Directed by Stephen Williams
Starring Kelvin Harrison Jr. as Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges
Released April 21, 2023
Chevalier is a fictitious take on the eighteenth-century maestro and master swordsman, Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges. The film was directed by Stephen Williams (The Walking Dead, How to Get Away with Murder, Lost) with rising star Kelvin Harrison Jr. (The Trial of the Chicago 7, Waves) in the title role.
The film opens with a fanciful violin duel between the “Black Mozart” and the real Mozart (Joseph Prowen), who reprises his role in Amadeus (1984) as a brilliant little sh*t. To no one’s surprise, Bologne not only upstages his famous contemporary at his own concert but also does so with the obligatory flair. Later, we learn that Bologne is a favorite with Marie Antoinette (Lucy Boynton). However, their friendship is soon stymied by court politics, which are thrown into sharp relief by the looming Revolution.
Case in point is a scene where the queen visits Bologne to negotiate, or rather demand, a reconciliation. When he rejects her overtures, she reminds him that she has the power to make or break him and his musical career if he refuses to bow to her royal prerogatives. Then, as she sweeps from his residence, the crowd gathered outside it angrily demands her head. This interpretation of history turns Marie Antoinette’s beheading at the hands of a bloodthirsty mob into an inevitable, even just, consequence of ruling-class (read: white) hubris and conveys the equally false impression that the French Revolution was fought to end racial injustice rather than to redress the socioeconomic disparity that distinguished the upper and lower classes.
In a flashback, we discover that Bologne’s relentless pursuit of excellence is motivated not by his prodigious talent, or a desire to excel for its own sake, but by his Caucasian father, Georges (Jim High), who forcibly separates him from his enslaved mother and enrolls him in an elite musical conservatory, where the only way to survive the stigma of being an illegitimate “half-caste” is to work harder than his peers to prove himself. “Always be excellent,” Georges tells him. “No one may tear down an excellent Frenchman.”
Bologne is so brainwashed by this trauma that he initially wants nothing to do with his mother, Nanon (Ronke Adekoluejo)—a predictably strong woman with a predictably unbroken spirit—because she proudly speaks her native tongue (assumably Creole or possibly Wolof), as opposed to French, and teases him about his posh white ways. “You’ve let these rich white people soften you,” she scoffs. His psychological scars run so deep that he spends much of the film wracked by melancholy and self-doubt. It’s not until he lets his self-assured mother tenderly tame his Frenchified hair into her native cornrows that he feels empowered to embrace his true identity and take up the mantel of blackness.
Except that he never actually does.
The film ends where it began with another concert. This time, the newly liberated Bologne embeds a childhood lullaby into one of his compositions. This show of cultural pride evokes so much idealogical support from his rapt audience that it dramatically prevents him from being arrested by royal guards in the middle of his performance—evidently an example of the power of the bow over that of the sword.
Needless to say, the film is so historically inaccurate in its pursuit of “wokeness” as to require a brief bio.
The real Joseph Bologne (December 25, 1745–June 9, 1799) was born on the Caribbean archipelago of Guadeloupe to a thirty-four-year-old French plantation owner named Georges de Bologne Saint-Georges (1711–1774) and his wife’s personal maid, a sixteen-year-old Senegalese slave named Anne Danneveau, or Nanon (c. 1729–1795). Georges also had a daughter named Elisabeth Benedictine by his wife, Elisabeth Mérican (1722–1801).
In 1747, Georges was accused of murder and fled to France, where he, his wife, his mistress, and his illegitimate child found asylum until a royal pardon permitted them to return to the then-French colony of Guadeloupe. In 1753, they returned to enroll the seven-year-old Bologne at a Jesuit boarding school in Angoulême, close to his uncle Pierre, so that he could be educated in Europe like other privileged colonial children. Two years later, Georges and Nanon moved from Basse-Terre to Paris sans his wife.
When Georges died in 1774, his legitimate child inherited most of his assets, leaving Bologne with an annuity of 8,000 francs and Nanon with a comfortable pension that allowed her to live freely in France for the rest of her life. His still-living wife apparently received nothing.
One speculates that their rather bizarre ménage à trois played out the way that it did because, though Elizabeth had given Georges an heir, it was Nanon who’d given him a son. It’s even possible that Nanon welcomed or initiated their affair, leveraging her status as the mistress of a wealthy man to secure the best possible future for herself and her son, as other underprivileged but enterprising women had done before her. Regardless, she and Bologne weren’t the victims that the film makes them out to be. Far from discarding Nanon like a worn-out shoe, Georges not only chose her over Elizabeth (unless she left him) but also gave their illegitimate child every advantage that the law allowed. This made Bologne more privileged than many people in France, as the precise record of his birth, the plight of the average eighteenth-century peasant, and the following narrative can attest.
