I mean, there's never been a single woman who's held the principal conductor post of a major German orchestra. I mean, it's - you know, in many ways, this film's a fractured fairy tale. Is it enough to say, well, you know, that's what white cisgendered men did?įIELD: No, I don't think it's enough to say that. Tar and some of the people around her invariably cite a long list of male conductors who did the same thing historically. SIMON: I think we don't reveal too much to say she is accused of abusing her power to compel sexual relationships. And that dream now has become sort of a nightmare based on, as you point out, you know, what she's actually doing running this organization and probably speaking to some of her less-than-admirable traits. What does Lydia Tar find in music, do you think?įIELD: I think she found probably the very first glimpse as a young person, you know, viewing, say, Lenny Bernstein on PBS or something like that, which was a window to something beautiful and fine and exotic that she didn't have in her upbringing. It's a little bit like being on Mount Olympus, you know? There are very few people who've walked the earth who knows exactly what that is. And if you talk to other conductors or if you hear them speak, they talk about that feeling of the music coming through them. Are they also the words of someone who is intoxicated with all that power?įIELD: Well, I mean, it's a very, very, you know, exalted position to be a conductor, as anyone who's had the opportunity and the privilege of doing it will tell you. SIMON: That description is, if I may, sensuous and lyrical and intoxicating. And the exact moment that you and I will arrive at our destination together. The reality is that right from the very beginning, I know precisely what time it is.īLANCHETT: (As Lydia Tar). Making the decision about the right moment to restart the thing or reset it or throw time out the window altogether. Now, the illusion is that, like you, I'm responding to the orchestra in real time.īLANCHETT: (As Lydia Tar). She is trying to describe what she does on stage to the real-life Adam Gopnik of The New Yorker as the orchestra's metronome.īLANCHETT: (As Lydia Tar) And however, unlike a clock, sometimes my second hand stops, which means that time stops. Cate Blanchett has been acclaimed for giving the performance of a lifetime, which is quite a statement given her lifetime career. SIMON: You do appreciate, seeing this film, how the head of a major orchestra really is the CEO, isn't she?įIELD: Yeah, she's sitting at the head of a very large bureaucracy with very, very defined lines of power and how that's transmitted and transmuted between different parties, for sure. So it felt sort of important that maybe our lead character wasn't a male and that perhaps we would have a slightly more nuanced way of asking some questions. And potentially, the tempo of arriving at that feeling narrows the possibilities of examining how the pyramid of power actually functions. ![]() So we're attenuated to how we're supposed to feel about that. Those individuals have been male and the last 2,000 years, predominantly white males. SIMON: What made you want to tell this story?įIELD: Well, I'd been thinking about this character for a very long time and sort of been asking myself, you know, some questions of how we look at power, you know? Like, who has it? Who feeds it? Who benefits? You know, and from the beginning of time, that hasn't really been a question. SIMON: But what is the cost of that song she creates sometimes, to her and to others? Todd Field wrote and directed "Tar," and he joins us now. OK? It's got to be like just one person singing their heart out. "Tar" is one of the biggest films of the fall - Cate Blanchett as Lydia Tar, a world-class, world-roving orchestra conductor - New York City, Berlin - who is, by universal acclaim, brilliant, driven and has the rare genius to make classical music come alive.ĬATE BLANCHETT: (As Lydia Tar) Please.
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