by Douglas
Messerli
David Weissman
(director) Song from an Angel / 1988 [4 minutes]
Sitting in a wheelchair and dressed in the
indignity of a hospital gown, Price sings music based on Kurt Weill’s “One Life
to Live,” with lyrics by Janice Sukaitis. The piece, retitled “Less Time Than
You,” is a truly remarkable declaration to his friends to stop speaking of him
as being already dead and simply take him out to dinner, give him a deep hug,
or even something deeper as a gesture of love. With a ghostly appearance, but a
wonderfully playful presence, Price sings and even taps from his wheel chair to
a piano accompaniment by Scrumbly Kodewyn and moving lyrics such as those I’ve
chosen below:
There’s an element
of doom and desperation
when I’m the
subject of the conversation.
Locals agree, I’ll
never see
my washboard stomach
or my derriere,
my youthful abundant head of hair.
….
I start the day
every morning
inspiring angels like you.
You say I’m
thinner,
take me to dinner
because I’ve got less
time than you.
….
Don’t feel that
you’ve got to cure me
I just need
someone to drive
and keep the car
running smoothly,
bring me flowers,
they keep me alive!
This may be one of the most remarkable short films about AIDS victims ever made; the zany attitude the dying man conveys speaks to the thousands of brave victims which hung on to their talents, entertaining us until the very last moment of their gifted lives.*
Song from an Angel is an absolutely memorable warble of death, something once you see it you can never forget. This angel, Price, who Weissman’s film so beautifully memorializes, is someone any of us would surely have wanted know while he was living, to have, to kiss, and to hold near. This man’s joy of living is so palpable that it hurts just to watch. Song from an Angel is a little masterpiece to the terrible AIDS era.
*Weissman wrote me in response to this essay several comments that must be included in this discussion.
“That was one of the
most challenging and inspiring experiences of my life really. Rodney came
directly to the shoot from the hospital where he'd been semi-comatose for over
a week. I was afraid he'd die mid-performance. But never have I experienced
such a profound manifestation of ‘The show must go on.’”
Price died on August 15, 1988, at the age
of 38, just two weeks after he was filmed in this performance which Weissman was
not sure he could recreate given his condition. As Price himself expressed it
in the San Francisco Chronicle obituary essay about his performance: “It’s
amazing the kind of adrenaline you get. I guess, that’s the ‘old trouper’ kind
of thing, y’know. You never lose it.” Price made certain that the film was
dedicated to “Beaver Bauer, without whose love and support my life could never
be complete.”
Los Angeles, June 4,
2024
Reprinted from My
Queer Cinema blog (June 2024).
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