This film documentary is a great companion piece to the autobiography "Clive Davis: The Story of My Life", written with collaborator Anthony DeCurtis. The book details more of Davis's personal and family life than what you find here, which is OK, because fans tuning in will probably be more interested in the music. A lot of what you learn here is fascinating. like the singer he signed as his very first client - Janis Joplin. Davis had a warmth and manner about him that managed to captivate most every singer and band he came into contact with, and as a result, came to produce an impressive stable of musicians over the course of his fifty plus year career. What's unusual is that there's virtually no one that casts aspersions on the character or business acumen of Davis, and we do hear from a wide range of musical personalities in the documentary, like Bruce Springsteen, Carlos Santana, Steven Tyler, Simon and Garfunkel, and Barry Manilow. Davis's career is traced from his days at Columbia Records (owned by CBS), Arista Records, and eventually to J Records where he brought his talent for matching performers with material in such a fashion that literally anything he touched turned into a hit. Some segments of the story are expanded, such as the treatments offered on Barry Manilow, who recorded the first single on Arista ('Mandy'), Dionne Warwick, and the one person that he most seemed to favor of all his proteges, Whitney Houston. If you have any interest in spanning the musical decades of a master producer, organizer and hit-maker, you have to tune in to this story. And to think, his career came about almost by accident! Check it out.
"...when he got into music, he was a music man!" - Berry Gordy on Clive Davis
2 October 2020
Warning: Spoilers