bouzereau shows Faye's self-acknowledged perfection early on in how she holds up filming to adjust every aspect of her posture, make-up and hair. Faye says she got her perfectionism from her mother who was trapped in a marriage with an alcoholic serviceman, and disciplined her daughter into academic success. Dunaway does not regret this and credits her mother for her work ethic and perfectionism.
We see Faye in her pomp - equally beautiful and talented - searing our collective imaginations in BONNIE & CLYDE, CHINATOWN and NETWORK. We then see Faye's sudden reversal of fortune with her portrayal of Joan Crawford in MOMMIE DEAREST. The film is now seen as a camp classic but its initial failure still clearly stings. Dunaway blames the director for not telling her to modulate her performance. We then enter the 1980s - roles in minor films - and a reinvention as a Broadway actress. But the great era is over.
As the interview unfurls we realise that Faye may have been difficult in the same way that Streisand was difficult - because she was smart and had opinions - but there was something deeper and darker going on too. Dunaway was/ is actually bipolar and those hair-trigger (literally) mood swings can be attributed to undiagnosed mental illness. And then, in the 1980s, to alcoholism that was partly hereditary and partly self-medication before her son got her properly treated for both.
All this leaves us with a nuanced and profoundly compassionate picture of a woman who was strong, smart, talented but also vulnerable and struggling to survive. There is so much to Faye's story beyond the damning headlines - and so much to consider about how people who do not conform to Hollywood's pressures and expectations are depicted in the media.
FAYE has a running time of 91 minutes and is available to stream.
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