Copyright The Boston Globe
Daring to be yourself is water to carry in a world where a very specific type of uniformity is preferred. Diane Keaton and D’Angelo had everything and nothing in common. She was a superstar actress, with a career spanning over 50 years – and in so many ways, hiding in plain sight. He was a revolutionary musician who preferred privacy to public persona and managed to give us three distinctly different yet unanimously celebrated classic albums between 1995 and 2014. But when they both died earlier this month, him at 51 and her at 79, there was a collective mourning. My heart broke twice. Had they simply given us their art, it would have been more than enough. But these unicorns gave us something of themselves, too. I revisited Keaton’s films, from “The Godfather” to “The First Wives Club” to “Because I Said So.” I’m not sure we understood how radical she was as a woman of quiet muchness. There’s a reason we all love that when Alvy met Annie “Annie Hall” snippet. She is the magic. She sets the tone. Advertisement At a time when women were expected to be whatever was asked of them, and even more so for an actress, Keaton forced you, even in the fantasy of film, to see her. The androgynous rebellion of her style. The goofy quirks that made her charming. Her distinct fingerprint is never stamped out of any role. I don’t think I have ever seen anyone force you to reconcile with their reality while also suspending it. A woman who came of age when women still had to fight to have mortgages and bank accounts without a man’s co-sign, she loved and was loved, but never desired marriage. She adopted children in her 50s. She showed us what it meant to live in your fullness and defy stereotypes. She shared an unbound joy. She romanticized friendships and dancing and doing the right thing. She existed beautifully free. Advertisement And D’Angelo resisted, beautifully. Day in and day out, I have been breathing in the genius of a man who gave us funk, soul, R&B, rock, and something else, too. A piece of him. He ushered in the neo-soul chapter of music but would not be boxed in by it. “Brown Sugar” was soulful and sensual without being exploitive. And it was loving and soft, too. It became an undeniable intergenerational classic laced with a jazzy edge. It’s like a Black & Mild cigar, somehow smoky, sweet, and lingering. When “Voodoo” came along in 2000, he gave so much more than skin and “How Does it Feel.” This album is a sonic masterpiece. Listening to “Voodoo” is like watching Kobe Bryant and Phil Jackson or falling into the photography of icon Gordon Parks. It is a championship. “Voodoo” is both studied and simultaneously playful. It’s sexy and radical. It’s all-encompassing and something of its own because D’Angelo put it all on the line. By the time “Black Messiah” debuted at midnight on a Friday morning in 2014, I was in San Antonio laying next to my best friend waiting for it. For a year, we kept a spreadsheet of the police killings of unarmed Black men. We read James Baldwin and old Black Panther books. We shared affirmations and quotes to keep us empowered during a very dark time. We knew D’Angelo was about to give us something we needed, we just didn’t know what. “Black Messiah” is a farm-to-table revolution of love. Unifying love. Hurdle-defying love. It’s honest. It’s dark. It’s light. From “1000 Deaths” and “Charade” to “Really Love” and “Another Life,” the album is a prescription for your soul. The music glides over the cracks and bruises in your spirit like an ointment. We listened and listened again. We fell asleep, woke up, and pressed play. And fought to share our truths another day. Advertisement Artists, at their full selves, creating in the power of their own gaze, blaze a bright trail in the dim and cataclysmic times. The work is always alive. The work is always needed. You, too, are an artist. Whatever your gift, now is the time. To sign up for A Beautiful Newsletter, click here. A BEAUTIFUL RESISTANCE A BEAUTIFUL RESISTANCE Black joy, Black lives, as celebrated by culture columnist Jeneé Osterheldt Jeneé Osterheldt can be reached at jenee.osterheldt@globe.com. Follow her @sincerelyjenee and on Instagram @abeautifulresistance.
