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Here’s What’s Fact and What’s Fiction in Love & Mercy , the New Biopic About Brian Wilson

In Love & Mercy , the new biopic about the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson, there’s a scene in which legendary studio musician and Wrecking Crew bass player Carol Kaye notices something unusual about the sheet music that Wilson has set in front of her: “Two different bass lines in two different keys?” she asks. “How does that work?” “It works in my head,” Wilson replies. In many ways, this also sums up the approach of the film, which could be said to work in two different keys at once: It cuts back and forth between two very specific periods of Wilson’s life, Wilson’s songwriting heyday of the mid-1960s and his time under the control of Dr. Eugene Landy in the mid-1980s.

But what’s fact and what’s artistic license in these two portrayals? I consulted several sources to find out, including Peter Ames Carlin’s acclaimed biography of Wilson, Catch A Wave: The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson , as well as “Beach Boys: A California Saga,” an in-depth two-part article about the band published in Rolling Stone in 1971. While Love & Mercy makes some perhaps necessary adjustments to simplify the musician’s story, the film is generally quite meticulous in its presentation of the events of Wilson’s life—not least because because co-screenwriter Oren Moverman consulted Wilson, now 72, and his wife, Melinda , while writing the screenplay.

Brian Wilson in the mid-1960s (Paul Dano)

Paul Dano plays the young, baby-faced songwriter as a vulnerable, earnest musical prodigy and a perfectionist in the studio, just as he was in real life. The 1971 Rolling Stone profile describes Wilson’s recording process during this period: “At a session he would go around to each player, take the instrument from him, show him what he wanted, and hand it back. Once that was accomplished he could go into the booth and take over the board. Sometimes he would mix the track even as it was being recorded.”

Just as in the movie, Wilson has also been deaf in his right ear at least since childhood, but accounts differ on whether this was caused by a blow to the head from his abusive father Murry Wilson, as the movie suggests. Murry denied that he caused it, and Brian thinks it’s possible that he was deaf from birth. Wilson’s father also really did acquire authority over his son’s share of Sea of Tunes, the publishing company that owned the copyrights to most of the Beach Boys’ songs, before selling them to A&M records for $700,000. (Exactly how Murry managed this would later be the subject of lawsuits.) Exactly when Wilson began taking LSD is the subject of some debate, but in a 2006 interview Wilson said that he started hearing voices shortly thereafter .

Mike Love (Jake Abel) and the Beach Boys

Most of the other Beach Boys—Brian’s brothers Carl Wilson and Dennis Wilson, and childhood friend Al Jardine, are minor characters in the movie—with one exception: Brian’s cousin Mike Love, who is portrayed a foil to the songwriter.

Love & Mercy depicts Love as focused on the band’s profits and frustrated with Brian’s perfectionism, his mental illness, and his drug use. (Though the film doesn’t always specify the drugs Wilson used over the years—especially during his darker periods—they included cocaine, cannabis, and amphetamines, in addition to LSD.) This portrayal is more or less accurate, if understandably one-sided: The notoriously adversarial relationship between Brian and his cousin led to disputes over songwriting credits and ownership of the band’s name, and their disagreements have continued all the way up through the Beach Boys’ recent 50 th anniversary tour .

Brian Wilson in the 1970s and 1980s (John Cusack)

Brian Wilson in the 1980’s and John Cusack in Love & Mercy

The darkest chapter of Brian’s life, the period during which he was rumored to be essentially catatonic in bed for two years during the mid-1970s, occurs mostly off-screen. Stories of this period are so central to the Brian Wilson mythos that they became the inspiration for the Barenaked Ladies song “ Brian Wilson ” (a song which the musician himself has since performed).

Love & Mercy openly addresses this rumor by having Melinda Ledbetter (Elizabeth Banks) ask the musician outright if it’s true, to which Cusack’s character responds, “Actually, it was more like three [years]. At least, that’s what I tell people.” The response seems genuine: Though the real-life Brian spent a great deal of that time in bed, he was also taking drugs, drinking, overeating, and going to clubs, including the bar at the Chateau Marmont.

Melinda Ledbetter (Elizabeth Banks)

Melinda Ledbetter in 2002 and still of Elizabeth Banks in Love & Mercy

The film is most precise in its recreation of the details of Brian’s courtship of his future wife, perhaps due to the real-life Melinda Wilson’s involvement in the film’s production . Melinda Ledbetter did meet her husband while working at Martin Cadillac, and he did buy the first car she showed him, a brown Seville. Although moments like Brian telling his future wife about the death of his brother Dennis while at a Cadillac dealership might seem contrived to cram in some exposition, Brian really did tell her then about how two years prior Dennis drowned , according to Catch a Wave . Similarly, before their first date, Wilson really did stand in the courtyard outside Ledbetter’s apartment, shouting her name. One difference: Eugene Landy did not actually accompany them on that date. Instead, his assistants did, and he called to check in several times.

Eugene Landy (Paul Giamatti)

Eugene Landy in the 1980s and Paul Giamatti in the movie Love & Mercy

Ultimately, in a film full of minor villains like Murry and Love, it is Landy who becomes Love & Mercy’s main antagonist. A hairpiece-clad Giamatti plays the role with such a terrifying blend of smarm and rage that the real Brian Wilson, when interviewed about the film, called the performance so true to life that it frightened him . Landy’s actions may seem too extreme to be plausible, but the doctor did in fact exert around-the-clock control over Brian’s life, monitoring his diet and love life, influencing his music, and keeping him drugged on heavy medication for what he falsely claimed was a mix of paranoid schizophrenia and manic depression. (The diagnosis was later overturned, and Melinda now says he has “ schizoaffective disorder, which is a manic depressive with auditory hallucinations .”)

Where the film does take artistic liberties is in its depiction of how Brian came to be rescued from Landy’s care. In the film, it is Ledbetter, aided by Brian’s housekeeper, Gloria Ramos, who persuades Carl Wilson to intervene by presenting evidence of Landy’s undue influence—specifically a 1989 will leaving most of Brian’s assets to Landy. The will is real: Landy was named Wilson’s primary beneficiary, though he claimed no knowledge of this at the time. But Carlin instead credits therapist and longtime Beach Boys fan Peter Reum with bringing Brian’s condition to the attention of Carl Wilson and biographer David Leaf. Reum, according to Carlin, noticed at a 1990 fan convention the physical changes Brian had undergone. However, Gloria Ramos is thanked in the credits of several of Brian’s albums, along with Leaf.

Here’s What’s Fact and What’s Fiction in Bessie , HBO’s New Bessie Smith Biopic
Here’s What’s Fact and What’s Fiction in Jersey Boys , Clint Eastwood’s Four Seasons Biopic

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Love & Mercy

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As unconventional and unwieldy as the life and legacy it honors, Love & Mercy should prove moving for Brian Wilson fans while still satisfying neophytes.

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Audience reviews, cast & crew.

Bill Pohlad

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Love & Mercy presents an unconventional portrait of Brian Wilson, the mercurial singer, songwriter and leader of The Beach Boys. Set against the era-defining catalog of Wilson’s music, the film intimately examines the personal voyage and ultimate salvation of the icon whose success came at extraordinary personal cost.

“ A great movie with superb performances.”

“Exhilarating and inventive.”

“ Bold …Explodes expectations of what a biopic can and should be.”

“Paul Dano delivers an astonishing performance as the younger version of Brian Wilson, with John Cusack playing him in the later years, a gambit that pays off handsomely in a production that reflects Wilson’s blaring imagination with its own ingenious structure, visual approach, sound design and poetic sensibility.”

“ A deeply satisfying pop biopic. John Cusack gives one of the best performances of his career.”

“It’s a refreshing surprise to find Love & Mercy , a story about the pop icon Brian Wilson from two ends of his life, break the mold and even invigorate the form.”

“For Beach Boys fans this will be an obvious must-see.”

“Paul Dano and John Cusack both do sterling work as the two halves of this broken soul, drawing us in and making us care, so that when we do finally get a chance to see the real Brian Wilson.”

“It’s like being inside Brian Wilson’s creativity.”

“ As conceived and written by veteran filmmaker Oren Moverman (Bob Dylan film I'm Not There , most pertinently), the fact-based Love & Mercy intercuts two tracks of Wilson’s life. In so doing, Love & Mercy achieves the improbable: make a music biopic circa 2015 fresh and interesting.”

“Paul Giamatti is marvelously monomaniacal as Eugene Landy.”

