Ray - Ray Charles Movie

[Lois Gilbert]

Went to a screening tonight. Nothing artsy here, but nevertheless a magnificent story line and brutally honest. Seemed everything was accurate - the casting of folks like Fathead, Neshui Ertegun and Jerry Wexler were a bit off - but Jamie Foxx was BRILLIANT. Steve Turre told me today that Foxx had his eyelids glued shut during the shooting, and Ray worked with him for months on his movements and stylings. He WAS Ray Charles and at various points, it was chilling.

Also liked that they didn't sugar coat Ray's personality. Great film to take kids to - lots of positive message plus the magnificent soundtrack.

[gonzo]

i hear its excellent, especially jamie.

[Lois Gilbert]

A definite go see

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by Lois Gilbert

the casting of folks like Fathead, Neshui Ertegun and Jerry Wexler were a bit off

Are you saying the guy who played Wexler didn't seem like the type who could knowingly screw Stax records and then claim ignorance with a straight face?

[moneyp]

The previews have me hooked. Jamie Foxx made a believer out of me in ALI.

I had mentioned this film on the movie thread in The Alley last night.

Looks incredibly interesting, and the similarities, physically, between Foxx and Charles are downright frightening!!

[Lois Gilbert]

Denver was the site for the US premiere of "Ray", the bio-pic of the late brother Ray Charles. It was the kick-off for the 27th Annual Starz Film Festival. It was a gala event at a SRO Buell Theatre with over 2,500 in attendance to view the first US screening following last week's World Premiere in Toronto. The producer-director as well as the starts of the film including Jamie Foxx were introduced before the screening with a brief history of the making of the film that took 16 years to conclude with Ray Charles involved in the entire process and as stated last night, "including Ray viewing the finished product in his own way". After the passing of Mr. Robinson, a montage of actual footage of Ray, including a few scenes of home movies, were added to the end with a dedication to Ray Charles Robinson, a true musical genius.

The movie, about 2 1/2 hrs. long was masterful, authentic and historically accurate with amazing details to the periods portrayed and great performances by the entire cast, fine castings for the characters of Ahmet Egetrun, Jerry Wexler, Lowell Fulsom, Tom Dowd, Jessie Stone, Fathead Newman, The Raelettes et al. Believe the hype, Jamie Foxx was outstanding as Ray, he worked with Ray before filming started and as pianist himself, it helped his portrayal although all the music heard was Ray Charles reproducing himself for the film. Of special note was the actresses who play Ray's wife and mother.

This is a must see when it hits the theatres in 2 weeks, you'll laugh, you'll cry, your head will sway side-to-side, and the film will go by in a flash leaving you asking for more as the last 30 years of Ray's life go by in less than 10 minutes but it is perfectly done and when you see it, you'll understand why that was done. I am usually disappointed with bio-flix in general and especially those of musicians, this colloid feature was much more than I expected and I'll be viewing it again as soon as it is released commercially and I am already jonesing for the DVD version, I'm sure it'll be loaded with extra behind the scenes features with Ray, out takes and deleted scenes.

Arturo Gómez
arturo893@qwest.net

[Lois Gilbert]

I caught a promo screening of "Ray" on Monday, and I thought I'd help spread the word. It's one of the best music bios I've seen in a long while -- really inspiring, well-acted and well-directed.

Taylor Hackford does right by the man and the music, with invigorating performance segments and a fairly comprehensive take on his career and his life (including the ugly stuff, like the heroin use and the infidelities). We see Ray making the transition from gospel music to blues (with Lowell Fulsom) to imitations of Nat Cole and Charles Brown to finding his own voice, including his interest in country music. The film also dramatizes his move from Atlantic Records to ABC-Paramount.

And it's a cliche to say this, but Jamie Foxx does channel Ray, nailing his vocal mannerisms and body language. I'm willing to bet he'll get an Oscar nomination for the performance.

I was happy to see an acquaintance, the talented Los Hombres Calientes/Irvin Mayfield bassist Edwin Livingston, grab lots of screen time (in the background in many scenes) as the bass player in Ray's band. Go, Edwin!
Several notable musicians and industry people are portrayed in the film, too, including Fathead Newman (Bokeem Woodbine), Quincy Jones (Larenz Tate), Ahmet Ertegun (Curtis Armstrong), Jerry Wexler (Richard Schiff) and Lowell Fulsom (blues man Chris Thomas King).

It was encouraging to see a packed theater of people respond so positively to good music (rather than the same old tired teenypop, hip-hop and prefab rock that dominates so many soundtracks).

Philip Booth
philipbooth@tampabay.rr.com

[Noj]

Thanks to the courtesy of a fellow jazz board poster, I just got home from seeing this. I felt it was a very good film.

