Entertainment

‘Wagner and Me’ review

Britain’s Stephen Fry, known mainly to Americans in his role as Jeeves, is a fan of Richard Wagner. That would be an understated English way of saying that Fry worships every note, to the point where when he’s discussing the music, this erudite man can scarcely get his words out in proper order.

In “Wagner and Me,” Fry grapples with the paradox of being a Jew who loves the music of the famously anti-Semitic composer. He visits Nuremberg and even interviews an Auschwitz survivor. He watches opera rehearsals and in one marvelous scene, Fry gets to play a single note on Wagner’s own piano.

Real aficionados may find the film superficial in its Wagner 101 approach. But in addition to the magnificent music, the movie takes its rumpled charm from Fry’s unfeigned fanboy manner. When Wagner’s great-granddaughter gives him a notably chilly interview and lays a hand on his arm before skedaddling, his reaction is, “I’ve been touched by a Wagner!”

Fry says he wants to decide if it’s right for a Jewish man, or anyone revolted by Wagner’s beliefs and his operas’ Nazi associations, to plunk into a seat at Bayreuth for 18 hours of the “Ring” cycle. There’s no question he will; Fry wants us to understand why. And that’s best stated early by a scholar he interviews: Wagner “may have been a nasty little man, and a nasty anti-Semite, but that doesn’t mean the music isn’t as supreme as it is.”