Topics: Brad Pitt, Music, TikTok, US News, Los Angeles, New York, Film and TV, Documentaries, Celebrity
Jeff Buckley's mom wasn't exactly keen when Brad Pitt asked if he could make a biopic about the musician.
The American singer-songwriter, Buckley, has been quite the enigma filmmakers have been unable to crack - until now.
Born in California, he was a somewhat struggling artist throughout his early 20s, performing as a session guitarist in LA and New York before singing with Columbia Records, recruiting a band and releasing his only studio album, 'Grace', in 1994.
Critics from Rolling Stone to legends like Bob Dylan and David Bowie considered it one of the greatest albums of all time, not forgetting his infamous rendition of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah'.
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However, his loss has been keenly felt for the past three decades as the Grammy winner, who wom the award posthumously in 1997, died by drowning just two years after his album was released at the age of 30.
Naturally, filmmakers have been chasing the dream of bringing Buckley's story to life on the big screen - and at the forefront of the running has been Brad Pitt.
Now, a new documentary tells Buckley's unique story, which Pitt executively produced. It also hilariously touches upon the Fight Club star's battle with Buckley's mom to get the project off the ground.
In 2000, Pitt attempted to persuade Mary Guibert to let him play Buckley in a biopic, to the point he even invited the mom to his wedding with Jennifer Aniston as a VIP guest.
In the film, Guibert commented: "If there’s 20 people calling you, and Brad Pitt is one of them, who are you gonna pick to go see?"
However, she wasn't fully convinced by the proposal and was skeptical about the idea of any actor being able to embody the life of her only child.
In a brutal stand-off over the idea, Guibert said she snapped to Pitt: "We’re going to dye your hair, put brown contact lenses on those baby blues, and you’re going to open your mouth and Jeff’s voice is going to come out?”
So, the project fell through, but the Golden Globes actor didn't give up.
Then, director Amy Berg, famous for her documentary films West of Memphis (2012) and Deliver Us From Evil (2006) took her shot, but the mom stood firm against the biopic narrative-style.
Fortunately, a compromise was eventually reached when Guibert gave Berg access to her son's archive and the pair agreed a documentary would be better suited to the task at hand - and Pitt on the team as an executive producer.
The eureka moment came as Berg said only a documentary made sense.
"Once I started listening to his voicemail messages and his DAP player and demos and reading his journals, I just couldn’t imagine it being anything but a documentary," she said. "And I just didn’t know how you could kind of replicate Jeff in that scripted sense.”
Despite his career being cut short, Berg says Buckley is still as relevant and popular today - if not more so.
She said: "One of the great things about Jeff Buckley is you discover him when you’re meant to discover him.
"He has definitely made a big impact on TikTok, where I was surprised to see that he has more followers on the Jeff Buckley hashtag than even Bob Dylan. He’s definitely having another moment in pop culture history.”
The documentary, It's Never Over, Jeff Buckley, will finally come to see the light of day with never-before-seen footage and accounts from his friends and family in a world premiere at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival on January 24.