Whoever chose the tracks of Ray's to play chose well. Although some are possibly oversaturated by a few of Ray's biggest hits, I can still enjoy them.

I didn't know Ray had dealt with a heroin problem. I knew very little of his life before seeing the film. I'm not sure if heroin was a good excuse for his more selfish decisions--Ray had issues the film didn't seem to resolve. Maybe Ray never did.

I think my first exposure to Ray Charles was some sitcom theme. Or the Pepsi "You got the right one, baybay!" thing. Later on I heard some of his instrumental tracks with guys like Fathead, which gave me a whole different level of appreciation for his music.

Foxx is a dead ringer for Charles, and his acting is very believable. His performance more than makes up for any flaws in the storyline.

[Noj]

"the casting of folks like Fathead, Neshui Ertegun and Jerry Wexler were a bit off"

Does anyone have pictures of these cats handy? I thought Fathead wasn't too bad based on some picture I have in my memory, and my friend thought Wexler was a good choice (maybe he was kidding?).

[John L]

Originally Posted by Lois Gilbert

Denver was the site for the US premiere of "Ray", the
The movie, about 2 1/2 hrs. long was masterful, authentic and historically accurate with amazing details... The Raelettes et al.

Is it rated X?

[Lois Gilbert]

Originally Posted by John L

Is it rated X?

No it's PG13 . I fully intend to see it again with my kid. As far as me saying the casting was off of Neshui Ertegun - he went in and out of a Turkish accent and the actor who played Jerry Wexler was a bit over the top. But I basically agree with all the other reviews that have come in so far and Jamie Foxx should get the Oscar nod for this one.

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Originally Posted by Noj

"the casting of folks like Fathead, Neshui Ertegun and Jerry Wexler were a bit off"

Does anyone have pictures of these cats handy? I thought Fathead wasn't too bad based on some picture I have in my memory, and my friend thought Wexler was a good choice (maybe he was kidding?).

Fathead….And Ray



Aretha and Jerry Wexler

Ray’s habit etc. (and much of that great 50s/early 60s small/big band) is covered at length and honestly in the Lydon biog : Well worth reading …RC.

"A scrupulous and perceptive piece of work."
— Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post

RAY CHARLES
Man and Music
by Michael Lydon

In this newly expanded paperback version of RAY CHARLES: Man and Music (Routledge; Paperback; ISBN: 0-415-97043-1 author Michael Lydon tracks the life of Ray Charles, from a poverty-stricken childhood in Greenville, Florida to his groundbreaking success worldwide.
Rolling Stone founding editor and renowned music journalist, Michael Lydon accurately documents Ray Charles' life and career including such events as:
• his affliction with blindness at an early age;
• his loss of family at age fourteen;
• his battle with heroin addiction;
• his cutthroat career at Atlantic Records.
Unlike many R&B singers, Charles overcame these many obstacles and took control of his career from its earliest days. Author Lydon follows the singer from the time spent in the mid '50s singing gospel to his recording of two country albums in the late '50s—a time when the black presence in country music was almost nonexistent. In addition, Lydon provides readers with anecdotes surrounding Charles' powerful pop hits of the '60s.
Originally published in 1995 by Penguin Books, and universally hailed as the definitive biography of Ray Charles, this new edition now includes chapters on the last seven years of his life

[Noj]

Thanks RC, now I see what Lois was saying. Fathead's head was fatter than the actor they chose, duh!

[HLJ]

Hustleman said I'd have the DVD in the crib by Wednesday.The Boyz on the corner are on the job.Peace and all that.

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Originally Posted by Noj

Thanks RC, now I see what Lois was saying. Fathead's head was fatter than the actor they chose, duh!

Noj - App. "Fathead" was/is so nicknamed because he could play everything by ear...so when he was given sheet music as a school kid he didn't bother to learn it. So fluffed it and was given the "Fathead" tag by his music teacher - and it stuck. Anyway, a vastly under-rated sax player even then and a teenage contemporary of Ornette, James Clay and Red Conners etc.

That's the story...nothing to do with his head! Ray called him "brains".

RC.

[Noj]

Thanks again RC.

[jazzy mary]

I also heard that "Fathead" got his name because he plays such fat, gorgeous tones. Have you guys seen Fathead--he's very handsome!

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Originally Posted by jazzy mary

I also heard that "Fathead" got his name because he plays such fat, gorgeous tones. Have you guys seen Fathead--he's very handsome!

JM,

With Ray...

France (Antibes) 1961

Brussels 1962

London (1962/3)...although I've got the memory he maybe wasn't at that later concert - part of the band were (falsely) busted in Paris. James Clay took the solos.


It was indeed a very good looking BAND! And a HELL of a good one.