“Elizabeth Banks is terrific.”

With an impressive body of work spanning the course of two decades, John Cusack (Brian Wilson, 1980s) has evolved into one of Hollywood’s most accomplished and respected actors of his generation, garnering both critical acclaim as well as prestigious accolades for his dramatic and comedic roles. In April 2012, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce presented Cusack with the 2,469 th Hollywood Walk of Fame star, honoring his long, groundbreaking career in film.

Cusack first gained the attention of audiences by starring in a number of 1980s film classics such as The Sure Thing , Say Anything and Sixteen Candles . Following these roles, Cusack successfully shed his teen-heartthrob image by demonstrating his ability to expand his film repertoire by starring in a wide range of dramas, thrillers and comedies including The Grifters , Eight Men Out , Being John Malkovich , High Fidelity and Grosse Pointe Blank .

Cusack next stars in Bill Pohlad’s Love and Mercy , in which he will play iconic Beach Boys songwriter and musician Brian Wilson. Cusack stars opposite Paul Dano, Elizabeth Banks and Paul Giamatti as Wilson in the later years of his life. The film premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival and will be released this June. Cusack also starred in David Cronenberg’s latest film, Maps to the Stars alongside Julianne Moore, Robert Pattinson and Mia Wasikowska which premiered at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival and will be released this February.

In 2012 Cusack appeared in Lee Daniels’ drama, The Paperboy , opposite Nicole Kidman, Zac Efron and Matthew McConaughey as Hillary Van Wetter, an inmate on death row. The Paperboy debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2012. Cusack also starred in the independent thriller The Raven where he portrayed the infamous author, Edgar Allen Poe.

Additionally, in 2009 he starred in Roland Emmerich’s apocalyptic thriller, 2012 . Released by Sony Pictures, the international blockbuster went on to gross more than $766 million worldwide.

In 2001 Cusack was nominated for a Golden Globe® Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical for his role in the feature version of Nick Hornby's English novel, High Fidelity , for Touchstone Pictures. In addition to starring in the film, Cusack also co-produced and co-wrote the script with Steve Pink and D.V. DeVincentis. The film also stars Jack Black, Lisa Bonet, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Joan Cusack.

In 1999 Cusack starred in the dark comedy Being John Malkovich for USA Films. Cusack’s performance earned him an Independent Spirit Award nomination in the category of Best Actor.

Some of his other feature film credits include: Adult World , The Frozen Ground , Hot Tub Time Machine , War Inc. , Grace Is Gone , The Ice Harvest , Runaway Jury , Identity , Max , Cradle Will Rock , The Thin Red Line , Con Air , City Hall , Bullets Over Broadway , The Road to Wellville , True Colors , Broadcast News , Serendipity , Better Off Dead and Stand By Me .

Cusack divides his time between Los Angeles and Chicago.

Emmy®-nominated actress, producer and director Elizabeth Banks (Melinda Ledbetter) has become one of Hollywood’s most sought after and versatile actresses, easily navigating between stage and screen, comedy and drama. In addition to acting, she has completed production on her feature directorial debut with Pitch Perfect 2 , the sequel to Pitch Perfect . She is also producing the film along with her husband, Max Handelman, through their company, Brownstone Productions. Pitch Perfect 2 will be released on May 15 th .

This summer, Banks stars in Love & Mercy which premiered at the 2014 Toronto Film Festival. Directed by Bill Pohlad, the film takes an unconventional look at the life of the celebrated leader of The Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, and his battle with mental illness. She also makes an appearance in Magic Mike XXL , the sequel to Magic Mike starring Channing Tatum and the indie Every Secret Thing , written by Nicole Holofcener. She recently wrapped production on the Netflix reprisal of the cult hit Wet, Hot, American Summer .

Banks will next star in and produce the untitled HBO film playing Billie Jean King in the true story of the 1973 Battle of the Sexes tennis match in which King beat the former Wimbeldon champ Bobby Riggs. Paul Giamatti will star as Riggs. She and her husband also serve as producers on the comedy series Resident Advisors which is set in the sex-and-drugs world of college dorm life. Resident Advisors will launch on Hulu on April 9, 2015.

In 2014 she lent her voice as “Wyldstyle” in The Lego Movie which became Warner Brothers’ biggest animated opening ever. She will reprise her role in the upcoming sequel. Last year Banks returned to her popular role as “Effie Trinket” in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 . She was previously seen in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and The Hunger Games . Catching Fire became the highest-grossing film released at the domestic box office in 2013 and the biggest November opening weekend in history. The first film is the third-highest debut in North American box office history . The Hunger Games: Mockingjay-Part 2 is scheduled for release on November 20, 2015.

Through Brownstone productions, Banks and her husband Max Handelman produced the hit film Pitch Perfect and upcoming sequel which Banks directed and appears in. The pair recently signed a production deal at Universal. Upcoming Brownstone slate includes two projects in development at Lionsgate: White Girl Problems and Heist Society , as well as Dirty Rush at Tristar and Tink , a Disney live-action romantic comedy in which Banks will star as “Tinkerbell.” In the digital space the company produced Resident Advisors , a digital comedy series with Paramount Digital which will premiere on HULU on April 9, 2014. In 2009, Brownstone produced the sci-fi thriller The Surrogates , which starred Bruce Willis.

In 2008 Banks received critical acclaim for her role as “First Lady Laura Bush” opposite Josh Brolin in Oliver Stone’s W . The cast included James Cromwell, Richard Dreyfuss, Ellen Burstyn and Jeffrey Wright. Banks’ additional feature credits include her breakthrough role in the award Academy Award®–winning film Seabiscuit , in which she starred as “Marcela Howard” opposite Jeff Bridges and Tobey Maguire, and Steve Spielberg’s Catch Me If You Can . She has also appeared in Walk of Shame , Little Accidents , Our Idiot Brother , The Details , Zack and Miri Make a Porno, What to Expect When You’re Expecting , People Like Us , Man on a Ledge , The Next Three Days , Role Models , Meet Dave , Invincible , The 40-Year-Old Virgin , Fred Claus , Sisters, Slither , Heights , The Baxter , The Trade , Ordinary Sinner , The Uninvited , Daltry Calhoun , Sexual Life , John Singleton’s Shaft with Samuel L. Jackson and cult hit Wet Hot American Summer . She also appeared as journalist “Betty Brant” in Columbia Pictures’ three blockbuster Spider-Man films starring Tobey Maguire.

On the small screen, Banks earned two Emmy® Award nominations for “Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series” for her performance as “Avery Jessup” on 30 Rock . She makes regular guest appearances on ABC’s Modern Family and appeared in a recurring role as “Dr. Kim Porter” on NBC’s Scrubs .

Her extensive theater credits include many roles in American Conservatory Theater productions, as well as the Guthrie Theater’s production of Summer & Smoke directed by David Esbjornson. In 2006 Banks played Cherie, the female lead in William Inge’s comedy Bus Stop , as part of the Williamstown Theatre Festival.

Originally from Massachusetts, Banks received her Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Pennsylvania and her Graduate Degree at the American Conservatory Theater. She is involved with many charities which include LA’s Best, Temple Israel of Hollywood, Planned Parenthood, The First Lady’s Reach Higher Initiative, Heifer International and Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund. She currently resides in Los Angeles.

Currently, Paul Dano (Brian Wilson, 1960s) is in production for the BBC television drama mini-series, War and Peace , directed by Tom Harper. The story, based on the novel by Russian author Leo Tolstoy, chronicles the events surrounding the French invasion of Russia as seen through the eyes of five Russian families. Dano will portray the character Pierre Bezukhov—a man who, upon receiving a massive inheritance, is transformed from a bumbling young man into the richest and most eligible bachelor in the Russian Empire, finding himself in a love triangle between Natasha Rostova (Lily James) and Andrei Bolkonsky (James Norton). BBC will premiere War and Peace in January 2016.

This year, Dano will star as Beach Boys songwriter and musician Brian Wilson in the biopic Love & Mercy , directed by Bill Pohlad, and alongside Elizabeth Banks, John Cusack and Paul Giamatti. Love & Mercy chronicles Brian’s life, from his successes with highly influential orchestral pop albums to his nervous breakdown and subsequent encounter with controversial therapist Dr. Eugene Landy (Giamatti). Roadside Attractions will release Love & Mercy on June 5, 2015.

