Parasha Beraisheet

Twenty Feet from Stardom

This past Monday I saw a movie called "Twenty Feet from Stardom".  It focuses on the careers of a number of African American women – Darlene Love, Merry Clayton, Lisa Fisher, Tata Vega  and Judith Hill, to name a few – who provided the background voices to the likes of Mick Jagger, Bruce Springsteen, Sting, Michael Jackson, Ike and Tina Turner, Stevie Wonder, Joe Cocker, Frank Sinatra and other famous entertainers. We have all heard these background singers on recordings and at concerts, but we do not know their names. The film asks a question that it ultimately cannot answer – What is it that makes a star? Why are some very talented people stars, while other equally talented people remain in the background, singing, quite literally twenty feet from stardom? 

All of these remarkably talented women grew up in the African American church, where they learned to sing with others in their church choirs and to blend their voices together in improvised harmonies for the sake of worship. Their fathers were often the pastors of the church in which they grew up. Yet despite a desire for a solo career, none of them became a household name.  None of them reached the top.  It was not a lack of talent. They all have abundant talent – that is evident from their performances in the film. Different theories are offered to explain this.  Perhaps, it was the lack of the appropriate material for their voices. Perhaps it was a lack of the driving ambition, the hunger -- yes, even the narcissism that propels one to stardom. Perhaps they never found the producer, the manager, that person who could help guide their career, to make them the next Aretha Franklin. Or, perhaps it was because there was already an Aretha Franklin, and there was not enough room in the public appetite for another!  The singer Sting opines that it is karma, or fate, or destiny. Whatever it is, the back-up singers who are featured in this film express a combination of gratitude, joy, acceptance, and disappointment as, now in their fifties, sixties and seventies, they look back over their professional careers – and at what "might have been."

Part of the power of this film is, I think, that we can all relate to the struggles, the disappointment and the satisfactions that these entertainers articulate about their lives.  Perhaps we have ourselves wondered why we have not become "stars" in our own chosen fields. Perhaps we too have experienced the frustration that comes with not achieving ones dreams.  We might ask, what is the difference between us and the person who has become wealthier, more acknowledged, more successful?  Is it a matter of birth, of talent, of luck, of guidance?  Were we to have studied harder, gone to the right school, been mentored by the right people, would our lives have been different?  Was it that we did not have the persistence to pursue our dreams to the utmost?  Did we not have the drive, the ambition – or was "being a star" simply not that important to us?  Were we unwilling to pay the price that the stars have paid for their fame, their position in life?  Were we born in the wrong time, or in the wrong place – or to the wrong family!    

In our parasha for this week we have the story of the creation of humankind. G-d creates all of the fish of the waters, the birds of the sky, and the beasts of the land en masse. G-d does not even give them names – that will be the task of the human.  But G-d only creates one human being.  G-d only creates a single individual from which to populate the earth.  Man is the only animal that G-d names. Our rabbis of antiquity marveled at this. "If a person strikes a coin from one mold, all of the coins that come from that mold are identical," they noted. "Each coin is exactly like the next one.  But although the Holy Blessed One fashioned every person from the mold of the first person, not a single one of them is exactly like his fellow. Therefore, each and every person should say, "The world was created for my sake."

The rabbis have it exactly correct. Each and every one of us is a unique individual. Each person has their own set of talents and interests, genetic endowments and family backgrounds. There has never been anybody like us who has ever lived, and there will never be anyone like us once we pass from this world. We ought not to try to be like anybody else. We ought to find satisfaction with who we are, where we are, and what we have accomplished. This was what those who were twenty feet from stardom came to accept and to understand.  This is what the viewers of the movie came to understand as well – that each artist that was portrayed is a "star" in their own right.

The story is told that when Rabbi Zusya of Hanipol was dying, his disciples gathered around his bedside, hoping to hear one last word of wisdom from him. He said to them, "My students, know that I am not worried that when I come before the Throne on High, that they will ask me 'Zusya, why were you not a great leader like Moses?'  If they ask me that question, I have my answer ready. I will say to the Court, 'Because You did not give me the courage and the ability to lead that You gave Moses.'"

"And I am not worried that they will ask me, 'Zusya, why did you not teach your people wisdom, as Maimonides did?' Because if they ask me that, I have my answer ready, I will say to them, 'Because You did not give me the profound intellect that You gave Maimonides.'"

"But there is one question that I fear they may ask me. If they do, I have no answer. What keeps me awake every night, and what worries me so much is what will I say if they should ask me, 'Zusya, why were you not Zusya?'"

May we have the courage to be ourselves, and to develop our unique talents and capacities to the fullest extent possible.  We are not twenty feet from stardom. Each of us is a star in our own right as well.