This film is a document of genius, however twisted and malformed it might have arrived onto the world. You get a sense that without the betrayal inherent in the story, Laura Albert's writing might have not been met with the same fanfare. Fair? Unfair? Does it matter? What Albert pulled off was her own; she brought an alter ego to life, and bamboozled a lot of people in the process. She also happens to be, as herself, a brilliant writer and public speaker, and this movie is transfixing because of her, rather than in spite of her. The way she tells her story in this documentary is completely delicious.
I won't bother with a primer, since those tuning into the film will surely know how about said deception, but won't know the details until they see it here. Those who have no clue about this story deserve to hear it from the horse's mouth.
What I'm most interested in what this deception/accomplishment says about the nature of celebrity and fame versus what it says about either Albert or the woman she enlisted to play JT LeRoy, Savannah Knoop. They were both playing roles, as were so many of the people they ingratiated themselves with; celebrities who knocked on their doors, rather than the other way around. The whole ordeal could be seen as a kind of long form performance art, although that would be unfairly generous, and Albert is so amusingly blunt in this documentary that she doesn't even try to pawn it off as such. She just explains how her lie got out of hand, and how amazed she was that it exploded so far out of proportion. She appears to be completely honest here, and that candidness is what makes the film so fun, and so astonishing.
I loved hearing Laura Albert as herself. A woman who was so afraid to be seen as the author of her own writing, as somebody so self conscious and suffering such negative self image, that it wasn't even a matter of trying to pull the wool over anybody's eyes, it was just a matter of necessity. Albert's con is so outlandish that it deserves a level of appreciation for the sophistication and dedication that went into it, although there is a level of illness and/or malevolence at play too.
This doc has been rightfully accused of glossing over some of this and presenting a single side of this story - many of LeRoy's suitors and admirers were horrified to learn that intimate conversations had been taped. Many people were embarrassed. And mostly people just wanted to believe, and wanted to be close to LeRoy, in whatever way, sometimes intimately. This is a game of celebrity, and if somebody wants to be famous this way, then so be it.
What separates Albert from a fame digger, or her as a fifteen minute idol is that she ultimately is a very talented writer, and wrote in a way that people responded to very deeply. And as a doc, this is about as entertaining as one could be.