In 2013 Dano appeared in Steve McQueen’s critically acclaimed and Academy Award®, BAFTA, and Golden Globe®–winning 12 Years a Slave , alongside Michael Fassbender and Chiwetel Ejiofor. Dano portrayed the role of the wrathful slave owner, John Tibeats. Also in 2013, Dano starred in Warner Brothers’ critically acclaimed thriller Prisoners , directed by Denis Villeneuve, and alongside Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal and Terrence Howard. Dano portrayed the role of Alex Jones in a chilling performance of a disturbed man with the IQ of a child who is suspected of kidnapping two little girls.

In 2012 Dano starred in Sony’s action crime sci-fi film, Looper , directed by Rian Johnson and alongside Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt. Dano also starred in and executive produced Fox Searchlight’s fantasy comedy drama, Ruby Sparks , directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris and written by Zoe Kazan—also starring Zoe Kazan and Chris Messina. Ruby Sparks accounts the story of a novelist struggling with writer’s block (Dano) who creates a female character that comes to life as a real person (Kazan).

In the same year, Dano starred as Nick Flynn in Focus Features’ drama, Being Flynn , directed by Paul Weitz and alongside Robert De Niro, Julianne Moore and Olivia Thirlby. Being Flynn tells the story of a man (Dano) who re-encounters his father (De Niro), a con man and self-proclaimed poet, at the Boston homeless shelter where he is working.

In 2010 Dano starred in Oscilloscope Picture’s critically acclaimed western drama, Meek’s Cutoff , directed by Kelly Reichardt, which recounts the story of settlers traveling through the Oregon desert in 1845 who find themselves stranded in harsh conditions.

In 2009 Dano lent his voice for the character Alexander in Warner Brothers’ and Spike Jonze’s critically acclaimed and Golden Globe®–nominated Where the Wild Things Are .

In 2007 Dano was nominated for a BAFTA award in the “Best Supporting Actor” category for his portrayal of the identical twin brothers Paul and Eli Sunday in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Academy Award®–nominated There Will Be Blood , starring Daniel Day-Lewis.

In 2006 Dano won a Critics Choice award for “Best Young Actor” for his portrayal as the voluntarily mute brother, Dwayne, in Fox Searchlight’s critically acclaimed and Academy Award®–nominated Little Miss Sunshine , directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, and starring Abigail Breslin, Steve Carell, Greg Kinnear, Alan Arkin and Toni Collette.

Dano starred in IFC Films’ The Ballad Of Jack And Rose in 2005, directed by Rebecca Miller and alongside Camilla Belle and Daniel Day-Lewis. The film chronicles the story of a father and daughter who, isolated on an island off the East Coast and living on a once thriving commune, grapple with the limits of family and sexuality.

Dano’s first major film was at seventeen, when he portrayed the role of Howie Blitzer in the crime drama L.I.E. , for which he won the Independent Spirit Award for “Best Debut Performance” and a Directors’ Week Award for “Best Actor.” L.I.E. chronicles the story of a fifteen-year-old Long Island boy who loses everything and becomes involved in a relationship with an older man.

Other film credits include For Ellen , Knight and Day , The Extra Man , The Good Heart , Gigantic , Cowboys & Aliens , Taking Woodstock , The Girl Next Door , Fast Food Nation , The King and Taking Lives .

In 2007 Dano starred in Ethan Hawke’s off-Broadway directorial debut, Things We Want , alongside Peter Dinklage, Josh Hamilton and Zoe Kazan.

Paul Dano currently resides in New York City.

With a diverse roster of finely etched, award-winning and critically acclaimed performances, Paul Giamatti (Dr. Eugene Landy) has established himself as one of the most versatile actors of his generation.

Giamatti recently wrapped production on several films including Brad Peyton’s San Andreas and Sophie Barthes’ Madame Bovary , in which he played the ardent Monsieur Homais. Giamatti also lent his voice to the English-language version of the Oscar®-nominated French animated feature Ernest & Celestine , as well as the highly anticipated feature-film adaptation of The Little Prince , directed by Mark Osborne. He will soon be seen as infamous ex-N.W.A. manager Jerry Heller in F. Gary Gray’s Straight Outta Compton , due out this year. Giamatti can also be seen in the upcoming Showtime original drama series Billions in which he plays the lead opposite Damian Lewis and the independent feature drama The Phenom , written and directed by Noah Buschel.

In 2014 Giamatti received an Emmy® nomination for his guest-starring role as Harold Levinson, the eccentric American brother of Elizabeth McGovern’s character Cora Crawley, on the highly acclaimed drama series Downton Abbey .

Prior to that, Giamatti produced and starred in Phil Morrison’s black comedy All is Bright alongside Paul Rudd. The film centers around two French Canadian Christmas tree salesmen who devise a get-rich-quick scheme and travel to New York to sell trees. Giamatti was also recently seen in Steve McQueen’s Oscar®-winning drama 12 Years a Slave , John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks and Peter Landesman’s docudrama Parkland. He played Spider-Man’s formidable foe The Rhino in the latest entry of the blockbuster superhero franchise, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 , directed by Marc Webb. In 2013 Giamatti played the title role of “Hamlet” in Yale Rep’s production of Shakespeare’s play.

In 2012 Giamatti was seen in New Line’s adaptation of the Broadway stage musical Rock of Ages , directed by Adam Shankman. The film co-stars Tom Cruise, Mary J. Blige, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand and Julianne Hough, and was released by Warner Brothers. He also starred in David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis , alongside Robert Pattinson and Juliette Binoche.

In 2011 Giamatti starred in the critically praised Win Win , a film written and directed by Oscar®-nominee Thomas McCarthy. Giamatti portrays Mike Flaherty, a disheartened attorney moonlighting as a high school wrestling coach who stumbles across a star athlete through some questionable business dealings. Giamatti was also seen in The Ides of March , directed by George Clooney and co-starring Ryan Gosling, Clooney and Evan Rachel Wood. The film received a Golden Globe® nomination for Best Picture – Drama.

He also starred in Curtis Hanson’s HBO movie Too Big To Fail , in which he portrayed Ben Bernanke opposite William Hurt and Billy Crudup. His performance earned him his third SAG Award® for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries as well as an Emmy® and a Golden Globe® nomination.

His performance in 2010’s Barney’s Version earned him his second Golden Globe® Award. Based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Mordechai Richler, the film was directed by Richard J. Lewis and co-starred Dustin Hoffman, Rosamund Pike and Minnie Driver.

In 2008 Giamatti won Emmy®, SAG and Golden Globe® awards for Best Actor in a Miniseries for his portrayal of the title character in HBO’s seven-part Emmy® Award–winning miniseries John Adams . Directed by Emmy®-winning director Tom Hooper, Giamatti played President John Adams in a cast that also included award-winning actors Laura Linney, Tom Wilkinson, David Morse and Stephen Dillane. In 2006 Giamatti’s performance in Ron Howard’s Cinderella Man earned him his first SAG Award® and a Broadcast Film Critics’ Award for Best Supporting Actor, as well as Academy Award® and Golden Globe® nominations in the same category.

For his role in Alexander Payne’s critically lauded Sideways , Giamatti earned accolades including Best Actor from the Independent Spirit Awards and New York Film Critics Circle, as well as a Golden Globe® and a SAG Award® nomination.

In 2003 Giamatti received outstanding reviews and commendations (Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Actor, National Board of Review Breakthrough Performance of the Year) for his portrayal of Harvey Pekar in Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini’s American Splendor .

Giamatti first captured the eyes of America in Betty Thomas’ hit comedy Private Parts . His extensive list of film credits also includes Jonathan English’s Ironclad ; Todd Phillips’ The Hangover Part II ; The Last Station , opposite Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren; Tony Gilroy’s Duplicity ; Cold Souls , which Giamatti also executive produced; David Dobkin’s Fred Claus ; Shoot Em’ Up , opposite Clive Owen; Shari Springer Berman and Roger Pulcini’s The Nanny Diaries ; M. Night Shyamalan’s Lady in the Water ; The Illusionist , directed by Neil Burger; Milos Forman’s Man on the Moon ; Julian Goldberger’s The Hawk is Dying ; Tim Robbins’ Cradle Will Rock ; F. Gary Gray’s The Negotiator ; Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan ; Peter Weir’s The Truman S how; Mike Newell’s Donnie Brasco ; Todd Solondz’ Storytelling ; Tim Burton’s Planet of the Ape s; Duets , opposite Gwyneth Paltrow; the animated film Robots ; and Big Momma’s House , co-starring Martin Lawrence. Giamatti also appeared in James Foley’s Confidence and John Woo’s Paycheck .

