Variety: First Trailer for 'Maestro' Finds Bradley Cooper Embodying Composer Leonard Bernstein (https://variety.com/2023/film/news/bradley-cooper-maestro-trailer-leonard-bernstein-1235489118/)Neither Sondheim nor Laurents is currently listed as a character on the film's IMDb page (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5535276/).
But Jerome Robbins is. (Played by Michael Urie, no less). So make of that what you will.
Spoilers, I guess?, albeit so vague and general that they not only spoil almost nothing, but hardly even justify the article's existence, under this or any other headline:
(Your mileage may vary).
NYT - Venice Film Festival: All Your Questions About Bradley Cooper's Maestro Answered (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/02/movies/maestro-bradley-cooper-venice-film-festival.html)The gist: Kyle Buchanan got to go to Venice and see the Bernstein/Montealegre
biopic love story three months before its US release, and you didn't.
Also, there's a dream ballet.
I found Bilge Ebiri's mixed-but-intriguing
Vulture review (https://www.vulture.com/2023/09/maestro-bradley-coopers-leonard-bernstein-biopic-at-venice.html) (linked in Buchanan's teaser) much more informative, though still not to a degree that I'd call spoilerish.
More reviews here (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/maestro_2023/reviews?type=top_critics) (currently rated 93% Fresh on RT).
Interesting profile of the the sculptor and prosthetic-effects designer Kazu Hiro ...
The New Yorker: The Makeup Artist Behind Bradley Cooper's Prosthetic Nose (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/12/04/the-makeup-artist-behind-bradley-coopers-prosthetic-nose)
image.jpg
(Jason McDonald/Netflix/AP)
And an interview with Cooper ...
The New Yorker: Bradley Cooper on Lenny, Lenny's Nose, and "The Hangover" Part 4 (https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-interview/bradley-cooper-on-lenny-lennys-nose-and-the-hangover-part-4)
To celebrate the film's arrival on Netflix:
Genius.com: "The Saga of Lenny" (lyrics) (https://genius.com/Stephen-sondheim-and-lauren-bacall-the-saga-of-lenny-lyrics)
A dissenting opinion (with which I'm sorry to agree, at least in part -- though Cooper's film, even while giving somewhat short shrift to LB's work, still offers many compensatory pleasures), from a classical-music critic:
NYT: Maestro Won't Let Leonard Bernstein Fail (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/22/arts/music/maestro-bradley-cooper-leonard-bernstein.html?unlocked_article_code=1.IE0.g9BA.-1Wu-mZIiV82&hpgrp=k-abar&smid=url-share)
And a graceful fact-check/overview of the relationship between the real Bernstein and Montealegre:
Smithsonian magazine: The Real History Behind Maestro (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/real-history-leonard-bernstein-felicia-montealegre-maestro-bradley-cooper-180983310/)
Plus, a Times podcast dissecting Cooper's [mimicry of Bernstein's] skill at the podium:
NYT Audio: Our Critics on the Conducting in Maestro (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/21/podcasts/culture-desk-maestro-bradley-cooper.html?unlocked_article_code=1.IE0.e1zu.wnIQkItB5EQn&hpgrp=k-abar&smid=url-share)
For a movie that hasn't, either in its premise or its execution, actually fascinated me as much as this thread might seem to suggest, I have admittedly been plowing through a fair amount of its surrounding press over the past month or two. The following article is a bit older, from 2018, and non-film-related; but I found it the most interesting piece I've yet come across -- a review of Jamie Bernstein's book Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein ...
The New Yorker: Leonard Bernstein Through His Daughter's Eyes (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/06/25/leonard-bernstein-through-his-daughters-eyes)
...Which still isn't to say that I've become a passionate devotee of LB* or his family, or of Maestro, though I will probably give the movie another look at some point. On the basis of the review, I might possibly give Famous Father Girl a read too, though not right away; for the time being, at least, I'm feeling a little Bernsteined-out.
* But for what it's worth, I did also find a YouTube playlist (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLU0HyYmOgH8Xn06fDThwLDh95igfZpurQ) of all 53 of his Young People's Concerts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_People%27s_Concerts), which originally aired on CBS from 1958 to 1972; and another playlist (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFjonLo8gYHIXC35K4Ujrbu6XHchNDCv9) of his 1973 Norton Lectures (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unanswered_Question_(lecture_series)) at Harvard. Both series are also available on DVD from Kultur International Films, here (https://www.amazon.com/Leonard-Bernsteins-Peoples-Concert-Philharmonic/dp/B07HN6P7KZ/) and here (https://www.amazon.com/Unanswered-Question-Harvard-Leonard-Bernstein/dp/B00005TPL8/) respectively. The Norton Lectures were published as a book (https://www.amazon.com/Unanswered-Question-Harvard-Charles-Lectures/dp/0674920015/) in 1976, while the TV scripts for most of the Young People's Concerts can be read on the Bernstein Office's website (https://leonardbernstein.com/lectures/television-scripts/young-peoples-concerts) or purchased in a paperback edition here (https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-Concerts-Amadeus-Leonard-Bernstein/dp/1574671022).