And Everything Is Going Fine

And Everything builds to a portrait of a man at ease with what he sees as the fundamentally entropic nature of the universe, a man who views accidents as serendipitous events to be publicly chronicled and describes his art as ascribing order to chaos. It finally emerges as a fond ode to a fallen comrade: someone who, with scathing humor and unrivaled self-knowledge, fended off life's cruel, random blows by exhibiting them for all to see and in doing so related something universally human.

"Weaving performance and interview clips into an autobiographical collage on behalf of storyteller Spalding Gray, Steven Soderbergh delivers a poignant eulogy." - Bill Weber

If you love Spadling Gray, this is a must-see. In contrast to Gray's Anatomy, here Soderbergh takes a completely hands-off approach. Gray's life is told entirely by the man himself, with clips from his monologues and interviews; no voice-over, no explanatory text, no testimonials. And not a single mention of his suicide, although it often looms large over the film. It's beautifully put together, creating a biography/autobiography that's consistently entertaining, revealing and poignant.

Being completely unfamiliar with Gray's work this was a fascinating and entertaining portrait of a man.

Soderbergh, after having directed a monologue and using as many cinematic tricks to get the audience in the mood, lets Gray speak largely unaccompanied - this biography is pieced together from monologues and interviews which paint an interesting and funny autobiography of his life. It's very good, concerning not just Gray's personal life but also his unique career as a monologist. Funny and heartfelt, Soderbergh creates a feeling of Gray speaking despite using no new footage - because he IS.

As someone who knew nothing about Gray, this film acts as a sort of crash course into his worldview, which is simultaneously funny and heart-wrenching in its poignancy.

I really loved this film. I found it very inspiring. Spalding Gray was a very smart and funny and talented man and his death makes me very sad. This film would be great for both fans and newcomers.

Makes you realise how weird his '90s burst of celebrity was, watching him being interviewed on fucking E! and MTV by nimrods with no idea what he's talking about. I wasn't super into this at first (the way it's stitched together makes it more obvious how closely he skirts the line between incisive self-analysis and being a total drama queen) but I was close to tears by the end so that's something.

Melancholy elegy for a performer who at his best gave genuine glimpses of the depths and the shallows of the struggle with and against the dark shadow. The sea, it seems, was for Gray the object of his death drive, towards which he was drawn to re-assimilate and dis-assimilate as a kind of return to the maternal breast.

This is my first and only introduction into Spalding Gray. I saw it probably right when it came out on dvd -- so nine years ago -- and I still think about Gray and his stories. I don't know if its because the movie is so good or because Spalding is a mistro.