"Offended as a woman, as a conductor, as a lesbian": Marin Alsop criticizes the film Tár with Cate Blanchett

With the upcoming Academy Awards fast approaching, there are rumors that a statuette may well be awarded to Cate Blanchett for her portrayal of an ambitious, manipulative lesbian bandleader accused of abuse and harassment in the film

.

Although fictional, his character seems to be problematic.

According to the

Zachary Woolfe, the film is largely inspired by the life of Marin Alsop.

At 66, the latter is the most famous woman conductor in the world, winner of the prestigious MacArthur Prize, pioneer conductor of the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, also the first woman, until recently, conductor of a great American orchestra.

A curious tribute which did not fail to react to the person concerned in the columns of the

this Sunday, January 8.

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The dangers of docu-drama

“I first heard about it at the end of August and I was shocked to find that it was the first time I had heard of it, says Marin Alsop to our colleagues from the

. .

So many superficial aspects of

seemed to fit my personal life.

But once I saw it, I was no longer concerned, I was offended: I was offended as a woman, I was offended as a conductor, I was offended as lesbian."

If the sexagenarian salutes the performance of Cate Blanchett, she denounces the dangerous game of this form of docufiction overseen by the director Todd Field.

“People can be wrong about what's real and what's not,” she points out.

In video, the trailer of

Tár

with Cate Blanchett

An “anti-woman” role

Her primary concern is not to whitewash her own reputation, assures Marin Alsop, but that of her colleagues.

"Having the opportunity to portray a woman in this role and turn her into an aggressor, it broke my heart," she says.

I think all women and all feminists should be embarrassed by this kind of representation, because it's not really about female conductors, is it?

It is about women as leaders in our society.”

“There are so many real, documented men that this movie could have taken inspiration from but, instead, (Todd Field) puts a woman in the role but gives her all the trappings of those men.

It's "anti-woman", she criticizes.

To assume that women will either behave identically to men or go hysterical, mad, demented is to perpetuate something we've seen in movies so many times before."

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Where are the chiefs?

For several years now, the conductor has been denouncing a glaring lack of female representation in her milieu.

"Women are more likely to lead a G7 country or become four-star generals in the US military than to be the principal conductor of a large orchestra", she lamented in 2021 in the documentary

.

And history proves it.

Appointed musical director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in 2007, Marin Alsop was the only woman to hold such a position in the United States.

Fifteen years later, only one remains in this role (Nathalie Stutzmann in Atlanta);

no other woman has been appointed to lead one of the country's five major orchestras.

In Europe, especially in the Scandinavian countries, the situation is better, nuance

.

Before adding: “But parity still remains a utopia;

since 2006, the number of women conductors at the international level has only increased by 1%.