UNCOVERING WHITNEY
Director Kevin Macdonald reveals four key moments that shaped his documentary His preconceptions were challenged
“When I was first approached, I wasn’t interested. Nicole David, who was Whitney’s film agent, said she never understood why her life went the way it did. That was intriguing. And then she sent me a New Yorker article about Whitney that took her seriously as a musical genius whose social impact was enormous. I was fascinated and thought maybe I had underestimated her.”
the family got on board
The family were incredibly brave and it’s been difficult for them. But they were as good as their word. Right at the start I said to them I’d only do this if they’d give me final cut. There are things they didn’t want in there, but they accepted it when I said they had to stay. Because I think it’s been a therapy session for them. Especially for her brothers.”
he interviewed Bobby Brown
“It was an achievement to get him to appear, but he’s not yet psychologically able to talk honestly about it. Maybe he never will be. You can see quite a lot in the exchanges where he’s refusing to talk about drugs — sometimes people say more by their refusal to speak. I feel sorry for Bobby more than anything else. I think he’s a bit of an idiot, but I don’t think he’s a bad person.”
he discovered a dark secret
“There was something so distant about her. It reminded me of someone who’d been traumatised in childhood. And so I started to ask. Gary, her brother, said he’d been abused so I asked about Whitney and he was non-committal. Eventually Mary, Whitney’s assistant, said she wanted to talk about it. She felt it would encourage other people to come forward to talk about these things.”