Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story
| Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story | |
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Cover
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| Directed by | Todd Haynes |
| Produced by | Todd Haynes |
| Written by | Todd Haynes Cynthia Schneider |
| Starring | Merrill Gruver Michael Edwards |
| Narrated by | Gwen Kraus Bruce Tuthill |
| Music by | The Carpenters |
| Cinematography | Barry Ellsworth |
| Edited by | Todd Haynes |
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Production
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Iced Tea Productions
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| Distributed by | American International Video Search, Inc. |
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Release date
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Running time
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43 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story is a 1987 American short biographical film produced and directed by Todd Haynes, co-written by Haynes and Cynthia Schneider, and follows scenes from the final seventeen years of Karen Carpenter's life. The film was withdrawn from circulation in 1990 after Haynes lost a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by Karen's brother and musical collaborator, Richard Carpenter. The film's title is derived from The Carpenters' 1971 hit song, "Superstar".
Over the years, it has developed into a cult film and is included in Entertainment Weekly's 2003 list of top 50 cult movies.
The film covers Karen Carpenter from the time of her "discovery" in 1966 to her untimely death by cardiac arrest (secondary to anorexia nervosa) in 1983. The movie begins with a quasi-first person recap of her mother Agnes Carpenter discovering Karen's body in her parents' Downey, California home on February 4, 1983, and then returns by flashback to 1966. The story touches on major points in Karen's life from 1966 on:
An unusual facet of the film was that, instead of actors, almost all parts were played by modified Barbie dolls. In particular, Haynes detailed Karen's worsening anorexia by subtly whittling away at the face and arms of the "Karen" Barbie doll. Sets were created properly scaled to the dolls, including locales such as the Carpenter home in Downey, Karen's apartment in Century City, restaurants, recording studios – including minute details such as labels on wine bottles and Ex-Lax boxes. Interspersed with the story were documentary-style segments detailing the times in which Karen Carpenter lived and also detailing anorexia; these segments were seen as dry and melodramatic parodies of the documentary genre. The underlying soundtrack included many popular hits of the day, including duets such as Elton John and Kiki Dee and Captain & Tennille, and songs by Gilbert O'Sullivan, Leon Russell, and the Carpenters themselves.
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