Being There was not the last film that Peter Sellers made before he died in 1980. That was unfortunately the extremely racist The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu, a movie that would otherwise be rightly forgotten in the great comedians’ filmography. Being There deserved to be that movie though, if only because it is probably Sellers’ best role and his best performance, and it would have been extremely fitting for him to go out on it. The character of Chance the Gardener, or ‘Chauncey Gardiner’ feels rather the perfect part for the man who was once described as Britain’s “greatest comic genius since Charlie Chaplin”. It is perhaps his most Chaplin-like character, if the movie itself isn’t so Chaplin-like: a dramatic satire on the world of American politics filtered through a likeable simpleton who just accidentally wandered into it.
Hal Ashby directed the film, based off the novel by Jerzy Kosiński (who also wrote the script on Sellers’ request) at the end of an extremely strong decade for him that included Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Shampoo, and his Oscar-contender only the year before, Coming Home. And Being There still manages to stand out among that line-up. Its’ premise is one that has been repeated since, and which it is surely not the originator either, so obvious and fun are its’ comedic possibilities: the innocent dope who through misunderstanding or being in the right place at the right time is catapulted to major fame and/or political, cultural, or historical significance. It’s shown up in The Simpsons and Seinfeld, the first Mr. Bean movie, Dave, even last years’ An AmericanPickle, and was played with relative sincerity in Forrest Gump (though strangely I think Being There is more sincere). To a degree even the brilliant Ted Lasso falls under this banner. But Being There seems to be the template, so much so that for a time TV Tropes named the unwittingly profound stock character after Chance.
There’s a reason for that though, even as this movie has faded from being the most popular version of that story. Because while Chance may not be profound, the movies’ commentary could very well be. As it makes fun of politicians and mass media and the exorbitantly wealthy who maintain a power over both, it showcases how perceptions and personal biases can obscure meaning, as well as who is allowed to be a dispenser of that meaning.
Chance is white and middle-aged. He has a polite, homely way of speaking, and he dresses in the handsome attire of the sophisticated class of some thirty years prior to the movies’ setting. In short, he is, by all appearances, exactly the sort of man western society has been conditioned to listen to and value. And he gets very far off of this; this repressed man-child who grew up sheltered in a townhouse in a dilapidated part of Washington D.C. primarily raised on television, and likely the bastard of a recently deceased U.S. senator. Anyone else from that background, and especially if they belonged to D.C.’s majority black population, would never be allowed to amass a fraction of his influence. This is noted by one of the few truly intelligent characters in the movie, Chance’s caretaker Louise (Ruth Attaway): “It’s for sure a white mans’ world in America” she comments to her friends watching her former charge on a talk show. “All you gotta be is white in America to get whatever you want.”
Of course, Chance didn’t really want to plucked off the street by a millionaire’s wife and inducted into their family and realm of political kingmaking. It just happened to him by (fitting) chance, and he went along with it, unaware of just what he was doing and unconscious of his privilege in it. Chance has no aspirations, no real goals, and no direction in life once vacated from the only home he’s ever known. He’s got no opinions of his own, and no discernable identity even, which is what drew Sellers to the role. As a man who thought of himself as having no personality apart from the outlandish characters he played, it was a dream come true for him to play someone whose only personality is what others project onto him. Sellers had set his heart on making a movie of Being There, had personally convinced Kosiński to adapt it, and then turned out a career-best performance in ultimately seeing it through. He suits the innocent Chance rather well, playing him as this anomaly, this alien: sympathetic, but never too endearing, and uncanny, but never too off-putting. He reminds me in some respects of Mr. Bean, though perhaps more closely, Jacques Tati –his early wandering around D.C. brought to mind Playtime in particular.