Best RC. (no relation!)

[Lois Gilbert]

Movie Review | 'Ray': Portrait of Genius, Painted in Music

October 29, 2004
By A. O. SCOTT


WHEN Ray Charles died in June, he had ascended to the most
rarefied level of fame; no longer merely a celebrity, he
had become an institution. There is no doubt that he
deserved this status, or that he enjoyed it, but universal
esteem is not always a blessing for an artist. Some of
Charles's music has become so familiar that we risk growing
deaf to the audacity and innovation that made it great in
the first place. The opening bars of "Hit the Road Jack"
can be heard at every ballpark in the land, whenever a
hapless pitcher heads for the showers - a clever enough
joke the first hundred times you hear it but a curious fate
for a song that crackles with so much high-spirited sexual
drama.

In "Ray," the new film biography directed by Taylor
Hackford, some of that drama is restored, and you hear some
of Charles's best music - the signature R & B hits of the
mid-1950's, the astonishing forays into orchestral pop and
country-and-western of the early 60's - as if for the first
time. In the movie's account, "Hit the Road Jack" emerges
almost spontaneously from a hotel-room lovers' quarrel
between Ray (Jamie Foxx) and Margie Hendricks (Regina
King), one of his backup singers. This episode may be
apocryphal, and is no doubt embellished, but "Ray"
succeeds, to an unusual extent for a movie of this kind, in
presenting a vivid, convincing portrait of an artist.

If it falls into some of the lacquered conventions that
bedevil so many biopics, it also has some of the sly candor
that makes Charles's memoir, "Brother Ray" (written with
David Ritz), such a delight to read. And though "Ray"
occasionally strays into sentimentality and facile
psychologizing, Mr. Hackford and James L. White, the
screenwriter, have hit upon an insight that eludes most
filmmakers who try to put the lives of artists on screen,
namely that the real story lies in the art itself.

So while "Ray" occasionally flashes back to Charles's
childhood in Florida, recounting the twin traumas of his
younger brother's death and his own blindness (the result
of glaucoma), and while it does not shy away from his
womanizing or his heroin addiction, its main concern is his
music. Mr. Hackford trusts the audience's taste and
intelligence enough to assume that, much as we might be
curious about Charles's mother (Sharon Warren) or his
marriage, we are most interested in learning - in hearing -
how Ray Charles went from Nat King Cole-style crooning to a
raucous fusion of gospel and blues and beyond, treating the
whole range of American vernacular music, black and white,
sacred and secular, urban and rural, as a cornucopia of
musical possibilities. We hear a lot of what he made of
this bounty, and "Ray" lets us appreciate Charles's genius
and eclecticism in a way that no CD boxed set could.

This is partly a result of Mr. Hackford's judiciousness and
generosity, and the deft way he weaves Charles's recordings
through the behind-the-scenes set pieces that fill out the
narrative. But what makes "Ray" such a satisfying picture,
in spite of some shortcomings and compromises, is Mr.
Foxx's inventive, intuitive, and supremely intelligent
performance. That this erstwhile comedian possessed
formidable acting chops was evident even back in the days
of "In Living Color," but it was not always clear how far
he would go in developing them. It's clear now. He has
mastered Charles's leg-swinging gait, his open-mouthed
smile and the tilt of his head, as well as the speaking
style that could sometimes sound like a form of scat
singing.

But there is much more than mimicry at work here. In his
best big-screen performances - as Drew (Bundini) Brown in
Michael Mann's "Ali," for instance, and as the young
quarterback in Oliver Stone's "Any Given Sunday" - Mr. Foxx
has displayed an intriguing blend of quick-wittedness,
bravado and sensitivity, and his recognition of those
qualities in Ray Charles is the key to his performance. You
get the sense that he is not just pretending to be Ray
Charles, but that he understands him completely and knows
how to communicate this understanding through every word
and gesture, without explaining a thing.

Great popular art speaks for itself. "I'm not one to
interpret my own songs," Charles wrote in "Brother Ray,"
"but if you can't figure out 'What I Say,' then something's
wrong. Either that, or you've never heard the sweet sounds
of love." And "Ray," at its best, partakes of both the
directness and the incomparable sophistication of his
music. Apart from the flashbacks to Charles's youth in
rural north Florida (where he was born Ray Robinson in
1930), the film concentrates on a two-decade span - roughly
from the late 1940's until the mid-60's - during which he
made his way from rough-and-tumble clubs and
chitlin'-circuit dance halls onto the top of the pop and
R&B charts.

Along the way, we get a sense of the fertility of
African-American popular culture in the era of segregation,
and of the hustling, nickel-and-diming and endless
negotiating that permeated all levels of the music
business. Musical genius that he was, Ray Charles was also
a sharp businessman. His experience taught him to be tough,
ruthless and suspicious of everyone, traits that Mr. Foxx
presents without apology.