As an accomplished stage actor, Giamatti received a Drama Desk nomination for Best Supporting Actor as “Jimmy Tomorrow” in Kevin Spacey’s Broadway revival of The Iceman Cometh . His other Broadway credits include The Three Sisters directed by Scott Elliot; Racing Demon directed by Richard Eyre; and Arcadia directed by Trevor Nunn. He was seen Off Broadway in the ensemble cast of The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui with Al Pacino.

For television, Giamatti appeared in The Pentagon Papers with James Spader, HBO’s Winchell opposite Stanley Tucci, and Jane Anderson’s If These Walls Could Talk 2 , also for HBO. He resides in Brooklyn, New York.

Bill Pohlad (Director & Producer), an Academy Award®–nominated filmmaker, has been producing quality films for more than two decades. As founder and CEO of River Road Entertainment, his ability to seek out compelling material and bring it to light has established his reputation as a filmmaker unafraid to take creative risks.

After starting out as a writer-director in the late 1980s, Pohlad has spent most of the last 15 years producing. His credits include the Academy Award®–winning Best Picture 12 Years a Slave , which also won the Golden Globe® for Best Motion Picture – Drama, two BAFTA Awards including Best Film, five Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature, and a total of three Academy Awards®. His producing effort The Tree of Life was nominated for three Academy Awards® including Best Picture. The feature also won the Palme d’Or at the 2011 Cannes International Film Festival and shared the prize for Best Feature at the 2011 Gotham Independent Film Awards. In 2007 Pohlad produced Sean Penn’s award-winning adaptation of Into the Wild , based on the best-selling book by Jon Krakauer. The film earned two Academy Award® nominations, as well as nods from the Directors Guild, the Writers Guild and SAG, among others.

Pohlad has also served as executive producer on numerous films including Ang Lee’s Academy Award®–winning epic Brokeback Mountain . He has also produced a number of feature documentaries including Robert Kenner’s Academy Award®–nominated documentary Food, Inc .

Pohlad wrote, directed and co-produced his first feature film, Old Explorers , starring veteran actors José Ferrer and James Whitmore, in 1990. He has also directed and produced a number of commercial and documentary film projects over the years.

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In ‘Love & Mercy,’ Brian Wilson Is Portrayed by John Cusack and Paul Dano

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By Alan Light

May 29, 2015

In 1973, following a creative breakdown, a long descent into drug use and the death of his father, Brian Wilson — the primary force in the Beach Boys, among the most significant American rock ’n’ roll bands of all time — became a recluse. For the next two years, he spent most of his days in bed, occasionally showing up in public without changing out of his bathrobe.

When he resurfaced in 1975, he was in the care of a controversial therapist named Eugene Landy , who (incorrectly) diagnosed Mr. Wilson’s condition as paranoid schizophrenia and oversaw his every move for the next decade, until the Wilson family — and Brian’s new girlfriend, Melinda Ledbetter, whom he would later marry — won a court order freeing Brian from Mr. Landy’s grip.

One might say that Brian Wilson, who was later found to have bipolar schizoaffective disorder, was two different people before and after his years in seclusion. Indeed, this very idea is the premise behind the construction of “ Love & Mercy ” (opening on Friday) in which two actors portray Mr. Wilson: The film cuts back and forth between Paul Dano, who is 30, playing Mr. Wilson at his creative peak and subsequent implosion in the mid-1960s, and John Cusack, 48, depicting his mid-80s struggle to re-emerge.

It’s an uncommon approach for a biopic, one conceived by the film’s director, Bill Pohlad. The usual challenge of the format — whether an actor can be credible through the stages of a subject’s life — is inverted: Will the two actors read to the audience as the same person? How similar do they need to be to keep consistency, and how different should their interpretations be to enhance the story?

Anatomy of a Scene | ‘Love & Mercy’

Bill pohlad narrates a sequence from his film about brian wilson, featuring paul dano..

Mr. Cusack and Mr. Dano sat down over coffee in the lounge of the Crosby Street Hotel in SoHo to discuss in depth, for the first time together, the dual Brian Wilsons of “Love & Mercy” (which takes its title from a 1988 Wilson song ). Though their shooting schedules overlapped for a few days during the production, they never swapped ideas or hashed out tactics.

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‘Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road’ Review: A Documentary Love Letter to a Pop Genius

The saga of the former Beach Boy has been told many times, but Brent Wilson and Jason Fine's film — part musical exploration, part "Carpool Karaoke" — makes the old stories new again.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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Even if you think that Brian Wilson is God — and yes, I do — you could easily say that we don’t need another documentary about him. There have been some good, rich, and deep ones, like “Brian Wilson: I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times,” the 1995 musicological meditation directed by record producer Don Was, or “Brian Wilson and the Story of ‘SMiLE’,” which chronicled the history of that most fabled of all unfinished albums as well as the remarkable story of how, in 2004, Wilson and Darian Sahanaja put its majesty back together again. “Love & Mercy” (2014) wasn’t a documentary, but it had the true-life power of one; it’s one of the great music biopics, with an insight into the perfect storm of forces that made Brian Wilson tick. Beyond that, so many of the tales of Wilson’s life and art — his creation of, and withdrawal from, the Beach Boys ; the mythology of “Pet Sounds”; the inextricable vines of his genius and mental illness; the lost years he spent in recovery with the charlatan shrink Eugene Landy — have been repeated so often that they’re now part of our cultural lore.

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Brian Wilson did more than write great pop music. He turned pop songs into hymns, soaring chorales, sublimely delicate and jaunty effusions of sweet-souled sound laced with an underlying sadness so divine that, as Bruce Springsteen says in the movie of “Pet Sounds,” “The beauty of it carries a sense of joyfulness even in the pain of living. The joyfulness of an emotional life.” So yes, maybe we don’t need another documentary about Brian Wilson, but even if you think you know it all, “Long Promised Road” is an affectionate and satisfying movie, sentimental at times but often stirringly insightful, a collection of pinpoint testimonials to Wilson’s artistry by such authoritative fans as Springsteen and Elton John, and a movie that lets the enchanting qualities of Wilson’s music cascade over you.

As for Brian himself, he seems in pretty good shape for a man pushing 80 who still hears voices, but the truth is that he doesn’t say all that much about anything. Jason Fine asks him if it was weird writing all those songs about surfing even though he didn’t surf himself — a fabled fact about Brian. His response? “Yeah, Dennis surfed. I never learned how to surf.” Okay, thanks for sharing! When Fine asks him what he now thinks about the mid-’60s implosion of “SMiLE” and why he felt like he had to shelve it, Brian says, “We thought it was a little ahead of its time. We waited for, like, 30 years. And we finally finished it.” And so it goes. Brian Wilson, apart from his thin-shell-encasing-a-damaged-mollusk quality of blitzed hypersensitivity, doesn’t appear to have the impulse toward introspection.

Yet as the film goes on, you feel like you kind of get to know him. Jason Fine is the easygoing friend who inquires about stuff, fields Brian’s one-sentence answers, never pushes too hard, absorbs Brian’s thoughts and feelings with sympathetic understanding, and talks music with him. He brings Brian out — at least as much as one can. And the thing about Brian is that even when he doesn’t reveal much, there’s something disarmingly honest and tender about him. He says just enough to get you in tune with his heart.

In the clips we see of the Beach Boys, and there some great ones, when we watch Brian singing, trying to play the part of a happy pop star along with his two brothers and Al Jardine and Mike Love, the truth is that there’s something off about him, and always was. He’s frozen, not fully there. Though it took decades for him to be diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, he heard voices in his head (and still does), aggressive and judgmental voices, and in the old footage he looks like someone who heard voices.

Yet part of what’s haunting about his story is that the Brian Wilson who heard voices in his head is also the Brian Wilson who heard the most gorgeous four-minute pop symphonies in his head; and those two things cannot be separated. He was touched by a higher spirit, and sometimes he was just…touched.