But as much as the movie follows Chance, it isn’t really about him. Again, he’s something of an empty vessel whose role in the narrative is determined by how others interpret him. And what they interpret is what’s most telling, and ingenious in a way. Chance’s intellectual sphere is limited to his basic gardening experience and what he’s seen on T.V., as well as a handful of quaint observations he’s made in a lifetime divorced from almost any human contact. But when in conversation with Melvyn Douglas’ Ben Rand or his good friend the President of the United States (Jack Warden), Chance’s vague musings and attitude are attached with a meaning that isn’t there. When he simply offers his advice on gardening it’s taken as a brilliant metaphor for political policy, when he addresses the President personally just because it’s what he knows he’s seen as being boldly confident, and when he just wants to emphasize his fondness for television by clarifying he “likes to watch” he’s mistaken for being into voyeurism. And each of these responses betray certain predispositions in the people making them. Rand sees everything through his narrow lens of politicking and economics (something which the D.C. elite and even the public to an extent is then trained to when they’re told Chance is an important political figure), for the President it’s all about ego, and Rands’ wife Eve (Shirley MacLaine) has been around enough rich men like “Chauncey” to expect them to have strange sexual proclivities.
That scene is the movies’ most extreme, arguably the most cutting, but also in there clearly for the shock value of Shirley MacLaine masturbating. It seems to be the culmination of her role in the story too, which is a shame because there did seem to be at least something genuine the movie was hinting at in the developing romance between Chance and Eve. The sweeping kiss just before was a great moment, simultaneously kind of touching and very funny (Chance was just imitating a scene from The Thomas Crown Affair). Add to that Eve’s clear dissatisfaction in her marriage and Chance’s affections for her being really his one independent characteristic, it’s rather disappointing the film chose to just turn it into a joke. And I’m inclined to agree with Roger Ebert that MacLaine is a bit too good for that and really ought to have been among those few smart enough to see through Chauncey to Chance –like Richard Dysarts’ inquisitive doctor.
But the point is that that is a small club. The majority of the people Chance encounters are fooled by his faux profundity, and it calls into question our confirmation bias and our relationship to things like authority, leadership, and perhaps even intellectualism. And it’s easy to see this movie as deeply cynical of all of those things, but I think it rather encourages a healthy questioning of where and in who we invest trust and esteem. Which voices are elevated and why? How much do we read into the language of the powerful?
The world of Being There is rather lucky to have Chance. He’s soft-spoken, child-like in virtue, and harmless, which are things that cannot be said for his real-world counterparts similarly launched to political fame with no qualifications and only regurgitated soundbites -but enough about Marjorie Taylor-Greene. There’s a scene that plays out an extended portion of an episode of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood (also at an earlier point, Sesame Street plays just before actual muppeteer Fran Brill makes an appearance). It’s rather significant that this is what we are shown informs Chances’ moral compass; and of course, Fred Rogers is only one of the moral icons our protagonist is associated with. In the films’ famous ending, Chance is seen slipping off from Rands’ funeral and walking away on the lake on his property. The questions posed by this final shot and the accompanying final words, carried over from the eulogist, “Life is a state of mind” have provoked a lot of speculation and debate, some of which re-frames the whole film. Is Chance an angel or some other supernatural being? Is he Christ himself? And consequently, is he who we are meant to emulate? Should we perhaps look at the world in such terms? Or was he simply here to show us the truth and breadth of our gullibility? To teach our leaders and one-percenters a lesson? It says all of these things and more, and is beautifully mystifying to boot. We leave the movie with less a grasp on who Chance the Gardener was than when we started –and I think that’s just what Sellers would have wanted.
He hated the end credits outtake that follows, and it is very inappropriate to the note the film just closed on (it’s also broadly racist). Nevertheless, the power of that final moment stands, the most famous of a bunch of strong and memorable choices Ashby made in his direction of the film. Though it’s largely a political satire, he directs it like a drama, with median lighting and reserved compositions, excepting when he just can’t resist indulging in its more ridiculous aspects; the best example being Chance’s initial departure from his house and meandering journey in the direction of the Capitol Building set to a remix of Also Sprach Zarathustra -a deliberate evocation of the evolutionary motif to 2001: A Space Odyssey. It should be noted these scenes are shot terrifically, with perfect tracking by cinematographer Caleb Deschanel on his very first movie.
If Being There had gone just a little further it might have got into full Borat territory and truly ruffled things: Chance is certainly the kind of figure others would lower their guard around enough to let some truly heinous thoughts and feelings out. But then 1979 was simply not aware of or ready to have that conversation. What Ashby, Kosiński, and Sellers did though was still bold, especially for that time. Through this bizarre character, they put a considerable segment of society under the microscope and asked it to interrogate itself to a degree society is still extremely reticent to. There’s significance in a movie doing that, and in audiences heeding its’ advice.
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