One of the insidious aspects of celebrity biographies is
their tendency to become disingenuous fables about the
pathology of fame, in which the price of success is
reckoned in broken relationships, substance abuse and
self-destructive behavior. Spectacles of unhappy genius, I
guess, are meant to make the rest of us feel justified in
our mediocrity.

"Ray" does not entirely avoid this kind of moralism.
Charles turns on some of his most loyal band-mates and
employees, including his steadfast driver and road manager,
Jeff Brown (Clifton Powell). Ray's relationships with
Margie, with his wife, Bea (Kerry Washington), and with
another singer, named Mary Ann (Aunjanue Ellis), all
include their share of tears and melodramatic fights. (All
three of the actresses hold their own in underwritten
roles, with Ms. King in particular matching Mr. Foxx's
feints and weaves with bouncing pugnacity). His drug habit
and his workaholism take their inevitable toll.

But if this kind of trouble is the price of artistic
achievement, the movie makes clear, as "Brother Ray" did,
that Charles paid it ungrudgingly, even joyfully. "Ray" is
the story of a man surmounting the obstacles of racism and
disability, but for the most part it steers clear of easy
uplift or self-congratulation. Mr. Hackford trusts his
material and loves his subject, too much to puff the man up
with hagiography.

"Ray" while not a great movie, is a very good movie about
greatness, in which celebrating the achievement of one
major artist becomes the occasion for the emergence of
another. I'm speaking of Ray Charles and Jamie Foxx, of
course, though at this point I'm not entirely sure I can
tell them apart.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/29/mo...851d80504214ee

[Dr Dave]

Can't wait to see this!

[Noj]

This article combined with Lois and Richardo's comments have downgraded my initial positive reaction. Chrome at Organissimo posted it...

From Slate:

It's a Shame About Ray
Why must biopics sentimentalize their subjects?
By David Ritz
Posted Friday, Oct. 22, 2004, at 3:54 AM PT



Foxx stays true to Ray

Ray, the new biopic directed by Taylor Hackford, satisfies in some wonderful ways: Jamie Foxx miraculously embodies Ray's soul; Ray's own musical voice sounds bigger and better than ever; and several of the supporting performances—Sharon Warren as Ray's mom and Regina King as Margie Hendricks—are heartfelt and powerful. The problem, though, is that Ray is a saccharine movie while Ray himself was anything but a saccharine man. He was a raging bull. Sentimentalizing his story may make box office sense, but, to my mind, it trivializes the compelling complexity of his character.

For example, the film focuses on Ray's relationship with his mother, Aretha. Yet the truth is that Ray had two mothers. According to what Ray told me and insisted we include in Brother Ray, an autobiography that I co-authored in 1978, two women dominated his early years: his biological mother, Aretha, and a woman named Mary Jane, one of his father's former wives. "I called Aretha 'Mama' and Mary Jane 'Mother,' " wrote Ray. After her 6-year-old son went blind, Aretha fostered his independence, while Mary Jane indulged him. For the rest of his life Ray was as fiercely self-reliant as he was self-indulgent. Two dynamic women, two radically different approaches to his sightlessness—you can imagine the impact on his character. Ray ignores this phenomenon completely.

Ray tries to explain Ray's blues—the angst in his heart—in heavy-handed Freudian terms. At age 5, Ray helplessly watched his younger brother, George, drown. The film insists that the guilt Ray felt for failing to rescue George is responsible for the dark side of his soul. Once the guilt is lifted, the adult Ray is not only free from his heroin habit but is liberated—in a treacly flashback—from his emotional turmoil. George's death was certainly traumatic for the young Ray, yet the only time Ray suffered what he termed a nervous breakdown had neither to do with the drowning nor the loss of his sight a year later. "It's the death of my mother Aretha," he told me, "that had me reeling. For days I couldn't talk, think, sleep or eat. I was sure-enough going crazy."

That the film fails to dramatize the scene—we learn of Aretha's death in a quick aside from Ray to his wife-to-be—misses the crucial heartbreak of his early life. It happened when Ray was 15, living at a school for the blind 160 miles from home. "I knew my world had ended," he said. The further fact that Ray fails to include a single scene from his extraordinary educational experience is another grievous oversight. It was at that state school where he was taught to read Braille, play Chopin, write arrangements, learn piano and clarinet, start to sing, and discover sex. Ray shows none of that. Such scenes would have been far more illuminating than the unexciting story, which the film does include, of Ray changing managers in midcareer.