At one point, Don Was sits in the studio, separating out the tracks of “God Only Knows” the way they used to do on episodes of VH1’s “Classic Albums.” He gets to the part at the end where Brian layers Carl Wilson singing “God only knows what I’d be without you” into a kind of contrapuntal acid-head loop, and it’s even more amazing to hear with the instruments stripped away. “God Only Knows” might, along with “Penny Lane,” be the greatest pop song ever written, but talk about the sound of voices in your head! And the film’s analysis of the song is itself a thing of beauty. Elton John talks about how Wilson used the fifth of a chord as a bass note (the way Elton would later do in “Someone Saved My Life Tonight”), and Don Was picks out the instruments, almost shaking his head in disbelief as he identifies…a banjo! Which along with a piano and a harmonica fused into one sound. “Brian had to sit at home and dream up these textures that no one had ever, ever used.”

But there was another side to Brian. Linda Perry, the producer and songwriter, say that she hears Brian’s competitive nature in the DNA of those songs. He was trying to be better than the Beatles. And that pushed him to come up with an airy density of form that transcended what he’d heard on “Rubber Soul” (the album that inspired him to make “Pet Sounds”). People in the film also testify to what a leader he was. When you hear stories about him in the ’60s, especially when he was cracking up during the “SMiLE” sessions, you get a sense of someone who was fragile, vulnerable, a genius on the verge of a nervous breakdown. But if you listen to the hours of outtakes that were part of the box-set reissue of “SMiLE” released in 2011, you hear Wilson rehearsing the other Beach Boys with a martinet discipline that makes him sound like a fusion of Phil Spector, Stanley Kubrick, and Johann Sebastian Bach.

“Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road” is finally a love letter to Brian Wilson — to all the beauty he has given the world, but also to the fact that he made it through his crack-ups and came out the other side. He’s now a confident live performer, filling a place like the Hollywood Bowl as he and his band perform “Pet Sounds” or “SMiLE.” He also continues to record simply because the songs won’t stop coming to him. His voice is a frail shadow of what it once was, but he’s there, he’s relaxed, he’s delivering his music to an audience enraptured to be in his presence, and he’s sharing their energy. When you listen to him perform “Caroline No,” his singing back on the album sounds more than ever like a dream, but his singing here tells a different story: that he still feels this song, and can still channel it, the way he channeled the cosmic winds that allowed him to write it. The movie shows you that Brian Wilson’s genius is not something that should ever be taken for granted. God only knows what we’d be without him.

Reviewed online, June 15, 2021. MPAA Rating: Not rated. Running time: 92 MIN.

Production: (Documentary) A Ley Line Entertainment production, in association with BriMel. Producers: Tim Headington, Theresa Steele Page, Brent Wilson. Executive producers: Brian Wilson, Melinda Wilson, Jason Fine.
Crew: Director: Brent Wilson. Screenplay: Jason Fine, Brent Wilson. Camera: Maximilian Schmige, George Dougherty, David West. Editors: Hector Lopez, Kevin Klauber. Music: Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys.
With: Brian Wilson, Jason Fine, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Don Was, Linda Perry, Jim James, Melinda Wilson, Al Jardine.

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Brian Wilson

Who Is Brian Wilson?

Brian Wilson formed the Beach Boys in 1961 and had a long string of hit singles and albums, helping to establish the “California sound” along the way. By the mid-60s, however, Wilson looked to move beyond the cheery, simple, teen-based formula that characterized much of the Beach Boys’ early music. The result was 1966’s Pet Sounds , which is ranked by many as one of the greatest albums of all time. But at the peak of his creative powers, substance abuse and mental illness took their toll on Wilson, who for much of the next 25 years lived in seclusion. After breaking free from psychologist Eugene Landy, who exerted an excessive amount of control over Wilson’s life during the 1980s, Wilson revived his career and released several solo albums in the 1990s.

He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988, remarried in 1995 and was honored by the Kennedy Center in 2007 for lifetime contribution to the performing arts. Since that time he has continued to tour and record albums and was also the subject of the 2014 biopic Love & Mercy .

Early Life and Childhood

Brian Douglas Wilson was born in Inglewood, California, on June 20, 1942. But while the Wilson family lived an outwardly normal, middle-class suburban life, at home Wilson and his younger brothers—Dennis and Carl—endured a rough childhood. They were subjected to regular physical and mental abuse by their father, Murry, and their mother, Audree Wilson, was by all accounts an alcoholic. Despite this background of turmoil, the Wilson home was a musical one. Murry was an aspiring—though only vaguely successful—songwriter, and both he and Audree played piano. Wilson and his brothers would often sing along with them in the living room, developing an early ability to harmonize with one another, a feat made all the more impressive by the fact that Wilson was mostly deaf in one ear.

Wilson remembers his childhood with mixed feelings, once telling an interviewer, “I had a good childhood—except for my dad beating me up all the time.” But as Wilson grew older, he increasingly turned to music as an escape from the pain of his home life. Along with his two younger brothers and their cousin, Mike Love, Wilson began performing at parties and small gatherings. In the late 1950s the four relatives joined with Hawthorne High School friend Al Jardine to form a band called the Pendletones, a name chosen because of the popular Pendleton flannel shirts that became the group’s uniform in the early days. The group featured Brian on bass, Carl and Al on guitar and Dennis on drums. Though Mike and Brian would take most of the lead on vocals, every member lent his voice to their layered harmonic sound.

'Surfin' Safari'

In October 1961, the Pendletones recorded demos of two surfing-themed songs, “Surfin’” and “Surfin’ Safari.” Although Dennis was the only member of the group who actually surfed, the band sought to tap into the rising popularity of the sport and, more importantly, its accompanying lifestyle. The small label that released the single liked the idea so much that it even went as far as to rename the group the Beach Boys, much to its members’ surprise. Released that December, “Surfin’” cracked Billboard's Hot 100, eventually peaking at No. 75 while remaining on the chart for six weeks. They followed a few months later with “Surfin’ Safari,” which reached the Top 20 and earned the Beach Boys a contract with Capitol Records, who released their first full album, Surfin’ Safari , later that year. It reached No. 32 on the album charts, launching the group on its first wave of success.

With Wilson as the primary creative force, the Beach Boys released a slew of hit singles and top-charting albums during the early 1960s, featuring a bright and cheery music that would come to represent the California youth culture of the period. They released three albums in 1963 alone— Surfin' U.S.A. , Surfer Girl and Little Deuce Coupe —all of which cracked the Top 10. They followed that breakout year with hit releases like All Summer Long (1964) and Summer Days (and Summer Nights!!) (1965). Among the band’s many iconic hit songs from this era are “Surfin’ U.S.A.” (No. 3), “Fun, Fun, Fun” (No. 5), “I Get Around” (No. 1), “Help Me Rhonda” (No. 1) and “California Girls” (No. 3), to name a mere few.

'Pet Sounds'

But by the mid-60s, Wilson had begun to experiment musically, conceptually and chemically, and he sought to push the group’s sound beyond the light and accessible sun-and-fun formula that characterized its early music. By late 1964, he had quit touring with the Beach Boys, due in part to a nervous breakdown he had suffered on the road, and he used his time at home to begin work on the band’s next album. Initially inspired by the Beatles’ Rubber Soul (1965), Wilson’s goal was to create an album where “every song mattered” and that would “make people feel loved.” After collaborating with his friend Tony Asher on the lyrics, and writing and arranging the music almost entirely on his own, Wilson then employed the famous session group known as the Wrecking Crew to commit his vision to tape.

Ironically, considering its later success, Capitol Records and the other members of the Beach Boys initially resisted the musical direction Wilson took on the album, preferring to stick with the safer, proven sound that had brought them so much success. The name Pet Sounds was born when band member Mike Love quipped, “Who’s gonna hear this sh**? The ears of a dog?” Arguably far ahead of its time, it received mixed reviews and did not sell as well as many of the band’s previous albums, further adding to the strain between Wilson and the other members, particularly Love.

Heroes and Villains

But Wilson was undeterred and immediately followed with what is considered to be one of the greatest rock songs of all time, the 1967 single “Good Vibrations,” which he had begun work on during the Pet Sounds sessions. The track hit No. 1 on the charts and encouraged Wilson to employ many of the same recording techniques he had used on a new project that he hoped would reach even greater musical heights. Collaborating with songwriter Van Dyke Parks on the lyrics and enlisting many of the musicians who had appeared on Pet Sounds , the album was initially titled Dumb Angel and later renamed SMiLE . Conceived by Wilson as a “teenage symphony to God,” it would not be released until more than 37 years later. One of the most famous unfinished albums of all time, SMiLE was shelved when Wilson’s personal life took a sharp turn for the worse—though reworked versions of a few of the songs would appear on 1967’s Smiley Smile and 1971’s Surf’s Up.

