For the second week in a row, our Pick is a documentary about a fairly successful pop artist who became a legendary record producer. Unlike Eno, however, Peter Asher: Everywhere Man is not very notable for its construction. It’s a relatively conventional music documentary. Still, the feature similarly centers on its very present subject, who guides the storytelling through newly captured interviews. The film also includes footage of a recent stage performance, where he tells tales of his life and career between singing classic tunes. It’s these tales, supplemented with archival material, that keep the documentary engaging. I was surprisingly delighted by the whole thing.
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I wasn’t familiar with Peter Asher as such a significant figure in the history of 20th-century music, though I knew a few of his songs from his Peter and Gordon days. If you don’t know much about him, the documentary will be a trivial yet entertaining trip through the decades with an extraordinary character. Compiled for a narrative throughline, points in Asher’s life make him seem like the Forrest Gump of the recording industry. These markers include the time his family took in Paul McCartney, the day he was partially responsible for introducing John Lennon to Yoko Ono, and the years he helped make James Taylor a star of a new era of soft rock.
Even though Asher is an interesting subject in his own right, with many monumental career achievements, he seems to sell himself a bit short in the stage show and film by telling so many stories about other, more famous people. It’s almost like he’s a namedropper, yet I think it’s more about him yearning for his own credit for the parts he played in these other lives and careers. Then again, I don’t think he wants to be blamed for breaking up The Beatles or the marriage of John Dunbar and Marianne Faithfull either. He was just there for those turns of events. He indeed deserves recognition for many things seen in the documentary, and for how charismatic he is on stage and screen, making the film such an enjoyable watch.