The minor characters are another major problem. Take David "Fathead" Newman, the saxophonist who, for over a decade, was Ray's closest musical and personal peer. In Ray, David is portrayed as little more than a loudmouthed junkie. While drugs were part of the bond between David and Ray, the key to their relationship was an extraordinary musical rapport. In real life, David is a soft-spoken, gentle man of few words. As Ray was boisterous, David was shy. Both were brought up on bebop. Like Lester Young/Billie Holiday or Thelonious Monk/Charlie Rouse, they complemented each other in exquisitely sensitive fashion. We neither see nor hear any of this in Ray. And while Hackford features a great number of Ray's hits, he ignores the jazz side of Ray's musical makeup. There's virtually no jazz in Ray, while in real life jazz sat at the center of Ray's soul.

If Fathead is painfully misrepresented, Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler, owners of Atlantic Records, suffer a similar fate. Among the most colorful characters in the colorful history of the music business, they are reduced to stereotypes. We don't get a glimpse of their quirky sophistication, sharp intellect, or salty wit. Same goes for Mary Ann Fisher, the first female singer to join Ray's band. Mary Ann was an engaging character—sometimes endearing, sometimes infuriating. In Ray she's just a manipulative tart.

Finally, though, Ray is about Ray, and its attempt to define his character. In many ways, the definition is accurate. Foxx brilliantly captures Ray's energy and contradictions. Yet those contradictions are not allowed to stand. The contradictions must be resolved, Ray must live happily ever after. The finale implies that, for all his promiscuity, he is back with Della, the true love of his life, and that, with his heroin habit behind him, it's smooth sailing ahead. The paradoxical strands of his life are tied up into a neat package, honoring the hackneyed biopic formula with a leave-'em-smiling Hollywood ending.

The truth is far more complex and far more interesting. Ray's womanizing ways continued. His marriage to Della ended in a difficult divorce in 1976. And while he never again got high on heroin, he found, in his own terms, "a different buzz to keep me going." For the rest of his life he unapologetically drank large quantities of gin every day and smoked large quantities of pot every night. While working on his autobiography he told me, "Just like smack never got in the way of my working, same goes for booze and reefer. What I do with my own body is my own business." Ray maintained this attitude until his health deteriorated. In 2003 he told me that he had been diagnosed with alcoholic liver disease and hepatitis C. "If I knew I was going to live this long," he added with an ironic smile, "I would have taken better care of myself." Whatever Ray was—headstrong, joyful, courageous, cranky—he was hardly a spokesman for sobriety.

The producers of Ray make much of the fact that Ray himself endorsed the movie. That's certainly true. He wanted a successful crossover movie to mirror his successful crossover music. He participated and helped in any way he could. In one of our last discussions, Ray reminded me that the process of trying to sell Hollywood began 26 years ago when producer-director Larry Schiller optioned his story. Since then there have been dozens of false starts. It wasn't until his son, Ray Jr., producer Stuart Benjamin, and director Hackford stayed on the case that cameras rolled.

"Hollywood is a cold-blooded motherfucker," said Ray. "It's easier to bone the President's wife than to get a movie made. So I say God bless these cats. God bless Benjamin and Hackford and Ray Jr. Weren't for them, this would never happen. And now that it's happening, maybe I'll have a better chance of being remembered. I can't ask for anything more."


David Ritz is the co-author of Brother Ray with Ray Charles, and Sexual Healing with Marvin Gaye, in addition to memoirs with B.B. King, Etta James, Aretha Franklin, Smokey Robinson, and the Neville Brothers.

[Valerie]

Originally Posted by Noj

This article combined with Lois and Richardo's comments have downgraded my initial positive reaction. Chrome at Organissimo posted it...

From Slate:

It's a Shame About Ray
Why must biopics sentimentalize their subjects?
By David Ritz
Posted Friday, Oct. 22, 2004, at 3:54 AM PT



Foxx stays true to Ray

Ray, the new biopic directed by Taylor Hackford, satisfies in some wonderful ways: Jamie Foxx miraculously embodies Ray's soul; Ray's own musical voice sounds bigger and better than ever; and several of the supporting performances—Sharon Warren as Ray's mom and Regina King as Margie Hendricks—are heartfelt and powerful. The problem, though, is that Ray is a saccharine movie while Ray himself was anything but a saccharine man. He was a raging bull. Sentimentalizing his story may make box office sense, but, to my mind, it trivializes the compelling complexity of his character.

For example, the film focuses on Ray's relationship with his mother, Aretha. Yet the truth is that Ray had two mothers. According to what Ray told me and insisted we include in Brother Ray, an autobiography that I co-authored in 1978, two women dominated his early years: his biological mother, Aretha, and a woman named Mary Jane, one of his father's former wives. "I called Aretha 'Mama' and Mary Jane 'Mother,' " wrote Ray. After her 6-year-old son went blind, Aretha fostered his independence, while Mary Jane indulged him. For the rest of his life Ray was as fiercely self-reliant as he was self-indulgent. Two dynamic women, two radically different approaches to his sightlessness—you can imagine the impact on his character. Ray ignores this phenomenon completely.