Plagued by his heavy abuse of alcohol, marijuana, cocaine and LSD, Wilson suffered numerous nervous breakdowns and grew obese. He famously began wailing in the aisle of an airplane, played his grand piano in a sandbox he had built in his home and claimed to hear voices in his head. Attempting to deal with his addiction and mental illnesses, Wilson spent much of the next two decades in seclusion. While he struggled with his personal problems, the Beach Boys continued to tour without him (with only a few exceptions), relying more and more heavily on a nostalgia for their early work to carry their live shows. They continued to record as well, though with diminished involvement from Wilson, and with consequently underwhelming results.

By the mid-1970’s Wilson’s substance abuse and deteriorating mental state led his family to enlist the help of psychologist Eugene Landy, from whom he received treatment on and off for the next decade and a half. But while Landy would help Wilson reign in his drug addiction and take charge of his mental and physical health, he also exploited Wilson’s dependency on him, even going as far as to convince Wilson to list him as a collaborator on several songs on his 1988 debut, self-titled solo album, as well as a beneficiary in his will. In 1991, Wilson’s family sued Landy, resulting in a restraining order and the loss of Landy's license to practice psychology in California.

Later Career

Wilson has credited the mid-90s renaissance of his personal and professional life to one thing—his wife, Melinda Ledbetter, whom he married in 1995. (Wilson had previously married Marilyn Rovell in 1964, and the couple had two children before divorcing in 1979). Since that time, Wilson has released numerous solo albums, including Orange Art Crate (1995) and Imagination (1998). He was also the subject of the 1995 documentary I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times . In 2004, 37 years after its initial recording, Wilson finally released a complete version of SMiLE to wide acclaim, and since reviving his career has even overcome his legendary stage fright, performing on his own and occasionally with the Beach Boys in concerts throughout the United States and Europe.

For his immeasurable contributions to music, Wilson has won numerous honors and awards. In 1988 he and the Beach Boys were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and in 2000 Wilson was also inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He won the 2005 Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental for the song “Mrs. O'Leary's Cow,” and in 2007 he received the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors for lifetime contribution to the performing arts.

After decades of seclusion, a happy and productive Wilson received a warm welcome back into the music industry. His good friend Sir Elton John said of Wilson, “He’s got a great family life now, he goes to basketball games, he seems happy. He's leading as normal a life as Brian Wilson can.” In fact, Wilson might be happier now than he was even during the heyday of the Beach Boys. “I’m having much more fun than I did as a Beach Boy,” he said in The Guardian . “Because I’m no longer a Beach Boy. I’m Brian Wilson.”

Endless Summer

In 2014 the Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival before appearing on U.S. screens the following year. Paul Dano earned a Golden Globe nomination for his portrayal of a young Wilson (actor John Cusack was cast as the older Wilson, Paul Giamatti appearing as Eugene Landy), and the legendary musician also scored a nomination for contributing the song “One Kind of Love,” co-written with Scott Bennett. That same year, Wilson released a new solo album, No Pier Pressure , which reached No. 23 on the album charts.

In October 2016, the memoir I Am Brian Wilson was published. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine to promote the book, the 74-year-old legend announced that he would begin work on a new album, Sensitive Music for Sensitive People , later that year.

QUICK FACTS

Name: Brian Wilson
Birth Year: 1942
Birth date: June 20, 1942
Birth State: California
Birth City: Inglewood
Birth Country: United States
Gender: Male
Best Known For: Brian Wilson is one of the most influential songwriters in rock 'n' roll history, best known as the frontman for the Beach Boys.
Astrological Sign: Gemini
Interesting Facts
The Beach Boys released a song written by Charles Manson, "Cease To Exist" (renamed "Never Learn Not To Love"), as a single B-side on their 1969 album, 20/20 .

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us !

CITATION INFORMATION

Article Title: Brian Wilson Biography
Author: Biography.com Editors
Website Name: The Biography.com website
Url: https://www.biography.com/musicians/brian-wilson
Access Date:
Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
Last Updated: April 19, 2021
Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
I had a good childhood—except for my dad beating me up all the time.
'Caroline, No' makes people cry. 'God Only Knows' makes people cry. A lot of love went into ['Pet Sounds'].
At times I thought I'd never be happy ever again, and then at times I did.
My father hit me, but he didn't hit my ear. I've never heard stereophonic sound ever in my life.
I'm having much more fun than I did as a Beach Boy. Because I'm no longer a Beach Boy. I'm Brian Wilson."[From 'The Guardian' interview, published May 31, 2002.]

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The Untold Truth Of Love & Mercy

Bill Pohlad's 2014 feature "Love & Mercy," about singer-songwriter and co-founder of the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, is far from a conventional biopic. Instead of following a traditional structure to showcase Wilson's most significant life and career moments, the director opted for a different approach. The film shows two brief but defining periods of Wilson's life in the 1960s and the 1980s — casting two actors for the leading role who look nothing alike: Paul Dano plays the musical legend in his younger days when he is filled with passion and inspiration, while John Cusack portrays the older version of the icon as he experiences mental unwellness and other personal issues.

The dynamic between past and future creates a beautiful and unique symphony here. Much like the often chaotic yet fascinating creative process Wilson is shown going through while composing music and recording songs, his genius just comes through perfectly in this feature. Although making this movie wasn't a straightforward process, the result speaks for itself. The dedication from the creators, cast, and crew is apparent throughout, which makes this biopic an absolute triumph.

Here, we gathered some trivia and lesser-known facts about "Love & Mercy" that fans of the Beach Boys will surely appreciate greatly.

If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, please contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741, call the National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264), or visit the National Institute of Mental Health website .

Brian Wilson wasn't involved but had high praise

Interestingly, Brian Wilson was never directly involved in the movie's development and production. According to an interview he gave to the Boston Herald in 2015, the musician claimed that while he was not involved in making the movie, the feature was factual, which couldn't have been an easy task to get right for the screenwriters.

In another interview with the LA Times , he explained that it was challenging to watch some of the scenes in the movie, saying, "[It was] quite an emotional experience because of all I went through, all those different kinds of trips I took." Despite reliving some of the worst periods of his life, he acknowledged the biopic and its accuracy, praising the actors who played him — Paul Dano in particular.

Wilson wasn't the only one to like the end results, though. The film's unusual style, tone, and structure paid off, and critics loved it . It was also a commercial success , making over $28 million on a $10 million budget.

Screenwriter Oren Moverman consulted with Melinda Ledbetter

Although Brian Wilson himself wasn't involved, his second wife Melinda Ledbetter (portrayed by Elizabeth Banks) certainly was. As Wilson told Boston Herald , "I had no control or involvement in the film, but my wife did. She made sure they cast the characters right, you know, so they could capture my personality and the records and stuff like that."

While screenwriter Oren Moverman was in the middle of penning the script, he reached out to Ledbetter. In an interview with Collider , Moverman explained how they approached the story of the film in order to have the right amount of accuracy they aimed for from the beginning. According to him, everything we see in the final cut is based on extensive research and facts, although specific periods were shown more briefly than how long they actually went on in real life.

Due to the consultation with Ledbetter, a crucial part of the plot (which tells how Wilson and his second wife met and what kind of relationship they had) is based on experiences that truly happened. As Moverman said, "I talked to Melinda, and she told me all these stories and I just transformed them into scenes — meeting at the Cadillac Theater, jumping off that boat and swimming — all those things really happened, at least in the way she told them."

The recording process is painstakingly accurate

One of the most fascinating aspects of "Love & Mercy" is when we see the young Brian Wilson construct music during studio sessions. The film does a meticulous job of portraying the process and how Wilson came up with some of the most iconic tunes ("Good Vibrations, "God Only Knows," etc.) — which later became essential parts of pop culture. His deep knowledge of instruments and sounds combined with great talent is undeniable. Paul Dano gives a spectacular performance to bring this whole experience as close to the viewer as possible. We witness how Wilson played around with several instruments to concoct just the right combination of sounds in the way he heard them in his own head.

In his 1971 profile written for Rolling Stone, journalist Tom Nolan described Wilson's music-making process in great detail. He wrote about how ecstatic Wilson could be during a recording session, going around and showing each player what he'd like them to play. It might've seemed chaotic from an outside perspective, but he was in complete control. He often took over the board in the booth to mix the tracks even in the middle of a recording. He was the quintessential musician — a true genius. This definitely resembles what we see in the film and why Wilson complemented its accuracy (not only the sensitive and emotional parts but also the ones that show him playing music and singing).

