“DOING THE CHAMELEON”

By Raymond Benson

Wikipedia defines “mockumentary” as a portmanteau (a linguistic blending of two words) of the words mock and documentary. Essentially, it’s a phony, comic documentary. Woody Allen didn’t invent this sub-genre of the comedy motion picture, but he delivered two of its more successful examples—his very first directorial feature, Take the Money and Run (1969), and Zelig, released in 1983. The latter can safely be counted as among the writer/director/actor’s best movies—and seeing that to date he has directed forty-six titles (and that’s not counting pictures he wrote but didn’t direct), that’s saying a lot.

Zelig, which takes place in the late 1920s to the early 30s, is the story of Leonard Zelig (Allen), a “chameleon man,” a nobody who inexplicably assumes the physical and aural characteristics of whoever he’s with. If he’s around scientists, he begins to speak the lingo and carry himself in an academic, erudite fashion; if he’s associating with Chinese folks, he turns Chinese, facial features included; and if he’s around African-Americans, his skin darkens. No one can figure out why this marvel occurs.

Before he knows it, Zelig becomes an international personality. The newsreels “of the day” are full of him as he rubs elbows with the contemporary rich and famous like F. Scott Fitzgerald or Jack Dempsey or even Adolf Hitler (all of whom appear in some way in the remarkable footage on display in this picture). As it was the “jazz age,” Leonard Zelig’s strange ability is celebrated in popular songs, dance crazes (everybody is “Doing the Chameleon”!), and merchandise befitting the lizard-like misfit.

Allen and his cinematographer, Gordon Willis (who was nominated for an Academy Award for the first time, unbelievably, for Zelig after acting as DP for such titles as The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, All the President’s Men, Annie Hall, and Manhattan, among many others) painstakingly inserted Woody Allen into frames of black and white still photographs and old newsreels—Forrest Gump-style, but without the benefit of CGI—to accomplish the amazing visual treatment for Zelig. The look of the film is simply remarkable, and totally believable, even more so than in Gump.

Additionally, color footage features 1983-era intellectual luminaries, such as Susan Sontag, Saul Bellow, and Irving Howe, providing “interviews” and commenting on the Leonard Zelig phenomenon as if it had really occurred.

The only other star of note besides Allen is Mia Farrow, who plays a psychiatrist who attempts to treat the “chameleon man.” Of course, Zelig and his doctor fall in love—it wouldn’t be a Woody Allen romantic comedy without the romance. It’s interesting to note that Allen actually started filming Zelig after Stardust Memories (1980) and it was the first of twelve films he made with Farrow. However, the visual effects took so much longer to achieve after principle photography was shot, that Allen wrote, directed, and released A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy (1982) before Zelig was completed.

Narrated by Patrick Horgan, a British actor with a voice that sounds astonishingly like one of those war-era documentarians, Zelig is a top-notch, sophisticated, and very funny comedy that is brilliantly photographed and directed. It was well-received at the time, and it launched Allen into a very successful run of several financially and critically-acclaimed pictures in the mid-1980s. And, as with all of the writer/director’s films, it helps if the audience knows a little bit about history, art, and literature—Woody Allen’s movies, then and now, are intended for a cultured crowd.

Twilight Time’s Blu-ray edition looks terrific—and you can’t complain about the artifacts and blemishes in the images because these were all intentional to make the old newsreel footage that much more believable. The disk comes with an isolated score track (and the “original” 20s-era music, adapted by Dick Hyman, is hilarious and dead-on), and the theatrical trailer. A collector's booklet with extensive liner notes by Julie Kirgo about the making of the film is also included.  

You, too, will be singing along with “You May Be Six People, But I Love You.” Limited to only 3000 copies, Zelig is a must-grab for Woody Allen fans.

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