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Last night, I watched the HBO documentary, The Trials of Ted Haggard, and then caught the second half of Ted and Gayle Haggard's appearance on Larry King Live.

I went in quite skeptically.  I know a couple persons who knew/know Ted, and they describe him as something of a meglomaniac.  No surprise, Alexandra Pelosi paints Ted as a sympathetic figure.  In fact, using footage from her earlier documentary that features Haggard, it's clear that she has a real affection for him.  Through the doc and the LKL appearance, I couldn't really get a handle on Ted.  He's pretty circumspect on many issues; for instance, he just wouldn't answer the question when a caller from Orlando who described himself as a gay Christian man asked Ted about the possibilities of being a gay Christian. Ted's response was basically: read your Bible and get into a good church.  Ted obviously doesn't feel the authority to judge anyone right now, which is surely smart on his part.

What stunned me, both in the doc and more acutely on LKL, was Gayle Haggard.  Either she is one of the finest actors I've ever seen, or she is one of the most spiritually and psychologically healthy persons on this planet.  She answered every question with composure.  She's not the stand-by-your-man-no-matter-what, mindless, conservative evangelical woman that some have portrayed her to be.  Nor is she the unkempt, sexually uninterested wife that Mark Driscoll infamously insinuated when the scandal broke (of course, Mark's orginal post is gone, but the Internet never forgets!).

She is, instead, thoughtful, kind, gracious, and forgiving.  She has stuck with Ted through a truly horrific experience.  She has accepted his remorse and granted him forgiveness.  And, as a cherry on top, the Haggard's eldest son, Marcus, joined them for the last bit on LKL and he was even more composed than Gayle.  This is a truly extraordinary family...

...Or, they are positioning themselves for a new career.  I've been told by one insider that the Haggards, basically broke, are hoping to establish an income by writing and speaking about their trials.  Indeed, at the end of LKL, both Gayle and Ted said several times that they want to "communicate their story."  Fishing for a book deal? Speaking gigs? A reality TV show?  Very possibly.  So, my cynical side has to acknowledge the possibility that Gayle's (and Ted's and Marcus's) grace and composure is actually a patina, covering a family in great distress trying to dig themselves out of a massive financial hole.

I suppose time will tell.
 

My friend, Patton Dodd, has a piece up on Slate in advance of Alexandra Pelosi's HBO documentary, The Trials of Ted Haggard, premiering tonight.  Patton used to work for Haggard and New Life Church, primarily as a writer and editor, so he writes about Haggard with some authority.  Money Quote from Patton:

Two years have gone by with little more than occasional peeps from Haggard, and now he's back in The Trials of Ted Haggard, an HBO film directed by Alexandra Pelosi, a sort of sequel to her Friends of God, that documents Haggard's dreary life in exile--no job, no home, no friends, no ministry. Earlier this week, when CNN's Anderson Cooper interviewed Pelosi, he tried to open with a question about the fallen minister's "spiritual restoration." Pelosi interrupted Cooper before he could finish the question, saying she couldn't speak to Haggard's mental or spiritual condition. Fair enough. But Cooper's question is the right one--for journalists, for Haggard, for his former church, and for countless other congregations that have suffered similar betrayals.

I spoke to Patton on the phone last night, and one of the more vexing questions in my mind is this: Why is Ted Haggard promoting a documentary about himself?  It seems odd, doesn't it?  Would Roger Smith promote Roger & Me?  Definitely not. 

I'd like a journalist to ask Pelosi and/or Haggard what is the financial arrangement between them, and that might color how we all view this "documentary."

Regardless, I'll be watching it tonight.  And I'll be interested to read all of your comments here.

Last Saturday night, rain and general fatigue scuttled my plans to head into Manhattan, so my hosts and I went to see the film, Rachel Getting Married at the wonderfully quirky and historic Avon Theater in downtown Greenwich, Connecticut. 

Several little surprises awaited me.  One was that we spontaneously met up with Chuck Royce, president of the Royce Funds and of the Royce Foundation, which owns the Theater.  In other words, Chuck purchased the old theater to save it from demolition.  Chuck also happens to be an active member of Trinity Church.  Chuck epitomized a common experience I had in Greenwich: you just wouldn't know that these are some of the wealthiest people in the world.  We sat next to one another in the back row of the theater, and he's the epitome of unassuming generosity.

The second surprise was that the movie was filmed in Fairfield County, Connecticut, just down the road from where we sat.  Fairfield County allegedly has the highest concentration of wealth of any county in the U.S. -- in fact, the day after I left, Newsweek pondered the question, "What Are Rich People Thinking?" in a story that pondered the unlikely Obama victory in a county of richies whose taxes he will surely raise.  It's a quirky place, pockmarked with massive mansions and old country charm, inspersed with ultra high-end retailers and, as Ian pointed out often, $125,000 cars.  It also makes for a strange backdrop for a quirky, indie film, and I would think that the setting would place this film out-of-reach for the imaginations of many Americans who just don't understand New England.

The film itself is brilliant, if a bit long.  First, the aesthetics.  It is filmed exclusively on handheld cameras which I love, though I know that others hate it.  Even more interesting, from my POV, is that the film's soundtrack is all in real-time, primarily supplied by a wandering group of musicians playing fiddle, oud, and hand drum -- they spend most of the film on the porch of the home at which the wedding is taking place, noodling around and preparing for the nuptials.  It's hard to know quite what to make of the Indian theme of the interracial wedding, since it's never referenced.  It's almost like going to see a Shakespearean play set in World War II Germany.

The story is tragi-beautiful.  Anne Hathaway, as has been noted consistently in reviews, is off-the-charts good at playing a young junkie who's sister is getting married.  Hathaway's Kym is the broken keystone in the arch of a family barely holding together.  The tragedy in the family's past is unthinkable, and Kym becomes the focal point of the pain that they all carry with them.  I won't spoil the plot, but will only note that Kym gives the singularly most painfully awkward, shift-in-your-chair uncomfortable toast ever filmed.  This cringe-inducing scene alone, including the cuts to the pained expressions on other actors' faces, is proof of Jonathan Demme's filmmaking brilliance.

Outside of the theater, we all rolled our eyes at how close-to-home this movie felt.  Demme and the cast really captured the pain and unexpected joy of living in a family rife with grief, chemical abuse, divorce, passive aggression, and conflict avoidance.  I'm guessing more than a few seminary classes on pastoral counseling will assign this film in coming years.