Some pieces of media seem destined to excite us. When we hear that an issue particularly close to our hearts is going to be explored, that a topic we care about is going to be given its own series or film, expectations run high. This was the case for me with TÁR (2022), Todd Field’s most recent film, which follows the story of the eponymous Lydia Tár, a fictional renowned gay composer and conductor.
The discussion of representation in the world of classical music is a hot button issue, and most agree that systemic change is required – a report by Donne (Women in Music) found in a survey of 111 orchestras that less than 0.1% of works performed were by nonbinary composers. It was encouraging, then, to see a story centring on an openly queer female musician even being made – were we finally going to see the problem explored, the discourse of identity politics in classical music given the time it deserves? In short, no.
Before going any further, it is worth pointing out that despite my sense of disappointment at the film’s refusal to engage in this prescient and potentially beautiful, eye-opening issue, it was often a joy to watch. Each member of the cast delivered, Blanchett notably so of course, and each production element enhanced the ongoing psychological drama impressively, which was itself engaging and well-written. The depiction of music performance was, however, the biggest plus. Cate Blanchett actually studied conducting, and the players in the film were real professionals from the Dresden Philharmonic – it was a great relief not to see actors desperately miming along à la Amadeus.
However, the film had the opportunity to go further than this admittedly refreshing commitment to realism. Lydia Tár could have been a gift, but she’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing, as her character smacks of a cis straight man’s myopic impression of queer women. That is, a crucially masculine, tyrannical, manipulative ideologue; Lydia is a manipulative man in a woman’s body. She refers to herself as her daughter’s ‘father,’ wears (admittedly incredible) tailored suits, and bemoans her moniker of ‘maestra’ – she is a beautifully presented, intellectualised stereotype.
Further, it seems that Tár’s identity does not factor into her relationship with music at all; there is only the sense of novelty of a woman being appointed to lead a prestigious orchestra – she is taking her place ‘alongside the composers of the canon’ (to quote Adam Gopnik interviewing Tár in the film). However, that is not the exploration of queer identity in the notoriously homogenous world of classical music that this film could and should have been.
Field also manages to fumble the ball with another character, Max, one of Tár’s students with whom she clashes during a masterclass. Introduced as a self-described ‘BIPOC, pangender person’, their only character traits seem to be their identity itself and the virulent, petulant defence of said identity. Here we have yet another caricature, the white conservative’s nightmare speaking in buzzwords and demanding the world bends around them.
Even worse is the dynamic that emerges between the two characters, and the subsequent reduction of an important debate – how to reconcile modern identity and expression with such sanctified music. Max limply defends their (supposedly) ill-founded misgivings – ‘white, male, cis composers…just not my thing’ – they are presented as a figure of ridicule as a result of their dogmatism. Tár then seems prompted to complain of ‘the narcissism of small differences’ leading to ‘the most boring conformity,’ that ‘if Bach’s talent can be reduced to his gender, birth country, religion, sexuality, and so on, then so can yours.’ She fulfils her dramatic role as an iconoclastic, brutal polemicist, but in doing so completely tramples an engaging conversation waiting to be had.
This scene is where the film’s true colours became clear. Tár’s identity only factors into the debate in the form of a gauche joke on her part, and she is otherwise a mouthpiece for traditionalist ideals – in essence, these works and composers are greater than you will ever be, and it is a grievous sin to humanise them. Max fares no better, nervously fighting their corner with their argument founded on nothing but their main character trait, their identity. Neither character seems likely to come to a flexible, more Barthesian conclusion in their relationship with classical works and composers, with Tár proudly admitting her lesbian identity is nigh on erased when she comes ‘nose to nose’ with Beethoven’s ‘magnitude and inevitability,’ placing herself under the thumb of the author, rather than in dialogue with him.
Artists and musicians like Max exist in the real world, but they are not standing against years of criticism and pedagogy for the sake of their identities, but for the sake of the preservation of classical music in harmony with modern values. In the film this is depicted as childish, inchoate whinging, but how is change to be substantiated if not through active efforts for diversification and resistance of traditionalism?
Most damningly of all, while TÁR has (rightly) received praise from film critics on account of its direction, acting, writing and so on, the reception in the world of classical music has been telling. Marin Alsop, one of the most eminent living conductors, who is herself a lesbian, voiced downright disgust in a recent Sunday Times interview – she labels the film ‘anti-woman,’ continuing, ‘I was offended as a woman, I was offended as a conductor, I was offended as a lesbian.’ Who better to be passing judgement on this venture?
TÁR undoubtedly succeeds as a character drama about a self-destructive artist, just like Black Swan and Whiplash before it. However, it fails as an exploration of the queer experience in classical music, and as a meaningful discussion of the nature and importance of interpretation; possibly because it was never intended as such.