Performance is probably the most bohemian of films. It is a
frenetic mish mash of cockney gangland thriller, euro- hippy morality tale, and
iconic music soundtrack, all wrapped up in a mélange of sex, drugs and rock and
roll. Although released in 1970, the film was shot in the summer of 1968 and
faced difficulties getting on screen. The film's content was an unwelcome surprise to Warner Studios. It has been reported that during a test screening, one Warner
executive's wife vomited in shock.
Directed by Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, its cultural
and philosophical roots go deep- a kind of 60’s hippy hangover meets the
impending morning after of the 70’s. And then of course there is the
outstanding cast including Mick Jagger (Turner), James Fox (Chas), Anita
Pallenberg (Pherber) and Michèle Breton (Lucy).
First impressions are perhaps that Pherber is the most mesmerizing
female presence, but after a while, Lucy exerts a peculiarly enigmatic
influence (Chas: “you're a funny little
frog, like a little boy”). I have quoted some information on Michèle Breton
from the Bloomsbury Movie Guide by Mick Brown:
“Breton was a French actress for whom Performance was her
one and only film role… For many years after the making of the film, Michèle
Breton was to be the enigma at the heart of the Performance story. Those who had
worked on the film, or known Breton for the short time that she was associated
with Cammell’s circle, could cast little light on where she had come from, or
what had happened to her when filming was completed.
Sandy Leiberson remembers her as “one of Donald’s little
girlfriends, someone he’d picked up in France who didn’t care who she slept
with. A strange little creature, totally androgynous- looking- the way Donald
liked them.” … she represented that image that Donald was so in love with- that
young girl who is totally uninhibited, no hang up whatsoever.
By Cammell’s own account he had met Breton in St. Tropez. It
is clear from the early drafts of the script that Cammell already had her in
mind for the part of Lucy. Breton was just seventeen, and Cammell was obliged
to falsify her age to secure the necessary work permits.
Breton was erratic, and sometimes disturbing presence
throughout filming. Cammell would later recall that “she smoked too much” hash
and was frequently under the influence of psychedelics. On at least two
occasions, workmen had to be dispatched to her Knightsbridge flat to repair a
bathroom window which she had smashed.
[After the film]… Breton seemed to vanish off the face of
the earth. Anita Pallenberg has heard she had been admitted to a sanatorium.
Marianne Faithfull thought she had died- “perhaps in Marseilles”.
In 1995, Mick Brown found Breton living in Berlin…
Her memories of making Performance were confused. She had never acted before
and she said she was stoned all of the time. “I was very young and very
disturbed. I didn’t know what I was doing and they used me. It was a very spaced-
out atmosphere. There was no love there, no understanding between people.
Everybody was on a heavy ego trip. James Fox was the only person who had some
human communication. He saw what was going on with me- the emptiness. He
understood that and was very gentle to me.”
In Paris,
a friend told her the drugs were cheap in Afghanistan,
so she made her way to Kabul. She
lived there for a year, shooting morphine, selling her passport, her
belongings, everything. One night she took LSD. “I looked at my needles, my
drugs, and said never again”.
From Kabul, she
traveled to India
where she was hospitalized for three months. She returned to Kabul,
then to Italy,
and eventually to Berlin, where
she had lived for the past thirteen years.
“I’ve done nothing with my life” she said. “Where did it
start going wrong? I can’t remember. It’s something like destiny.” She last saw
Performance in 1987. “I was feeling kind of sick looking at this. It was a
feeling of death.”
By South Utsire
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