Josh Reviews Public Speaking
After my third (or fourth?) rewatch of Martin Scorsese’s magnificent 2021 HBO mini-series Pretend It’s a City, spotlighting his friend Fran Lebowitz, I decided the time had finally come to watch Public Speaking, the documentary movie about Ms. Lebowitz that Mr. Scorsese had made a few years earlier, back in 2010.
I love Pretend It’s a City so much (it’s one of the only streaming series I have made time to rewatch — multiple times! — from the pure joy of it, as opposed to rewatching because during the multi-year gap between seasons of a show I had forgotten everything that happened so felt forced to go back and rewatch), so I’m not sure why it’s taken me so long to watch Public Speaking!! (Actually, that’s a lie. I know exactly why it’s taken me so long. I discovered this movie existed soon after watching Pretend It’s a City. But when I saw it was only available on DVD, I decided to wait in the hopes that, following the release of (and strong reviews for) Pretend It’s a City, they’d release a blu-ray version so I could watch this on high-def. But it’s been several years with no movement, so recently I finally decided to just order the DVD.) (Public Speaking does not seem to currently be available to stream anywhere. This is why I like to own physical media!!)
To my surprise and pleasure, Public Speaking is presented in almost exactly the same format as Pretend It’s a City! It’s like one long episode of that series. As was the case in Pretend It’s a City, we get lots of scenes of Fran chatting with Marty, sitting at a table in a warmly-lit New York City restaurant (The Waverly Inn), intercut with footage of Ms. Lebowitz walking around New York, lots of funny interview clips with Ms. Lebowitz from throughout her long career, as well as the occasional clip of another New York luminary who comes up in the conversation. (I was particularly taken by the clips of James Baldwin, eloquently speaking on the subject of racial equality.) I’m amused to see that Mr. Scorsese mimicked the format of Public Speaking so closely when he went on to make Pretend It’s a City. But the format clearly works!
If you’re not familiar with Fran Lebowitz, just watch this film, or an episode of Pretend It’s a City, and I suspect you will fall in love with her immediately, as I did. Ms. Lebowitz came to fame in her twenties, writing columns for Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine. That was followed by the publication of two collections of her essays: 1978’s Metropolitan Life and 1981’s Social Studies. In the years since she’s continued to write (though since the nineties she’s gone through a very public case of writer’s block. which she frequently discusses in interviews) and participate in all sorts of speaking appearances.
Ms. Lebowitz is a sharp wit and a crank. She has VERY STRONG opinions on almost every topic imaginable. The fun of this movie is listening to her wax poetic on all sorts of subjects, but mostly aspects of modern life and, particularly, life in her beloved New York City. For the most part, Mr. Scorsese just lobs Ms. Lebowitz general topics and then sits back as she holds forth. I was enraptured listening to her talk. Sometimes I was laughing out loud and other times I was rolling my eyes, but she was endlessly interesting and very funny.
Mr. Scorsese & his team have assembled a fantastic array of clips to punctuate the film. I smiled watching her banter with a very young Conan O’Brien. I particularly enjoyed the warm rapport Ms. Lebowitz seemed to share with Toni Morrison in several clips of the two of them onstage together, in conversation.
But for the most part, the film sits easily on Ms. Lebowitz’s shoulders, as we watch and listen to her sit in her cozy booth and tell amusing stories and recollections and express her sharp, clever, and always very funny opinions on all sorts of different topics, from cars to books to telling time to the state of the arts and culture and so, so much more.
Public Speaking is a brisk 80 minutes. I could have kept watching for twice as long.
Give it a watch if you can find it, or stream Pretend It’s a City on Netflix!
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