Paul Williams is a singularly fascinating figure of American popular culture ― a singer, an actor, and a songwriter whose work has made an undeniable mark across many eras. He wrote songs for the Carpenters and Barbra Streisand, as well as one (“The Rainbow Connection”) for Kermit the Frog, in The Muppet Movie. Williams was also, possibly, the best talk show guest of the 1970s.
His story, which also included a lengthy spell of alcoholism and drug addiction, would seem an ideal subject for a documentary. Paul Williams: Still Alive is that, but it’s also something much, much weirder.
For part of its time, Paul Williams: Still Alive ― released in June of 2012, ten years ago last week ― is a conventional documentary, featuring interviews with Williams, and lots of archival footage of movies, and live performances, which get at why he was an important figure. There’s also quite a bit of Williams in the then-present day, going on the road to see adoring fans. Seeing this footage makes me especially sad that we never got a Paul Williams biopic starring Philip Seymour Hoffman.
The other side of the movie is the Stephen Kessler side. Kessler is the director, and also the co-protagonist. The story is that Kessler grew up as a Williams superfan, at some point lost track of him, and just assumed that he was dead. Then, Googling one day, he discovered Williams wasn’t dead after all. So he decided to follow Williams everywhere, and make a documentary about him.
It’s the Michael Moore/Morgan Spurlock/Nick Broomfield school of documentary filmmaking that was in vogue at the time
Kessler is a journeyman filmmaker who’s best known for directing Vegas Vacation, plus a long list of commercials. Throughout the film, he narrates, repeatedly bringing the focus to himself. And it’s also clear, many times throughout, that Williams is visibly annoyed with him.
Sure, it’s the Michael Moore/Morgan Spurlock/Nick Broomfield school of documentary filmmaking that was in vogue at the time, in which the documentarian is front and center and makes the film less about its subject and more about the filmmaker’s journey. But it’s especially egregious here; why would we want to watch an uninteresting filmmaker, rather than one of the more compelling pop culture figures of the last half-century?
A similar film in 2013, Dear Mr. Watterson, was somewhat similar, in which the filmmaker at times seemed to be stalking the reclusive “Calvin and Hobbes” creator. The great Documentary Now! would parody this tendency a couple of years later with “Searching for Mr. Larson.”
Paul Williams: Still Alive may have felt like an end-of-career summation for Williams, but the now 81-year-old has been up to quite a lot in the decade since. In fact, he won an Album of the Year Grammy in 2014 for his work on Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories album, delivering a memorable speech:
In 2017, he made a fantastic cameo in Edgar Wright’s movie Baby Driver, as a white-suited arms dealer, delivering a speech comparing guns to meat (I remember someone in the theater blurting out “that’s Paul Williams!”).
As for Stephen Kessler, Paul Williams: Still Alive remains his last directorial credit to date.
Paul Williams: Still Alive is now available to stream on Vudu, for free with ads. I’d be up for a sequel, albeit one where the filmmaker remains off camera.
