“DO YOU HAVE any advice for young people?” Spike Jonze asks Where
the Wild Things Are author Maurice Sendak at the outset of Tell
Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak. “Quit
this life as soon as possible,” Sendak responds. “Get out! Get
out!”
Jonze’s giddily anticipated big-screen adaptation of Where the
Wild Things Are has had a mysterious, troubled history—when
it finally hits theaters next week, it will have taken the better part
of a decade to arrive. For a chunk of that time, ever since 2003,
filmmakers Jonze and Lance Bangs have been visiting Sendak in
Connecticut, talking with him in his home and in the barn where he
writes and draws. Tell Them Anything is the 40-minute-long
culmination; insightful and heartfelt, it packs a hell of punch as it
profiles the man behind not only the beloved Wild Things, but
also In the Night Kitchen, Higglety Pigglety Pop!, and
Outside Over There.
Throughout the astounding Tell Them Anything, Sendak tells
stories from his childhood—some delightful, some
devastating—and remembers his “wonderful, truly wonderful”
brother and sister. Reflecting on what led him to art, he delves into
the then-controversial publication of Wild Things (“It’s
probably the only real children’s book I’ve ever done—scary and
funny and ludicrous”), his homosexuality (“It was yet another sign
of isolation”), and future projects (“That’s the only thing wrong
with being old, is there’s no time,” Sendak says after describing,
beautifully, a book he’d like to do. “There is no time”).
Sometimes cantankerous, sometimes goofy, and more or less always
melancholy, the wise, endearing, and funny Sendak returns often to the
idea of death, and to the question of what makes any life—even
one such as his—worth living. Despite his best efforts, even
Jonze seems incapable of convincing Sendak how much he, and his work,
have meant; here’s hoping that the release of Wild Things offers
him irrefutable evidence that his life and work have, in fact, made an
extraordinary difference.