In 1758, Bologne joined his parents in Paris, where master of arms Nicolas Benjamin Texier la Boëssière gave the thirteen-year-old private lessons in horsemanship and weaponry alongside his son, Antoine. Bologne’s progress as a swordsman was so rapid that he was able to challenge Alexandre Picard while he was still a student. Picard was a fencing master from Rouen who had been publicly mocking him as “Boëssière’s upstart mulatto.” Opponents and proponents of slavery attended the match and bet heavily on its outcome. Bologne’s victory earned him a horse and buggy from Georges and a knighthood from Louis XV, who also appointed him a Gendarme de la Garde du Roi (Officer of the King’s Guard) some time between the match in 1761 and his graduation from Boëssière’s academy in 1766. Thereafter, he adopted the title Chevalier de Saint-Georges after one of Georges’s plantations in Guadeloupe. In a professional fencing career that spanned several decades, he suffered only one notable defeat, earning the sobriquet “god of arms.”
No one knows how Bologne learned to play the violin but his adult skill was such that he must have studied the instrument from a young age. Jean-Marie Leclair, Pierre Gaviniès, and Antonio Lolli have been cited as possible influences. François-Joseph Gossec may have tutored him in musical composition before and after he joined his orchestra, Concert des Amateurs, in 1769. By 1771, Bologne was composing his own music as the orchestra’s concert master. The following year, he debuted two original works as a violin soloist, a display of virtuosity that left his female attendees particularly enraptured. In 1773, he succeeded Gossec as conductor, and, in less than two years, he’d drilled the Concert des Amateurs into the finest symphonic orchestra in Europe (hashtag: not so Amateurs now). Then, in 1776—the same year that the American colonists declared that “all men are created equal”—a racist petition foiled his ambition to lead what’s now the Opéra national de Paris, then known as the Académie royale de Musique, or, more commonly, the Opéra.
According to Baron von Grimm’s account of the affair in his Correspondence litteraire, philosophique et critique (Literary, Philosophical and Critical Correspondence), three of the Opéra’s reigning divas “presented a placet to the Queen assuring Her Majesty that their honor and delicate conscience could never allow them to submit to the orders of a mulatto.” In an apparent attempt to prevent a scandal without offending either side, the newly crowned Louis XVI (1754–1793) plucked the management of the Opéra from the city of Paris and placed it in the care of his Intendant of Menus-Plaisirs du Roi (Lesser Pleasures of the King). Meanwhile, Marie Antoinette (1755–1793) began hosting exclusive musical performances in the salon of Versailles’s private suite, Petit Appartement de la Reine (Little Apartment of the Queen), and her more intimate, “rustic” retreat, Petit Trianon, where she and Bologne performed duets. This is a far cry from the humiliating public rift depicted in the film, which has an intoxicated Bologne cringingly protesting his ill-usage at court. In fact, LA Opera (which premiered his third opera, L’Amant anonyme, or The Anonymous Lover, in 2020) states that he withdrew his application of his own accord.
Despite this incident—or perhaps, stubbornly, because of it—Bologne soon abandoned instrumental composition and devoted himself solely to opera. I say “stubbornly” because his operas were never as well received as his other musical contributions and led to financial difficulties when his first, Ernestine, flopped after one performance. (The audience loved his score but hated Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’s libretto, which had a coachman ludicrously crying, “Ohe, Ohe!”, causing the young queen to exclaim, “To Versailles, Ohe!”, as she left the Opéra.) Thereafter, Bologne was forced to diversify his talents and depend more heavily on the goodwill of his patrons, moving more frequently from role to role and from residence to residence. On May 17, 1779, John Adams described him as “the most accomplished man in Europe in riding, running, shooting, fencing, dancing, musick [sic]. He will hit the button, any button on the coat or waistcoat of the greatest masters. He will hit a crown piece in the air with a pistoll [sic] ball.” While this is certainly a testimony to Bologne’s many accomplishments, it also makes him sound a bit like a circus attraction.
In 1781, the Concert des Amateurs went bankrupt but Bologne and his musicians re-formed as the masonic Concert de la Loge Olympique, or Orchestra of the Olympic Lodge (yes, our hero was also a Freemason). It was in this capacity that Bologne conducted the premiere of Haydn’s six Paris symphonies. He would later serve the French Revolution as both a soldier and a spy (was there anything sexy that the man didn’t do?) but was later jailed for eleven months because of his close ties to the aristocracy. He’s also believed to be the inspiration for Aramis in The Three Musketeers, due to the fact that Alexandre Dumas’s father served under him in the Légion franche de Cavalerie des Américains et du Midi (Free Legion of Cavalry of the Americans and the South), also known as Légion Américaine, Légion noire, and the Légion de Saint-Georges in Bologne’s honor.
