The Zen of Bennett Blu-ray Review
Portrait of the artist as elderly statesman.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, November 23, 2012
There was a time when Tony Bennett
wasn't the coolest cat in the room. Ironically, it was when his long time
record label Columbia was trying to make the legendary singer more palatable to younger listeners by having him
record more youth oriented material, something they were also foisting on many of Bennett's then label mates, to
varying results. Bennett and Columbia had always been contentious musical bedfellows. Bennett considered himself a
jazz singer, while Columbia's musical director Mitch Miller favored middle of the road and novelty material for his new
signees, something that chafed both Bennett and the somewhat contemporarily signed Rosemary Clooney, who
perhaps had an even worse time of it in that regard, with tunes like "Come On-A My House" forced on her, whatever
their ultimate nostalgic chic value has become. Bennett chugged along through the fifties with a number of impressive
chart hits (many arranged by Percy Faith, whom Bennett evidently didn't like very much), but he really became the gold
standard of Columbia's vocalists in 1962 when "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" hit the big time. (Ironically, it was the
B-side of a single that was
supposed to be Bennett's next big hit, the lovely ballad "Once Upon A Time" by
Adams and Strouse from the Broadway flop musical
All American, which featured a book by one Mel Brooks.) But
the rest of the sixties weren't nearly as kind to Bennett. He continued to have a number of great selling singles and
albums, but his foray into feature films (
The Oscar, one of the worst films of all time featuring one of the most
beautiful scores of all time, ironically by Percy Faith) was a spectacular failure, and his sales continued diminishing
throughout the decade, ultimately leading to another spectacular flameout, the legendarily horrible
Tony Sings the
Great Hits of Today!, recorded in 1969 and released in early 1970. Bennett is on record as stating he hated the
album, despite the fact that it includes a wealth of contemporary standards by the likes of Bacharach and David, Lennon
and McCartney and others. But Bennett blamed Columbia (a long running situation between the two), and soon he cut
himself loose from his album home of some two decades. The ensuing years found Bennett wandering in a self created
wasteland of substance abuse if occasional artistic highlights like his collaborations with famed jazz pianist Bill Evans. It
took nearly another decade for Bennett to reinvent himself, and once again irony was part of the equation: suddenly
Bennett was cool once more by singing standards of yesteryear to a jaded younger audience who found the notion of
The Great American Songbook somehow a salve for their own self inflicted cynicism.
The Zen of Bennett plays as a rather appealing companion piece to
Tony Bennett: Duets II - The Great
Performances.
Zen was conceived by Bennett's son Danny, and due to director Unjoo Moon's flash and
flair, it's a visually interesting amalgamation of
snippets from the
Duets II recording sessions combined with some brief archival footage and lots (and lots) of
the
elder Bennett's philosophizing, sometimes via voiceover, sometimes to his collaborators, and often just in first person
confessionals delivered straight to the camera. Some of this stuff may be unintentionally humorous, redolent of
Grandpa
Simpson's rants about "back in my day. . ." on
The Simpsons, but some of his comments, while wistful, reveal
Bennett to be an intelligent if sometimes just slightly cranky elder statesman who calls 'em as he sees 'em.
Bennett seems especially concerned about today's "disposable" society, aching for a time when quality mattered and
crafting things that would last was an aspirational goal. In fact that seems to be one of his chief complaints about his
early years at Columbia, when Mitch Miller foisted "cheap" knock off tunes on him that Miller knew would sell well but
which for Bennett had no intrinsic value. This also seems to be what speaks (or sings) to Bennett so deeply about The
Great American Songbook—namely, revisiting songs that have withstood the test of time and proven themselves to be
sturdy, long lived artistic accomplishments.
There's some now added poignance to both the duet Bennett recorded with Amy Winehouse as well as some of his
comments before the session begins, where he talks about how "hooked" she is on drugs and how he hopes he can
talk her out of her addiction. That may sound like the ultimate in naïvete, but of course Bennett himself struggled for
years with both drug and alcohol problems, and he's also on record here regarding the legendary Bill Evans and that
pianist's long heroin addiction, which Evans himself wrestled with unsuccessfully for many, many years. Winehouse is a
rather stark contrast to someone like Carrie Underwood, who shows up with cupcakes for everyone and confesses to
being very nervous about the session. Bennett has already revealed in an earlier confessional that he still feels
butterflies before performing, and considers that a good sign, as it means he's still invested in the outcome.
This is ultimately a very personal journey about and actually
for Tony Bennett, including an emphasis on his
painting and drawing career, a place where he was able to call the shots from the beginning. Bennett interacts with his
kids and grandkids here and also in a way interacts with his ancestors as he seeks to trace the history of the
Benedetto family. Danny Bennett calls
The Zen of Bennett a "love letter" to his father, but it turns out this nicely
wrought documentary is equally a love letter to everyone who has ever loved Tony Bennett.
