Never underestimate the power of the right needle drop.
In Malcolm & Marie, the new romantic drama from Euphoria creator Sam Levinson, that needle drop comes as the eponymous pair (John David Washington, Zendaya) return home following the successful premiere of Malcolm’s latest film. Still riding the high of audience approval, the young director stumbles into his Malibu beach house humming the song that he immediately throws on the stereo: James Brown’s “Down and Out in New York City,” from the 1973 blaxploitation classic, Black Caesar, about a Harlem shoeshine boy who ascends the criminal underworld to become the lone Black boss in the New York City mob. As Malcolm sings along, sauntering through the living room with a drink in his hand, jumping on furniture, deeply feeling himself, we get the sense of someone who’s arrived, and knows it. It’s a magnetic scene from Washington, no doubt complemented by the music, his wardrobe, and the black and white photography — the liquor-ad ambiance of it all. It’s honestly my favorite moment of his on screen, to date.
Up to this point, I’ve been less impressed with John David Washington, the movie star. I appreciated him on HBO’s Ballers; as the brash, temperamental Ricky Jerret, he was funny and explosive — but he came in incremental doses. When he’s charged with carrying a film, it often appears to be the other way around; in both 2018’s BlacKkKlansman and last year’s Tenet, Washington crowd-surfs the style and flourish of his directors, outmatched by his more experienced co-stars. Despite all the praise he’s received, I find him emotionally flat in both roles, and I’m left unclear about what motivates his characters beyond whatever comes next on the page. But with Malcolm & Marie, a talky two-hander that arguably asks more from him as an actor than any role prior, Washington steps up and succeeds, despite what has been a mixed reception to the film by critics.
Of course, given the subject matter tackled by the film, it’s hard to imagine that it would win the hearts of many critics. Early on we see Malcolm going on a series of diatribes, kneecapping the criterati and its hold on cultural discourse: from the jump to politicalize the work of Black artists (“If I decide to make a fucking LEGO movie, it’s not because I want to tell a story about how the building blocks of the American empire was slave labor…”), to the limited technical savvy that undermines a critic’s integrity (“The only reason you know it’s a 2-perf 35, is because I said it at the premiere, dipshit…”), to the problem of conveniently conflating identity with artistic perspective (“You can’t say that I brilliantly subverted ‘this’ trope because I’m Black, but I fell into ‘this’ [other] one because I’m a fucking man…”). He takes particular aim at a nameless “White girl at the LA Times,” whom he describes as a “fucking bobblehead” who, rather than remarking on his, or any artist’s work, should instead be “holding a smiling sun placard for the local news, because all she is, is a motherfucking weatherman… or weatherwoman. Whatever.” In his eyes, Malcolm has been ghettoized as a Black filmmaker by critics, and will continue to be the more recognition he garners. Here, we’re reminded of the chorus to that opening needle drop, with James Brown hollering, “Here’s a dime, boy! Gimme a shine, boy!” as a reminder that, no matter how big the titular Black Caesar got, any respect he earned would be overshadowed by the social implications of his race, and that whatever power he wielded would always be subject to authority of White approval.
Does that mean Malcolm believes he’s above all critique? Maybe. But what writer-director Levinson may have his sights on here is the sport of criticism — the reckless reduction of the art and the artist, the result of “fear that you’re not gonna get the clicks.” As Malcolm stomps around reading an LA Times review aloud off of his phone, he could just as well be reading feedback from anyone with an online platform — that’s to say, one need not be a paid critic to get their opinions read; we could easily be watching Malcolm starring in an episode of “Celebrities Read Mean Tweets”. The film goes on to show us how often, how quickly, and how deliberately we weaponize our words when given the opportunity to speak.