Initially, the script was 170 pages long and had 100 songs in it

The theatrical version of "Love & Mercy" closes in on two hours, but the first draft of the screenplay was a lot longer than that. According to Collider, when Oren Moverman finished the first draft, it was 170 pages long and featured 100 songs. But even with such an extreme length, he felt that he didn't do justice to Brian Wilson. He said, "Actually, the first draft that I wrote was almost 170 pages, and I felt it was too short. I remember sending an email to Bill [Pohlad] saying, 'Here's the first draft attached, I feel it's too short.' It had 100 songs and 170 pages and I just felt like I didn't do enough to tell the story."

However, Pohlad told Moverman that he overperformed and did a 150% job. So, after a long conversation between the two, Moverman managed to cut down the script for the right length — which included the most significant points to tell an accurate yet condensed story of Wilson and his most influential and important relationships.

Most of the deleted scenes portrayed Wilson in the 1970s

A shorter script also meant that Oren Moverman had to get rid of some great material. Most of these outtakes took place in the '70s when Brian Wilson was going through the toughest period of his life. He was physically, mentally, and emotionally down, awfully depressed for years, not doing much of anything that would've moved his music career (or life) forward. The myth was that he spent four years in bed in his bathrobe.

Moverman wanted to set the record straight that Wilson might've not done anything exciting or significant musically, but he still did things besides curling up in his room. He said, "He spent four years in bed, not a lot was going on, but it was also demystifying that because he wasn't really in bed all the time. He was eating, and he was doing drugs and drinking and staying in bed and being depressed all the time, but he would walk out of the house in his bathrobe. He would go to clubs, he would listen to music, he would interact with some people."

We don't see much of that in detail in the movie; however, the way Wilson is portrayed in the '60s and '80s implies effectively what went wrong in the '70s — and why Dr. Eugene Landy came into the picture.

If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Paul Giamatti's portrayal of Dr. Landy frightened Brian Wilson

Paul Giamatti 's skill to scare us to our core maybe wasn't as well-known back in 2014 as it is today, but he did maximize that ability in "Love & Mercy." He played the infamous psychotherapist, Dr. Eugene Landy, who treated the Beach Boy for many years. It's really tough to watch some of his scenes as he controls and intimidates the singer with a very strict hand.

In an interview with FOX 7 Austin , after seeing the film for the first time, Wilson explained that some of it was a little rougher to watch since certain characters were truly realistic to their real-life equivalents. He said, "The guy who played Dr. Landy was so right on ... so true to life, that he absolutely scared me. I was absolutely in fear for about 10 minutes."

The real-life Dr. Landy was suspended from medical practice by court

Despite how abusive and domineering Dr. Landy seems toward Brian Wilson in the film, he'd been even worse in real life. In an interview Melinda Ledbetter gave to the New York Post , she said, "After I first saw the film, I had to just drive around for a couple of hours to clear my head. Then I remembered that what Landy did to Brian was even worse. You don't get a sense of it in the movie, but it happened on a daily basis for years."

Landy had a doctorate in psychology and treated celebrities like singer Alice Cooper and actor Rod Steiger. In 1975, he was hired by Wilson's first wife to help him battle his drug addiction, physical unfitness, and abnormal behavior. He (mis)diagnosed him as a paranoid schizophrenic and began to heavily medicate him. By 1989, he became the Beach Boy's legal guardian and manipulated Brian to an extreme level. According to the Boston Herald , in 1992, a court ruled that Dr. Landy could no longer practice in California, and he was also banned from contacting Wilson due to a lawsuit filed against him by Wilson's family .

Surprisingly, though, Wilson doesn't hold any bad feelings towards his ex-doctor, despite Landy's abuses. Wilson said, "He wouldn't let me do anything except exercise and eat healthy foods... He was a great doctor. He died about eight years ago, and that came as a shock to me. He meant well. He just yelled a lot, you know."

Paul Dano didn't know as much about Brian Wilson as he thought

In "Love & Mercy," we get to see insightful bits of Brian Wilson's dysfunctional relationship with his father, Murry Wilson (played by Bill Camp), and other personal differences that often led to conflicts between him and his cousin, Mike Love (Jake Abel). In an interview with Variety, actor Paul Dano admitted that although he was a fan of the band, he didn't have as much knowledge of the singer-songwriter as he thought.

Dano explained that it was a pleasant and wonderful surprise to read the script and get to know Wilson, "I felt like I knew the music, you would think you would know the story behind the man who made it. And I think that was the first truly exciting thing, not just even as an actor, but about the film. Like, wow, this guy has been through it and got a story. A story that would move and surprise people." He also said that when he read the script the second time, he did it with the band's famous album, "Pet Sounds," playing in the background, which was the moment he really started to prepare for the role.

The film doesn't always specify what Wilson used over the years

We don't see much of the other Wilsons — Carl and Dennis, who were also part of the band — in the film, however, Brian Wilson's relationship with his cousin Mike Love is an essential element of the script. As the plot moves forward, Love becomes more and more frustrated with Wilson's strange behavior and obsession with perfectionism. He just simply can't deal with his cousin's issues and the excessive drug use.

According to Slate , although "Love & Mercy" doesn't always detail the kind of drugs Brian had taken over the years, it includes various substances in addition to LSD. In a 2016 interview with Rolling Stone , Wilson opened up and talked candidly about his drug use and what it did to his mind. "I want people to realize that drugs can be very detrimental and dangerous. I've told a lot of people don't take psychedelic drugs. It's mentally dangerous to take. I regret having taken LSD. It's a bad drug." He also added that he believes that his "struggle for mental health is the result of bad drugs."

Dr. Landy was a cartoon and fraud in real life

There's a lot to the abusive and exploitative relationship that went on for years between Dr. Landy and Wilson. According to Far Out Magazine , by 1983, Landy wasn't simply Wilson's therapist but also became the Beach Boys' business manager, co-songwriter, and executive producer, too. He had total control over Brian Wilson's mind and body, keeping him in constant fear. Landy was also a master manipulator who once dreamed of his own musical stardom but had neither the talent nor the work ethic to follow through. He was greedy and compulsive, hungry for fame and success that he didn't deserve.

Screenwriter Oren Moverman told Collider why Landy's part was the hardest to write and capture in "Love & Mercy": "Even though many things that he says in the movie I actually have a recording of, in real life, he was a cartoon, and he was so over the top," he said. "You kind of wonder, "Did everybody miss it?" I think it's so clear the guy is a fraud, a manipulator, out of his mind, probably drugged even more than Brian, and where is everyone? Where is everyone to kind of call him out and say, "Wait a minute, he's ruining Brian's life, and he's cutting him away from his family?" Indeed, the result was a character that affected even the real-life subject of the story, so he must've gotten it just right.

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A simplified brian wilson in 'love and mercy'.

Mark Jenkins

Paul Dano plays a young Brian Wilson in Love and Mercy . Francois Duhamel/Roadside Attractions hide caption

Paul Dano plays a young Brian Wilson in Love and Mercy .

Wouldn't it be nice if Beach Boy Brian Wilson's troubled life were as easily understood as Love & Mercy makes it appear? Where the Pet Sounds auteur is known for multi-part harmonies, director Bill Pohlad's biopic is a series of simple duets.

Scripter Oren Moverman, who shares credit with Michael Alan Lerner but is reportedly the principal writer, summoned seven Dylans for I'm Not There . Here he presents just two Brians: one from 1963-67, and another from roughly two decades later. The first is artistically agile, but beginning to lose his psychological balance; the second is essentially imprisoned, and ready to break free.

Crucially, the movie also juggles two acting styles. Paul Dano takes a cinematic approach to the younger Brian, even packing on some baby-genius fat to more closely resemble the Beach Boy who preferred junk food and cigarettes to surfing (or touring with the band). John Cusack's version of the older man is more distanced and theatrical, without attempts at either physical or psychological impersonation. The performance is amiable but not very convincing, and doesn't mesh with the literal-minded rest of the movie.

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Telling brian wilson's fractured life story on film.

The two chapters are interwoven, with equal emphasis on both. That makes some sense, since the making of Pet Sounds is virtually guaranteed to elicit smiley smiles, even from fans who know the history well enough to see how it's been condensed and elided.

