Miss Sharon Jones!
Description
Unlike a certain recent failed candidate for President, the rip-roaring R&B/funk/soul singer Sharon Jones earned and deserves her exclamation point. The South Carolina native spent years working as a corrections officer at Rikers Island and singing in wedding bands before hooking up with Brooklyn bassist, bandleader and producer Gabe Roth (cofounder of Daptone Records) and manager Alex Kadvan. Miss Sharon Jones! begins as their fruitful collaboration, Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, is forced off the road after more than a decade of touring and recording when Jones is diagnosed with Stage 2 pancreatic cancer. The life force is strong with the singer, who decamps to an old friend’s home for treatment, recuperation and a diet of spirulina smoothies and daytime TV. But back in New York City, the band feels the pressure of no gigs and no income. Unfailingly candid and outspoken whether she’s feeling up or down—even when she lacks the energy and inspiration to continue her lifelong pursuit of cathartic musical bliss—Jones cuts a commanding figure. Academy Award-winning documentary maker Barbara Kopple delivers definitive proof, from show-stopping testimony in a small South Carolina church to Manhattan’s glittering Beacon Theatre, that nobody raises the roof like Sharon Jones. —Michael Fox
Barbara Kopple was honored with SFIFF’s Golden Gate Persistence of Vision Award in 2012 for a remarkable body of work that includes Academy Awards for Harlan County U.S.A. (1976) and American Dream (1990). She received Primetime Emmy nominations for Fallen Champ: The Untold Story of Mike Tyson (1993), A Century of Women (1994) and Running From Crazy (2013). Long before the cinema vérité master followed Sharon Jones off and onstage, she hit the road with Woody Allen (Wild Man Blues, 1997) and the Dixie Chicks (Shut Up & Sing, 2006). Kopple’s recent films include Hot Type: 150 Years of The Nation and Shelter, inspired by the work of the Santa Rosa-based Veterans Resource Center.
Film Details
Language English
Year 2015
Runtime 93
Country USA
Director Barbara Kopple
Producer Barbara Kopple, David Cassidy
Editor Jean Tsien, Anne Fratto
Cinematographer Gary Griffin, Tony Hardmon, Kyle Kibbe
Music Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings