There’s an indelible scene in the film Shame, in which Carey Mulligan, in one of her early breakout roles, performs a torchy rendition of “New York, New York.” Director Steve McQueen frames Mulligan in a tight close-up, so we can see the exhaustion in her troubled character’s eyes as she sings those famous, triumphal lines: “Start spreading the news….” Nothing happens in this scene. And everything happens as Mulligan sings, because what we’re witnessing is a person fighting to keep the spark of herself alive. This, kids, is acting.
Mulligan performs the same magic trick in the new movie Maestro. Only this time, she does it just by listening. Playing Felicia Montealegre, wife of legendary conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein, Mulligan’s character is not, cannot ever be, the star of…