Yet the later story has more dramatic potential. After years of little musical output, Wilson is under the 24-hour-a-day authority of psychologist Eugene Landy (Paul Giamatti), who controls the onetime pop prodigy with drugs the therapist is not legally allowed to prescribe. The becalmed Beach Boy is rescued by Cadillac saleswoman Melinda Ledbetter (Elizabeth Banks), who sues Landy and eventually marries Brian.

Giamatti and Banks both give enthusiastic but predictable performances in shallowly written roles. Cusack portrays the Landy-dominated Brian as child-like and sometimes fearful, but capable of sly self-awareness. This seems unlikely, given his '80s diet of sedatives and anti-psychotics.

Aside from the heroic Ledbetter, Wilson's relationships are mostly with villains: Landy, of course, but also his father Murry (Bill Camp) and cousin and bandmate Mike Love (Jake Abel). Those two want hits, and don't appreciate Brian's attempts to expand the group's style and lace the fun-fun-fun with wistfulness and rue.

To acknowledge Wilson's many collaborators, the movie fleetingly introduces two of them, Tony Asher and Van Dyke Parks. But it doesn't explain what either of them did. (Asher wrote most of Pet Sounds ' lyrics, and Parks served repeatedly as Wilson's lyrical and musical foil.) It's easier to dramatize a lone prodigy, so the movie makes all the good musical ideas appear to be Brian's. In reality, even Mike Love had his moments.

Love & Mercy is named, curiously, for a 1988 song that Wilson supposedly co-wrote with Landy. (The extent of the therapist's contribution has been questioned.) But the movie wisely concentrates on the mid-'60s music, making expert use of the vocal-free backing tracks released on the Pet Sounds box set. Even Atticus Ross' shattered-pop score, used to evoke Wilson's alienation and auditory hallucinations, is cut and pasted mostly from Beach Boys ditties.

Those tunes wouldn't be remembered so fondly, however, if they were all sadness, self-doubt, and the disconnection Pohlad visualizes by showing Wilson behind windows or reflected in mirrors. So the final song, which ends a flawed movie with an immaculate burst of joy? Let's just say it's not "Hang on to Your Ego."

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User reviews

Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road

Documentary that looks at the career of musician Brian Wilson. Documentary that looks at the career of musician Brian Wilson. Documentary that looks at the career of musician Brian Wilson.

Brent Wilson
Kevin Klauber
Brian Wilson
Jakob Dylan
17 User reviews
19 Critic reviews
67 Metascore
2 wins & 3 nominations

Self - Producer & Musician

(as Sir Elton John)

Self - Producer & Songwriter

Self - Journalist & Friend

Self - The Four Seasons
Self - Engineer and Mixer, SMILE
Self - The Brian Wilson Band
Self - Post-Landy Collaborator
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Jun 19, 2022
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February 4, 2022 (Ireland)
United States
Official site
Brian Wilson: Vadedilen Uzun Yol
Ley Line Entertainment
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Runtime 1 hour 33 minutes

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Love & Mercy (film)
Love & Mercy is a 2014 American biographical drama film directed by Bill Pohlad about the Beach Boys' co-founder and leader Brian Wilson and his struggles with mental illness during the 1960s and 1980s. It stars Paul Dano and John Cusack as the young and middle-aged Wilson, respectively, with Elizabeth Banks as his second wife Melinda Ledbetter and Paul Giamatti as his psychologist Dr. Eugene ...
Love & Mercy (2014)
Love & Mercy: Directed by Bill Pohlad. With Paul Dano, John Cusack, Elizabeth Banks, Paul Giamatti. In the 60s, Beach Boys leader Brian Wilson struggles with emerging psychosis as he attempts to craft his avant-garde pop masterpiece. In the 80s, he's a broken, confused man under the 24-hour watch of shady therapist, Dr. Eugene Landy.
Love & Mercy fact vs. fiction: How the new Brian Wilson biopic starring
In the film, it is Ledbetter, aided by Brian's housekeeper, Gloria Ramos, who persuades Carl Wilson to intervene by presenting evidence of Landy's undue influence—specifically a 1989 will ...
Love & Mercy
In the late 1960s, the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson stops touring, produces "Pet Sounds" and begins to lose his grip on reality. By the 1980s, Wilson (John Cusack), under the sway of a controlling ...
'Love & Mercy' Brings The Life Of Brian Wilson To The Big Screen
Screenwriter Oren Moverman talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about the film's depiction of the Beach Boy's troubled life. We'll also listen back to an interview Gross recorded with Wilson in 1988.
Love & Mercy
LOVE & MERCY presents an unconventional portrait of Brian Wilson, the mercurial singer, songwriter and leader of The Beach Boys. Set against the era-defining catalog of Wilson's music, the film intimately examines the personal voyage and ultimate salvation of the icon whose success came at extraordinary personal cost.
Review: 'Love & Mercy' Gets Inside Brian Wilson's Head
June 9, 2015. A film review on Friday about "Love & Mercy," which portrays the relationship between the Beach Boys singer Brian Wilson and his therapist, Eugene Landy, described Dr. Landy's ...
Telling Brian Wilson's Fractured Life Story On Film : NPR
Telling Brian Wilson's Fractured Life Story On Film. Paul Dano (center) co-stars in Love & Mercy as Brian Wilson in the 1960s heyday of The Beach Boys. We're watching The Beach Boys ' Brian Wilson ...
In 'Love & Mercy,' Brian Wilson Is Portrayed by John Cusack and Paul
Indeed, this very idea is the premise behind the construction of " Love & Mercy " (opening on Friday) in which two actors portray Mr. Wilson: The film cuts back and forth between Paul Dano ...
'Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road' Review: Love Letter to a ...
Brian Wilson, apart from his thin-shell-encasing-a-damaged-mollusk quality of blitzed hypersensitivity, doesn't appear to have the impulse toward introspection. Yet as the film goes on, you feel ...
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road is a 2021 documentary film about the Beach Boys' co-founder Brian Wilson directed by Brent Wilson (no relation). It follows Brian and Rolling Stone editor Jason Fine as they drive around Los Angeles and visit locations from Brian's past, interspersed with footage from recording sessions and comments from musical artists about his influence on the industry.
Brian Wilson
Brian Wilson. Archive Footage: Love & Mercy. Brian Douglas Wilson was born on June 20th 1942 and has gone on to become one of, if not the greatest, musical geniuses in the world. It was while growing up, while being physically and psychologically abused by his father, that he discovered music as a way of shutting out all hurt and pain that he was feeling at home.
Brian Wilson
Brian Wilson. Archive Footage: Love & Mercy. Brian Douglas Wilson was born on June 20th 1942 and has gone on to become one of, if not the greatest, musical geniuses in the world. It was while growing up, while being physically and psychologically abused by his father, that he discovered music as a way of shutting out all hurt and pain that he was feeling at home. As he listened...
Brian Wilson
In 2014 the Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival before appearing on U.S. screens the following year. Paul Dano earned a Golden Globe nomination ...
The Untold Truth Of Love & Mercy
The film shows two brief but defining periods of Wilson's life in the 1960s and the 1980s — casting two actors for the leading role who look nothing alike: Paul Dano plays the musical legend in ...
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A Simplified Brian Wilson In 'Love And Mercy' Played at different stages of his life by Paul Dano and John Cusack, the Brian Wilson who emerges from this film is a less engaging and complex ...
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Brian Wilson looks back at his life in new film. Video, 00:02:31 Brian Wilson looks back at his life in new film. Subsection. Entertainment & Arts. Published. 24 January 2022. 2:31. Up Next. Brian ...
Brian Wilson
Brian Douglas Wilson (born June 20, 1942) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer who co-founded the Beach Boys.Often called a genius for his novel approaches to pop composition, extraordinary musical aptitude, and mastery of recording techniques, he is widely acknowledged as one of the most innovative and significant songwriters of the 20th century.
Love & Mercy; the life of Brian Wilson on film
Melinda Wilson, Brian Wilson and their daughter Carnie Wilson link arms attended the the LA premiere of Love & Mercy together. "It was just that he was the guy to play Brian Wilson, it was a gut ...
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road (2021)
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road: Directed by Brent Wilson. With Brian Wilson, Jakob Dylan, Jim James, Don Was. Documentary that looks at the career of musician Brian Wilson.
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road
Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road. Premiere: 6/14/2022 | 00:02:04 |. Explore the life and career of the singer, songwriter and co-founder of The Beach Boys. The film traces the legendary performer ...