CLAPPING FOR THE WRONG REASONS (2013)
It’s fascinating to follow multi-hyphenate careers as they morph from one medium into another, and back again. For a certain set of people, seeing You Can’t Do That On Television’s plucky Alanis Morrisette become an icon for women scorned and introspection was a bit of a trip. The primary image of O.J. Simpson is closely associated with generational differences—a football player, the NAKED GUN actor, a murderer, a historical lens of race and the justice system are all part of Simpson’s life, but one particular aspect reigns supreme depending on when you were first introduced to the figure.
I first knew Don Glover as a member of the Derrick Comedy troupe that put up various sketches online and eventually made the (under-discussed) film MYSTERY TEAM. I also was aware that he wrote for 30 Rock.
But I truly came to know him best in his astounding performance as Troy on Community.
Around that time I discovered his side project as a musician under the pseudonym Childish Gambino. Most of his tracks in those days were fun affairs with good beats and clever wordplay (he also scored MYSTERY TEAM—another reason to watch the 2009 movie!).
But eventually he dove even further into the musicianship and pushed outside his comfort zone to make innovative and evocative music. In conjunction to this were the many music videos he made with director Hiro Murai, who would also helm multiple episodes of Glover’s show Atlanta when that launched (a series that would combine seemingly every aspect of his career up to that point).
2013 saw the release of Childish Gambino’s Because The Internet album. It was more experimental than his previous musical works, but still held over the winking comedy from his acting and writing days, while beginning to explore personal and societal issues in an impressively forthright manner. Along with these mutative tracks, Glover released a short film (directed by Murai) titled CLAPPING FOR THE WRONG REASONS. It is an abstract film that seems meant to capture a “day in the life”, by exploring how success breeds loneliness and the escapism of creation, all while engaging in a bunch of dreamlike sequences that include odd imagery and bizarre dialogue (also I swear there are a bunch of references to Aronofsky’s works and Lynch’s LOST HIGHWAY in it).
It feels akin to the sort of aloof L.A. weirdness of INHERENT VICE, UNDER THE SILVER LAKE, and others. And yet it’s absolutely its own thing. It’s been a long strange trip for Glover but also as a fan of his, to see him move from silly hijinks into surrealistic musical portraits in ways that should be completely disparate and yet all feel like individual patches stitched together along the same quilt.