Ironically, one of the things that Napolean Bonaparte (1769–1821) did as First Consul of France was reinstate slavery, which Louis XVI had abolished in 1791, the year after Bologne joined the French Garde nationale (National Guard) as a citizen-soldier. Thus, the film’s suggestion that Bologne became a revolutionary to stick it to the very aristocrats who were responsible for his success—people whom he counted as friends as well as patrons—is ludicrous at best. The French Revolution was contradictory in many respects. Bologne’s decision to fight against what was arguably his own class is only one of them. On the other hand, given that France’s Code noir (Black Code) prevented him from enjoying the same rights and liberties as his peers, what could be more natural?
That’s more or less as far as the film takes us. I’ve chosen not to include Bologne’s affair with Marie-Josephine de Montalembert (1760–1832, played by Samara Weaving) or their lovechild, as both are a case for historical conjecture and not part of the main plot. As for his supposed rivalry with Mozart (1756–1791), it’s likely that they did meet when they were both visiting their mutual patron, Count Sickingen, in 1778. It’s also likely that the twenty-two-year-old used passages from the older, more established composer’s 1777 Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in A Major, Op. 7, No. 1, in his 1778 Symphonie Concertante in E-flat (K. 364) after returning to his native Austria. However, it wasn’t uncommon for composers, writers, etc., to borrow from each other’s work (and even reuse portions of their own) at a time when there were little to no copyright laws.
Finally, in response to those who’ve claimed that Bologne was “erased” from history because he was black, it’s worth pointing out that society has become less racist over time. If Bologne’s contemporaries had been racist enough to erase him, they wouldn’t have let him succeed in the first place. Second, both he and Mozart died in poverty but only the latter was buried in an unmarked grave. And third, many white composers have been forgotten too. Johann Christian Bach (1735–1782) was more popular than his father in their lifetimes but “Bach” now means Johann Sebastian (1685–1750). Another example is Nic(c)olò Paganini (1782–1840). A wildly virtuosic violinist with a somewhat controversial reputation, he was one of the first soloist “rockstars” and is credited with inspiring Franz Liszt (1811–1886)—whose fans often succumbed to hysterical fainting fits dubbed “Lisztomania”—to practice the piano a dozen-plus hours a day. Yet, if you mentioned Liszt or Paganini today, the average person wouldn’t know who you were talking about. I even had a housemate who asked me if George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) was still alive (clue: he isn’t). Not to mention all the once-popular composers who I can’t even name because, well, they’ve been forgotten. Ever heard of Anton Arensky? Yeah, thought not.
Given how multitalented Bologne was, Chevalier could’ve been many things: An inspiring true story about a black person succeeding in a predominantly white society. An historically accurate adventure about a handsome polymath’s daring exploits. An entertaining look at the musical milieu of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century France à la Shakespeare in Love (1998). Instead, the filmmakers chose to focus on what Bologna suffered rather than on what he overcame, repeatedly inverting positive historical examples of inter-race relations to reinforce their “woke” agenda. In so doing, they inadvertently turned their “hero” into a martyr of social injustice, turning someone who deserved to be an exceptional source of inspiration into an object of pity. And the irony is that most of the film’s hardships never occurred: Georges didn’t heartlessly separate Bologne from his mother and abandon him at a French conservatory, Marie Antoinette didn’t turn on him in his hour of need, and his alleged lovechild wasn’t murdered by his lover’s vengeful husband.
But the film’s most glaring problem is its attempt to rescue Bologne from racial injustice by helping him regain his “true” identity, despite the fact that he was as as biologically French as he was Senegalese. This “woke” habit of claiming a genetic, cultural, or idealogical affinity with a country or culture that, in many cases, the person has never even visited is as ludicrous as a born-and-bred Californian like myself adopting an Irish brogue and banging on about my tenuous descent from High King Brian Boru (c. 941–1014). By the same token, I wonder how much cultural affinity that a superstar like Colin Kaepernick (who was born and raised in the U.S. by adoptive white parents and whose birth mother is also Caucasian) would feel toward his African “home” if he had to live in a rural village without air-conditioning, Internet, or WiFi (reality TV show, anyone?).
This “woke” practice also implies that black people can’t be French or vice versa—i.e., that someone of a different racial or cultural heritage can’t adopt the manners or customs of another country without losing, or at the very least threatening, their “true” identity. As if culture is something that we’re born with instead of something that we invented. Take what I said about “Frenchified hair”: the film depicts wigs as “white people hair” and cornrows as “black people hair.” Yet, if a black person wears a wig or a white person wears cornrows, the style is subsequently defined by both people regardless of who invented them, in the same way that a woman who drives “like a man” is actually driving like a woman.