Ray tries to explain Ray's blues—the angst in his heart—in heavy-handed Freudian terms. At age 5, Ray helplessly watched his younger brother, George, drown. The film insists that the guilt Ray felt for failing to rescue George is responsible for the dark side of his soul. Once the guilt is lifted, the adult Ray is not only free from his heroin habit but is liberated—in a treacly flashback—from his emotional turmoil. George's death was certainly traumatic for the young Ray, yet the only time Ray suffered what he termed a nervous breakdown had neither to do with the drowning nor the loss of his sight a year later. "It's the death of my mother Aretha," he told me, "that had me reeling. For days I couldn't talk, think, sleep or eat. I was sure-enough going crazy."

That the film fails to dramatize the scene—we learn of Aretha's death in a quick aside from Ray to his wife-to-be—misses the crucial heartbreak of his early life. It happened when Ray was 15, living at a school for the blind 160 miles from home. "I knew my world had ended," he said. The further fact that Ray fails to include a single scene from his extraordinary educational experience is another grievous oversight. It was at that state school where he was taught to read Braille, play Chopin, write arrangements, learn piano and clarinet, start to sing, and discover sex. Ray shows none of that. Such scenes would have been far more illuminating than the unexciting story, which the film does include, of Ray changing managers in midcareer.

The minor characters are another major problem. Take David "Fathead" Newman, the saxophonist who, for over a decade, was Ray's closest musical and personal peer. In Ray, David is portrayed as little more than a loudmouthed junkie. While drugs were part of the bond between David and Ray, the key to their relationship was an extraordinary musical rapport. In real life, David is a soft-spoken, gentle man of few words. As Ray was boisterous, David was shy. Both were brought up on bebop. Like Lester Young/Billie Holiday or Thelonious Monk/Charlie Rouse, they complemented each other in exquisitely sensitive fashion. We neither see nor hear any of this in Ray. And while Hackford features a great number of Ray's hits, he ignores the jazz side of Ray's musical makeup. There's virtually no jazz in Ray, while in real life jazz sat at the center of Ray's soul.

If Fathead is painfully misrepresented, Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler, owners of Atlantic Records, suffer a similar fate. Among the most colorful characters in the colorful history of the music business, they are reduced to stereotypes. We don't get a glimpse of their quirky sophistication, sharp intellect, or salty wit. Same goes for Mary Ann Fisher, the first female singer to join Ray's band. Mary Ann was an engaging character—sometimes endearing, sometimes infuriating. In Ray she's just a manipulative tart.

Finally, though, Ray is about Ray, and its attempt to define his character. In many ways, the definition is accurate. Foxx brilliantly captures Ray's energy and contradictions. Yet those contradictions are not allowed to stand. The contradictions must be resolved, Ray must live happily ever after. The finale implies that, for all his promiscuity, he is back with Della, the true love of his life, and that, with his heroin habit behind him, it's smooth sailing ahead. The paradoxical strands of his life are tied up into a neat package, honoring the hackneyed biopic formula with a leave-'em-smiling Hollywood ending.

The truth is far more complex and far more interesting. Ray's womanizing ways continued. His marriage to Della ended in a difficult divorce in 1976. And while he never again got high on heroin, he found, in his own terms, "a different buzz to keep me going." For the rest of his life he unapologetically drank large quantities of gin every day and smoked large quantities of pot every night. While working on his autobiography he told me, "Just like smack never got in the way of my working, same goes for booze and reefer. What I do with my own body is my own business." Ray maintained this attitude until his health deteriorated. In 2003 he told me that he had been diagnosed with alcoholic liver disease and hepatitis C. "If I knew I was going to live this long," he added with an ironic smile, "I would have taken better care of myself." Whatever Ray was—headstrong, joyful, courageous, cranky—he was hardly a spokesman for sobriety.

The producers of Ray make much of the fact that Ray himself endorsed the movie. That's certainly true. He wanted a successful crossover movie to mirror his successful crossover music. He participated and helped in any way he could. In one of our last discussions, Ray reminded me that the process of trying to sell Hollywood began 26 years ago when producer-director Larry Schiller optioned his story. Since then there have been dozens of false starts. It wasn't until his son, Ray Jr., producer Stuart Benjamin, and director Hackford stayed on the case that cameras rolled.