We see this later, after Marie accuses Malcolm of stealing her life experience to make his movie. In response, Malcolm fires off a slew of details about his exes, all of whom — and not Marie, he insists — inspired the way his protagonist walks and talks and self-destructs. “You’re not the first broken girl I’ve known, fucked or dated,” he spits. Even when he attempts to express love, he can’t help but couch it in contempt — ostensibly for Marie. However, in this new role as self-appointed critic, tearing down his subject, his diagnosis of Marie’s “delusion” and her desperate “need to be needed” shines a light on his own insecurity and fear of irrelevance. The film suggests that the same could be said about the “White girl at the LA Times,” or any critic — me, for instance, writing this piece in the first place; that the same could be said for any of us sitting at home, typing our two cents, glibly participating in the sport of critique, dunking on others, not because it’s our duty to do so, but simply because we can.
“You could have won without all that shit,” Marie tells him. “You could have won with 20% of what you said. But you cannot help yourself.” Fans of Euphoria could guess that Zendaya is a force here as Malcolm’s lover, verbal punching bag, and conscience. Though 12 years Washington’s junior, she’s the acting veteran, and brings a steadying presence to each scene, particularly when she’s not speaking, and her eyes alone carry her end of the conversation. As loud as Malcolm is throughout the film (and he is loud), Marie is able to cut through that noise with the truth: that Malcolm is too thirsty for the “likes” to appreciate the love. In forgetting to publicly thank Marie at his premiere — the catalyst for tonight’s fight — he only proves that he, too, can’t fully grasp what makes his work… work. In choosing to come for Marie instead — and in such a cold, competitive fashion — he’s revealed more about the possible character of the critic than the quality of the critiqued.
“All I wanted tonight,” Marie says, “was a ‘thank you.’ That’s it.” And not just for inspiring the story of his film (“‘Thank you for being a drug addict. Thank you for being clean.’”), but for her contribution to his filmmaking process (“‘Thank for watching 100 cuts and reading 100 fucking drafts…’”) and to his life, both inside the home (“‘Thank you for doing the laundry and picking out my suit tonight and making my ungrateful ass some mac and cheese…’”) and outside (“‘…thank you for looking so goddamn sexy in that dress tonight. You make me look good.’”) Marie challenges Malcolm to exchange his ego for appreciation. And perhaps Malcolm & Marie challenges the viewer to do the same. So quick to react, to scoop one another, to read and be read, we often neglect to recognize the work that’s put into what we so eagerly, gleefully torch. This is as true for relationships as it is for art, both born out of vision, time, and sacrifice. Nobody sets out to disappoint, or to outright fail at either, even though most of us do at one point or another.
Which makes the good times all that much more worthwhile, and success all that more satisfying. For my money, this performance from Washington is a success. He brings his usual arsenal — his good looks, his humor, his energy, an admirable scrappiness that belies his pedigree. But it’s what he does in the quiet moments that sets this performance apart from his other lead roles. As Malcolm oscillates from love to hate, struck, it seems, by his own knack for callousness — ashamed, even — Washington finally uses those eyes of his to reveal a much needed vulnerability. We don’t sympathize with him because he’s the decided “star” of the movie; we empathize with him as a symbol of our own potential for ugliness (whether we’re ready to admit to it or not). When Malcolm takes his due dressing down from Marie, it’s clear from Washington’s face and his body language what it means to hear her, truly, possibly for the first time, and to have the camera lens (as it were) turn back on him.
When it does, we don’t see the same bombastic Malcolm swaggering to JB at the start of the film. Indeed, in both Malcolm & Marie and Black Caesar, our heroes — that is, our “protagonists” — are “brought down” by those closest to them, by the people they exploited and then neglected on their ascension. That Washington is able to navigate Malcolm’s rise and fall in the course of a single night; that he could so deftly depict both Malcolm’s humility and pride; that he suggests, with this role, his capacity for growth as a performer; that he accomplishes all this while holding his own opposite Zendaya, makes this, despite the film’s flaws, the best piece of acting that Washington has delivered so far. And his real revenge, here, is that he’s gotten me, a long-time skeptic of his, looking forward to what he’s able to do next.
