NEW YORK ‒Step aside, “Mr. Robot.”
Rami Malek delivers an exquisite, career-best turn in “The Man I Love,” a bittersweet tribute to queer art and community set in 1980s New York. The Oscar-winning actor plays Jimmy George, a free-spirited performance artist preparing for one last show as he’s dying of AIDS.
Co-written and directed by Ira Sachs (“Passages”), the understated drama features a bevy of stunning musical performances, including a heart-wrenching cover of Melanie’s 1970 hit “Look What They’ve Done to My Song, Ma” that far surpasses anything Malek did as Freddie Mercury in 2018’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.” (Rebecca Hall, playing Jimmy’s devoted sister, Brenda, also has a gorgeous set of pipes.)
He wants to talk about it.
After a lauded premiere at France’s Cannes Film Festival in May, the movie bowed at the New York Film Festival Oct. 8 as it continues to seek U.S. distribution.
“People often ask: After the accolades, is it a given that you can just walk into a film like this? It’s not,” Malek said at post-screening Q&A at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. He explained that he sat down and got to know Sachs well before officially signing onto the project, and together, they built the character of Jimmy from the ground up.
“I could really relate to him and wanting to make the best out of everything you have, knowing there's a finite time,” Malek says. “I kept looking at that character, and thinking of creativity and love and lust and joy as being ... almost an act of defiance. As this powerful way of remaining present and enjoying life when the world was almost asking you to disappear.”
The film revolves around a love triangle, as Jimmy goes to bed with his eager and doe-eyed neighbor, Vincent (Luther Ford, in his captivating big-screen debut). But it’s Tom Sturridge who is a quiet knockout as Jimmy’s reliable long-term partner, Dennis, a tender caregiver and devastating voice of reason, even as he’s relegated to the background of Jimmy’s exciting, bohemian lifestyle.
Sturridge, a Tony-nominated theater veteran, beautifully anchors the movie with his shattering turn, which with any luck, will garner awards attention down the line.
“I've watched almost all of your plays, which I hope is not creepy,” Malek said of Sturridge, who joined him onstage at NYFF. “We sat down at a pub in London, and he put his hand on my hand. When you talk about chemistry, I was like, ‘Oh, I'm in great hands.’ I felt incredibly safe, and I think that's what Jimmy is straddling in a way: this sense of life and death. With Tom's character, we have this understanding that this man is always going to be there.”
In speaking with Malek, "we were very confident there was a grammar of intimacy that people who've loved each other for a very long time have," Sturridge said. "It's not one that's articulated with words ‒ it's with fingers and eyes and ankles. The way you develop that language is very boring and simple: It's just time."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Rami Malek's new role in 'The Man I Love' is an 'act of defiance'