"Hollywood is a cold-blooded motherfucker," said Ray. "It's easier to bone the President's wife than to get a movie made. So I say God bless these cats. God bless Benjamin and Hackford and Ray Jr. Weren't for them, this would never happen. And now that it's happening, maybe I'll have a better chance of being remembered. I can't ask for anything more."


David Ritz is the co-author of Brother Ray with Ray Charles, and Sexual Healing with Marvin Gaye, in addition to memoirs with B.B. King, Etta James, Aretha Franklin, Smokey Robinson, and the Neville Brothers.

Noj: Thank you so much for printing this. Really too bad David couldn't have had a strong hand in the making/writing of this movie. I'm sure the current movie is much better than "nuthin'" but it could have been really great and the truth, to boot!!

Again, thank you, Noj, and thank you, David Ritz.

[Mike P]

Here are the trailers for "Ray"

http://movies.yahoo.com/shop?d=hv&id...395&cf=trailer

[Chazro]

Wazzup All!

Saw it last night, it's a great movie and Foxx is amazing!

[Lois Gilbert]

I didn't think it was oversentimentalized, but yes a mass appeal movie. Taylor Hackford spoke at length at the Great Night in Harlem benefit on Friday (Jamie couldn't be there because his grandmother passed away the day before) - he said there was so much they didn't put in, but Ray was consulted all the way. He said in his speech that "as many of us know Ray could often not be the nicest of people... but they tried to capture his essence and not sugarcoat it." For eg. I didn't know he had 12 children (in the movie there are only 3 - 2 legit and 1 illegit)

Nevertheless I still think it's worth seeing

[Lois Gilbert]

Movie Review | 'Ray': Portrait of Genius, Painted in Music

October 29, 2004 By A. O. SCOTT


WHEN Ray Charles died in June, he had ascended to the most
rarefied level of fame; no longer merely a celebrity, he
had become an institution. There is no doubt that he
deserved this status, or that he enjoyed it, but universal
esteem is not always a blessing for an artist. Some of
Charles's music has become so familiar that we risk growing
deaf to the audacity and innovation that made it great in
the first place. The opening bars of "Hit the Road Jack"
can be heard at every ballpark in the land, whenever a
hapless pitcher heads for the showers - a clever enough
joke the first hundred times you hear it but a curious fate
for a song that crackles with so much high-spirited sexual
drama.

In "Ray," the new film biography directed by Taylor
Hackford, some of that drama is restored, and you hear some
of Charles's best music - the signature R & B hits of the
mid-1950's, the astonishing forays into orchestral pop and
country-and-western of the early 60's - as if for the first
time. In the movie's account, "Hit the Road Jack" emerges
almost spontaneously from a hotel-room lovers' quarrel
between Ray (Jamie Foxx) and Margie Hendricks (Regina
King), one of his backup singers. This episode may be
apocryphal, and is no doubt embellished, but "Ray"
succeeds, to an unusual extent for a movie of this kind, in
presenting a vivid, convincing portrait of an artist.

If it falls into some of the lacquered conventions that
bedevil so many biopics, it also has some of the sly candor
that makes Charles's memoir, "Brother Ray" (written with
David Ritz), such a delight to read. And though "Ray"
occasionally strays into sentimentality and facile
psychologizing, Mr. Hackford and James L. White, the
screenwriter, have hit upon an insight that eludes most
filmmakers who try to put the lives of artists on screen,
namely that the real story lies in the art itself.

So while "Ray" occasionally flashes back to Charles's
childhood in Florida, recounting the twin traumas of his
younger brother's death and his own blindness (the result
of glaucoma), and while it does not shy away from his
womanizing or his heroin addiction, its main concern is his
music. Mr. Hackford trusts the audience's taste and
intelligence enough to assume that, much as we might be
curious about Charles's mother (Sharon Warren) or his
marriage, we are most interested in learning - in hearing -
how Ray Charles went from Nat King Cole-style crooning to a
raucous fusion of gospel and blues and beyond, treating the
whole range of American vernacular music, black and white,
sacred and secular, urban and rural, as a cornucopia of
musical possibilities. We hear a lot of what he made of
this bounty, and "Ray" lets us appreciate Charles's genius
and eclecticism in a way that no CD boxed set could.

This is partly a result of Mr. Hackford's judiciousness and
generosity, and the deft way he weaves Charles's recordings
through the behind-the-scenes set pieces that fill out the
narrative. But what makes "Ray" such a satisfying picture,
in spite of some shortcomings and compromises, is Mr.
Foxx's inventive, intuitive, and supremely intelligent
performance. That this erstwhile comedian possessed
formidable acting chops was evident even back in the days
of "In Living Color," but it was not always clear how far
he would go in developing them. It's clear now. He has
mastered Charles's leg-swinging gait, his open-mouthed
smile and the tilt of his head, as well as the speaking
style that could sometimes sound like a form of scat
singing.