Ironically, the practice of segregating cultural characteristics into “X people things” and “Y people things” is not only antithetical to equality but also contrary to the inclusion that “woke” people are always banging on about. Also notice that their definition of inclusion always means Westerners accommodating themselves to the immigrant’s culture of origin, not the immigrant accommodating themself to their culture of choice. When Caucasians exert their influence on other cultures, it’s “colonialism/imperialism/discrimination/white supremacy”; when people of color do it, it’s “equality/democracy/inclusion/racial justice.” The same people who associate non-Western countries with specific cultural characteristics deny Western countries the same right.
Case in point: I’ve never heard the term “black supremacy” applied to Africa, a predominantly black continent with the world’s second-largest population, or “yellow supremacy” applied to China, which isolated itself from foreign influences for centuries, building and rebuilding the proverbial Wall to keep “inferior” people out. If non-Western continents/countries aren’t an equal, inclusive composite of all races and cultures as “woke” people expect the West to be, how can these people justify the double standard that they maintain between West and non-West? Are they suggesting that non-Western countries are inferior and therefore beneath the humanity, decency, and inclusion that they demand of the West, or are they suggesting that non-Western countries are superior and therefore above the standards that they require of the West? There are only two choices. Both are equally racist.
If all people are created equal, as the Declaration of Independence states, it was just as valid for Bologne to be raised French as for him to be raised Senegalese or any other culture in which he happened to find himself, regardless of his race. He didn’t stop being Bologne because he spoke French instead of Senegalese or wore wigs instead of cornrows; he simply added new dimensions to himself. Thus, there was no need to “liberate” him from racial injustice by subjecting his white heritage to the same discrimination practiced on his black roots. Racism can’t drive out racism any more than hate can drive out hate. Hypocrisy always condemns an argument; it never justifies it.
Overall, the kindest thing that I can say about Chevalier is that it fails to improve on a story that required no embellishments. Bologne was more talented than most of us can ever hope to be and was perfectly capable of standing on his own feet without the help of a “black savior.” Williams’s failure to grasp this turned his “hero” into a victim, making him a survivor instead of a success.
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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (May 5, 2023)
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The Little Mermaid (May 26, 2023)
Another summer blockbuster that everyone will see for its pretty POC star and catchy Caribbean rhythms but will leave some viewers wondering if we really needed another “woke,” live-action version of an award-winning Disney classic. 3 stars.
Astroid City (June 15, 2023)
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No Hard Feelings (June 23, 2023)
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Barbie (July 21, 2023)
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Oppenheimer (July 21, 2023)
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Dune: Part Two (March 15, 2024)
Starving background actresses with a crush on Timothée Chalamet have another reason to curse the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes that pushed this back from November 3, 2023 to the day before their birthday. If Part Two is at least as good as Part One, hat’s off because sequels usually suck. Word on the street is that Princess Irulan (Florence Pugh) will give Chani (Zendaya) a run for her money, which will mark the second time that Chalamet and Pugh play opposite after costarring in Gerwig’s Little Women. 3–4 stars.
The historical account of Bologne’s life and work was taken from Wikipedia’s “Chevalier de Saint-Georges” and supplemented and supported by the following articles. These differ in minor details, such as whether his mother went by Anne or Nanon, whether she was sixteen or seventeen when she gave birth to him, and whether he was seven or eight when they left Guadeloupe. Some of these discrepancies could be explained by the fact that he was born on Christmas, meaning that he spent most of 1753 being seven rather than eight, for example.
Any French mistranslations or misspellings are almost entirely mine. It’s my understanding that the French only capitalize the nouns in proper nouns, necessitating the use of italics for clarity but leaving me wondering if I should include words like “Versailles” and “Opéra” for continuity. Careful readers will notice that I made an exception for these, as their usage is both common and clear.
“Chevalier de Saint-Georges.” Wikipedia. Accessed April 21, 2023. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/chevalier_de_saint-georges.
David White. ” ‘Why has this person been erased?’: the untold story of the Black French maestro.” The Guardian. Published April 19, 2023. Revised May 7, 2023. https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/apr/19/chevalier-film-joseph-bologne-true-story.
“Five Facts about the Chevalier de Saint-Georges.” Houston Symphony. Published September 23, 2021.
https://houstonsymphony.org/five-facts-about-the-chevalier-de-saint-georges.
“Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges.” Minnesota Opera. Accessed April 21, 2023.
https://mnopera.org/biography/joseph-bologne-chevalier-de-saint-georges.
“Joseph Bologne.” Los Angeles Opera. Accessed April 21, 2023.
https://www.laopera.org/about-us/artists-2/creative-team/joseph-bologne.
Marcos Balter. “His Name Is Joseph Boulogne, Not ‘Black Mozart.’ ” The New York Times. Published July 22, 2020. Revised July 24, 2020.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/arts/music/black-mozart-joseph-boulogne.html.
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