This fall Netflix premiered two queer biopics. Rustin focuses on the year 1963 as Bayard Rustin co-organizes the March on Washington. Maestro follows the three-decade romance of Leonard and Felicia Montealegre Bernstein. The history is important. The people are interesting. The biopic formula lets them down. (Spoilers ahead.)

Rustin

Bayard Rustin (1912-1987) is an overlooked figure in the American Civil Rights movement. Martin Luther King Jr. looked on him as a trusted advisor. Other activists criticized him for his homosexuality and Communist past. Colman Domingo’s Rustin must not only perform a service but excel at it to justify his place in the movement. Domingo breathes life into a role made of exposition and inspirational speeches.

Screenwriter Dustin Lance Black imagines contrasting love interests for Rustin. A proud white activist (Gus Halper) and a closeted black preacher (Johnny Ramey). Both are cliches. Halper is basically playing James Franco’s role from Black’s previous film Milk. But it’s nice to see same-sex relationships treated with respect. The biopic genre can often be homophobic.

The swift moving screenplay fails to give any moment proper weight. The supporting actors (including Al Ameen, Audra McDonald, Chris Rock, Glynn Turman and Jeffrey Wright) get one character trait apiece. Even the march itself is given short shrift. Director George C. Wolfe lacks the budget to capture the scope. So, he skips to the aftermath. Rustin receives yet another snub from his fellow activists. True to life, perhaps, but anticlimactic.

Bayard Rustin deserves to be remembered. This film may not be.

Maestro

Bradley Cooper directs, stars and co-writes this biopic of musician Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990). The artist is seen through the eyes of his long-suffering wife. Carrie Mulligan’s Felicia starts as a lively bohemian. She doesn’t realize she’s being drained of all life till it’s too late. Then come the bitter tears and cutting remarks. It’s a powerful performance in a thankless role.  

Cooper plays Lenny as a hyper energy vampire. Always hungry for the next cigarette or chorus boy. He shows us his work, highlighting every studied gesture, vocal pattern and facial prosthetic. He painstakingly recreates Lenny’s conductors’ technique in an extended take. But he never captures Lenny’s inner life. Is Lenny gay or bi? Does he consider the marriage one of love or necessity? What does he get from the relationship that he doesn’t from the men in his life? And why do those men never get a say?

Matt Bomer and Gideon Glick’s talents are wasted as Lenny’s disposable boyfriends. Neither is allowed a meaningful conversation. Felicia sees them as interlopers. Obstacles to heterosexual bliss. A late scene features Cooper dancing in a gay club under blood red lights as if he wandered into the second circle of hell. This unconscious homophobia is infuriating. At one point Lenny tries to speak with his daughter about his current male partner. She says “I don’t want to hear this.” I cynically suspect that the Bernstein estate didn’t want to hear about it either.

Maestro’s the more entertaining film. Cooper directs with visual flair and a screwball comedy rhythm. Rustin’s more honest. Neither solves the problems baked into the biopic formula. Presenting a string of events and external traits without shaping them into a satisfying arc.

You can find more of my reviews on The Avocado, Letterboxd and Serializd. My podcast, Rainbow Colored Glasses, can be found here.