But there is much more than mimicry at work here. In his
best big-screen performances - as Drew (Bundini) Brown in
Michael Mann's "Ali," for instance, and as the young
quarterback in Oliver Stone's "Any Given Sunday" - Mr. Foxx
has displayed an intriguing blend of quick-wittedness,
bravado and sensitivity, and his recognition of those
qualities in Ray Charles is the key to his performance. You
get the sense that he is not just pretending to be Ray
Charles, but that he understands him completely and knows
how to communicate this understanding through every word
and gesture, without explaining a thing.

Great popular art speaks for itself. "I'm not one to
interpret my own songs," Charles wrote in "Brother Ray,"
"but if you can't figure out 'What I Say,' then something's
wrong. Either that, or you've never heard the sweet sounds
of love." And "Ray," at its best, partakes of both the
directness and the incomparable sophistication of his
music. Apart from the flashbacks to Charles's youth in
rural north Florida (where he was born Ray Robinson in
1930), the film concentrates on a two-decade span - roughly
from the late 1940's until the mid-60's - during which he
made his way from rough-and-tumble clubs and
chitlin'-circuit dance halls onto the top of the pop and
R&B charts.

Along the way, we get a sense of the fertility of
African-American popular culture in the era of segregation,
and of the hustling, nickel-and-diming and endless
negotiating that permeated all levels of the music
business. Musical genius that he was, Ray Charles was also
a sharp businessman. His experience taught him to be tough,
ruthless and suspicious of everyone, traits that Mr. Foxx
presents without apology.

One of the insidious aspects of celebrity biographies is
their tendency to become disingenuous fables about the
pathology of fame, in which the price of success is
reckoned in broken relationships, substance abuse and
self-destructive behavior. Spectacles of unhappy genius, I
guess, are meant to make the rest of us feel justified in
our mediocrity.

"Ray" does not entirely avoid this kind of moralism.
Charles turns on some of his most loyal band-mates and
employees, including his steadfast driver and road manager,
Jeff Brown (Clifton Powell). Ray's relationships with
Margie, with his wife, Bea (Kerry Washington), and with
another singer, named Mary Ann (Aunjanue Ellis), all
include their share of tears and melodramatic fights. (All
three of the actresses hold their own in underwritten
roles, with Ms. King in particular matching Mr. Foxx's
feints and weaves with bouncing pugnacity). His drug habit
and his workaholism take their inevitable toll.

But if this kind of trouble is the price of artistic
achievement, the movie makes clear, as "Brother Ray" did,
that Charles paid it ungrudgingly, even joyfully. "Ray" is
the story of a man surmounting the obstacles of racism and
disability, but for the most part it steers clear of easy
uplift or self-congratulation. Mr. Hackford trusts his
material and loves his subject, too much to puff the man up
with hagiography.

"Ray" while not a great movie, is a very good movie about
greatness, in which celebrating the achievement of one
major artist becomes the occasion for the emergence of
another. I'm speaking of Ray Charles and Jamie Foxx, of
course, though at this point I'm not entirely sure I can
tell them apart.

"Ray" is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). It has
sex, drug use and some profanity.

Ray

Opens nationwide today

Directed by Taylor Hackford;
written by James L. White, based on a story by Mr. Hackford
and Mr. White; director of photography, Pawel Edelman;
edited by Paul Hirsch; music by Ray Charles, score by Craig
Armstrong; production designer, Stephen Altman; produced by
Howard Baldwin, Karen Baldwin, Mr. Hackford and Stuart
Benjamin; released by Universal Pictures. Running time: 152
minutes. This film is rated PG-13.

WITH: Jamie Foxx (Ray Charles), Kerry Washington (Della Bea
Robinson), Clifton Powell (Jeff Brown), Aunjanue Ellis
(Mary Ann Fisher), Harry Lennix (Joe Adams), Larenz Tate
(Quincy Jones), Sharon Warren (Mother) and Regina King
(Margie Hendricks).

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/29/mo...a32c3422faad62

[Ennis Snavely]

Just saw this. I actually didn't know he was really blind. Go figure.

[Ron Thorne]

Originally Posted by Ennis Snavely

Just saw this. I actually didn't know he was really blind. Go figure.

Who? Brother Ray or Jamie?

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Rita and I really enjoyed this a lot when we saw it a couple of months ago, despite the fact that there is much to criticize about the movie. The writing is strictly by the numbers, the dialogue is embarassingly flat, and the acting is uneven. Foxx is very good, but what really makes the movie work is that there is so much music in it, most of it original tracks, that it plays like a concert film. And if you can't get into a Ray Charles retrospective concert, you can hit the road, Jack!