Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon
If you were wondering what Mike Myers has been up to, besides bathing in riches, the answer is Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon. The Canadian funnyman made his directorial debut this summer with a non-fiction film about the longtime Hollywood manager who shaped Alice Cooper’s career and can be credited with the invention of the “celebrity chef.”
Supermensch is a film with two sides. It begins as a supremely entertaining glimpse of a man who quickly used his business savvy to befriend some of the most illustrious people in show business. Many of Gordon’s stories are so unbelievable that they have to be true. No fiction film could make up how his career began: it was due to a chance encounter with Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix at a Beverly Hills hotel.
Beyond the tall tales, Myers and co-director Beth Aala focus on the hole inside the super-manager, one that guided him spiritually over his later years. The wrenching moments that comprise the last third of the documentary are poignant. Gordon both laments the stars he worked with that burned out from substance abuse and the pressures of fame, while also regretting some of his own personal demons.
Some may enjoy the doc for its colorful stories of excess and indulgence in the entertainment business. Others will find it more interesting for the deeply moving chapters toward the end, as we look at this “people person” who never started a family of his own. Myers shoves a lot of energy and emotion into 85 minutes, and in the process, makes one of the year’s most fascinating showbiz stories.