As the title suggests, Behind the Candelabra, in part, is about deception. The archetype for twentieth-century flamboyance, Liberace (Golden Globe winner Michael Douglas), refuses to age in front of his audience with the aide of numerous plastic surgeries, wigs, and makeup. His lover cum adopted son – sorta – convinces himself that he is the only one for Liberace, despite the performer’s track record with young, blonde men. Similarly, he also convinces himself that he is bisexual, as opposed to openly homosexual.
In this regard, Behind the Candelabra looks at the world of homosexuality in the 1970’s and early 1980’s. In Liberace’s prime – which appears to be between 1956 an 1980 — Liberace revealing himself as a homosexual would diminish his celebrity and cost him most everything. Thus, his agent Seymour (Dan Aykroyd) shells out money to create a fake love affair with Sonya Henie, while he and Liberace file lawsuits against various newspapers for libel. What’s ultimately created here is a culture of deception that begins with having to bury innate desire away from the public eye.
Such intense subversion also pervades the relationship between Liberace (affectionately known as Lee) and Scott (Matt Damon). There’s an overarching creepiness in the relationship that begins with the contrast of a young, toned Scott, and the wrinkled, bordering-on-overweight Lee. Moreover, there is an obvious manipulation that testifies to Lee’s need for control as well as Scott’s inherent callowness. This is never clearer than when Scott agrees to have plastic surgery – at Lee’s behest – to look more like Liberace. Lee’s agenda here is to mold Scott in his image and then legally adopt him as a son. In a way, this publically binds them so that homosexuality can be kept on a back burner, but this is also an agenda ripe with narcissism that threatens to overturn their relationship.
The resulting surgery is disturbing insomuch as Scott ends up looking like a wax figurine with jutting artificial cheek bones and an exaggerated triangular chin with a sloppily-constructed dimple. There’s also a sadness evoked, as this last act is the apex of desperation. Lee has found a replica, and the replica will continue to age, so Lee much move on.
And this is where Soderbergh’s commentary on deception comes full circle. The taboo of homosexuality simultaneously forced Lee and Scott to conceal their true selves, as well as allowed Lee to move without consequence in regards to relationships. Despite the talk of love and being “effectively married,” they are not. Despite the chatter about adopting Scott and leaving him everything up Liberace’s death, there is nothing legal to bind them, particularly since Lee and Seymour could never permit these bounds to come to light – even upon Lee’s eventual death.
While affectionate and sincere, Behind the Candelabra alludes to an additional benefit that stems from the rights for homosexuals to marry: the right for them to get divorced. Cynical, yes, but Scott and Lee’s need to conceal their relationship and its absence in legal recourse does more to protect Lee than Scott when the relationship founders.
Appropriately enough, Behind the Candelabra‘s place in the biopic genre forces us to question the veracity of Soderbergh’s chronicle of Liberarce’s life. The film itself is based on Scott Thorson’s autobiography that documents their five year relationship. As the film depicts, Scott becomes caught in a spiral of cocaine and prescription drug use — thanks to the amazingly unnerving Rob Lowe. And, despite the slight resolution at the end, Scott is the bitter, jaded party tossed out like last week’s less-attractive trash.
