Alys Robi

The Canadian 1940s singer Alys Robi underwent a lobotomy at the age of 29 in 1952. She had become depressed after she was injured in a car crash, and spent five years in a Quebec mental hospital. She described the experience in her book "Long Cri dans la nuit: Cinq Années à l'Asile" (Montreal 1990). Although she was terrified at the prospect of a lobotomy, she credited it with giving her a chance of recovery: "Je me réveillai guérie et j'ai compris plus tard que j'avais été un des rares cas réussis de lobotomie" (I woke up better and later understood that I was one of the rare success stories). She returned to singing, but not quite as successfully as before; the Canadian Encyclopaedia refers to her attempting "several comebacks 1952-74".

A film was recently made about Alys Robi's life.

BITTERSWEET MEMORIES
Directed by Denise Filiatrault, Starring Pascale Bussières, Michel Barrette, Serge Postigo.
Is it officially a genre now, biopics about gifted, glamorous women who go mad? If it isn’t, it should be. To the true stories of Marilyn, Billie Holiday, Frances Farmer and Piaf, add Quebecoise chanteuse Alys Robi. Like those other beautiful ruins, Alys Robi came from humble roots, was too strong and too talented to stay home, but not strong enough to survive in the world she went into.

The movie opens with Alys (Pascale Bussières) in a Quebec hospital, about to have a lobotomy to "cure" her manic depression, then flashes back to her childhood in the 1920s, following her rise from small-town singing sensation to international star. She was only 13 when she left home to go to Montreal to pursue her singing career. There, she changed her name from Alice Robitaille to Alys Robi, joined the National Theater, and was mentored by musical comedy star Rose Ouellette. It was in Montreal that she later became involved with comedian Olivier Guimond (Serge Postigo), her first love and a married man, whom she later derided for his lack of ambition. Her ambition led her to leave him for Toronto and the orchestra leader Lucio Agostino (Denis Bernard)–another married man with children back in Montreal. A pregnancy resulted, leading to an abortion that was very traumatic for Robi and forcefully brought to the surface the crippling religious guilt drummed into her in Catholic Quebec.

Professionally, the collaboration with Agostino was a fruitful one. She became the toast of Montreal, Toronto, London and Hollywood. As Robi’s star was rising, her family back in Quebec was struggling. Her beloved brother became ill with a crippling spinal disease that put him in a wheelchair and ultimately killed him, despite Alys’ efforts and expenditures to save him. This sent Robi into a tailspin. Already temperamental and prone to stage fright, she began to have irrational, diva-like fits of temper, and to make mistakes on stage. She felt hunted by paparazzi and gossip. Then the affair with Agostino imploded, and so did Robi, leading her father to have her committed to a mental institution for a lobotomy, against her will.

The story follows the genre’s formula pretty closely, and while he movie doesn’t go deep enough into her mental illness, its compelling storytelling provides a tantalizing look at Robi’s talent, exposing it to a whole new audience.

Pascale Bussières does a good job as Robi, and evidently does her own singing for the movie. She has a wonderful voice: I would have liked to have heard even more of it. And is it my imagination, or is Quebec producing some exceptional cinematographers and production designers these days? This is a richly beautiful film, a real treat for the eyes. From the hardscrabble hometown with its small comforts to the dazzling color of Robi’s big city life, every detail is right.

Alys Robi: Bittersweet Memories, has a much better title in French. Translated, it is My Life in Cinemascope, an apt metaphor for the wide-screen, larger than life Alys Robi. Too sensitive for the slings and arrows of stardom, yet too sensitive for the rigors and common tragedies of her family life back in Quebec, Robi seemed to have nowhere to go but mad.

SPARKLE HAYTER (SEE magazine, July 21 2005)