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Lady Gaga's "A Star Is Born" (Some Thoughts)

"A Star Is Born" is interested in sadism and in masochism--among other things. Most of the heavy-lifting goes to Bradley Cooper.

A sadist: Cooper's character, Jackson, berates Lady Gaga's character, Ally, for not being profound enough. (Ally has been singing about an alluring pair of buttocks. "Why'dya come around me with an ass like that?" This is Hollywood, so there isn't a great deal of evidence that Jackson actually is a better, deeper songwriter. The main thing to cite: Jackson, contemplating his own ennui, observes that it may be "time to let the old ways die," and then, folksy philosopher that he is, he informs us that it "takes a lot to change a man." Hell, it takes a lot to try. Fair enough.)

A masochist: In a compelling scene, Jackson humiliates himself publicly, and also embarrasses his wife. (I think we're at the Grammy Awards.) And, of course, Jackson allows himself to fall under the sway of that treacherous producer, and this leads to suicide. All of this is prefigured in one of the stranger and more surprising lines from the movie: "I'm falling. In all the good times, I find myself longing for change. And in the bad times, I fear myself." I love that line: "I fear myself." The psyche at war with itself. Odd fare for a Hollywood blockbuster.

Do you wonder what drew Lady Gaga to this script? Instead of--say--a more-conventional "find your voice" movie, in the style of "Part of Me," or the excellent Justin Bieber film?

I have to think that part of the allure was the script's darkness. The upsetting ending seems to dovetail nicely with certain preoccupations in Lady Gaga's own career.

In song after song, Lady Gaga has conflated love affairs with audience/fan relationships, and she has underlined the moments of dysfunction that other writers might choose to overlook.

Gaga's most famous song--the witty "Bad Romance"--seems to implore the listener to enter an unhealthy, predatory relationship. "I want your ugly, I want your disease. You and me can write a Bad Romance." Gaga uses, as her romantic template, something other than "Cinderella." She uses the films of Hitchcock. "I want your PSYCHO. Your VERTIGO shtick. Want you in my rear window..." Gaga seems to acknowledge that there is something inherently unhealthy in almost any love relationship--and instead of trying to combat the disease, she welcomes it. Perhaps she welcomes it because she knows it will be fuel for her art. (Tattooed on her body, pretentious and adorable, a line from Rilke: "Confess to yourself that you would die if you were forbidden to write....")

One of my favorite Gaga songs, another dissection of an "unhealthy" relationship (and again it seems deliberately unclear whether the love-object is the media, an actual boyfriend, a fan, or all of the above): "You can't have my heart, and you won't use my mind--so do what you want with my body. Do what you want with my body." (So strange and jarring to see Gaga gyrating, in a cheerful way, while singing these disturbing words! Gaga has suggested that she may retire this song--and, if I'm reading the suggestion correctly, then I hope she changes her mind.) There's a dose of masochism in "Do What U Want," as well: "I feel good, I walk alone, and then I trip over myself and I fall. I get up, and I'm OK. And then you print some shit that makes me want to scream...."

And then we have "Paparazzi," which Gaga famously performed live with hidden capsules of blood, to suggest, at the end, that she was in fact dying (in a Hitchcockian manner!) before our eyes. Using the paparazzi/Princess Di dynamic as a metaphor for love: This is fabulously disquieting. "I'm your biggest fan; I'll chase you down until you love me...Papa...paparazzi..." "We're plastic but we'll still have fun..."

It seems to me that Young Lady Gaga had fewer filters than most: She was able to hone in on societal demons and expose these demons in bizarrely upbeat "packaging." As she gets older--and, presumably, saner--I hope she doesn't lose the funny-and-alarming streak. A speaker in a song does not need to be a role model. She just needs to say something new and urgent about being alive.

I'm not a Lady Gaga expert, and have never seen her in concert. I'm just an (intermittently) admiring observer.

It's fun to imagine what Stefania would have done if she had been given the genuinely meaty role in "A Star Is Born"--if she had been allowed to play Jackson Maine....

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