Laurie Simmons And Lena Dunham Show And Tell “The Music of Regret”

If you’re familiar with the work of artist/photographer/filmmaker Laurie Simmons — her earlier oeuvre filled with dolls, dollhouses, dummies and puppets — you would not expect to hear that she’s passionate about music from the American Songbook. But it’s the seeming dichotomy of showtune music with her visual art sensibility that pervades her 2006 mini film, “The Music of Regret,” which will be screened online as a benefit Zoom event for the Cornwall Library on Saturday, Jan. 9 at 4:30. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with her daughter, actress Lena Dunham.

“I started the filmmaking as sort of a Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney feeling: ‘let’s put on a show,’” says the Cornwall resident, who began making waves in the art world with her photos of intricate tableaux featuring puppets and dolls. She wrote the lyrics and Michael Rohayton, the brother-in-law of her art dealer, wrote the Broadway-like score, which ranges in style from the American Songbook to Hawaiian ukulele serenades, with the tunes sung by Meryl Streep (yes, you read that right). Adam Guettel, composer/lyricist who wrote music for “The Light in the Piazza,” sang with Streep in the film. The dancing objects scenes were performed by The Alvin Ailey II dancers.

“In the early 2000s, my art dealer asked me what my dream project would be, and that was to make a movie. At the time I was looking back at my work and wanted to say goodbye to a history on memory and nostalgia and all the still photos I’d taken.”

"The Music of Regret," Act 3

Simmons always had a musical in mind when she was photographing her dolls and dollhouses. The “love letter to the old work” features a trio of stories connected to the idea of regret. Each of the three acts relates to a different series of her work dating from the 1980s. In Act 1, hand puppets portray two feuding families. Act 2 features Meryl Streep as Simmons’s alter ego singing a romantic duet with a dummy. Act 3 was inspired by the dance sequence in “American in Paris.” Its main star is a pocket watch, Simmons says, with the Alvin Ailey dancers as legged objects (the watch, a house, a book) auditioning for roles in the would-be production.

The film was premiered at the Museum of Modern Art in 2006. Because it was too long to be considered a short, and too short to be a feature film, it wasn’t eligible to enter into film festivals. But every year, Simmons says, there’s a burst of screenings. “People just keep deciding to revisit the film,” she says.

The benefit screening will include a conversation between the artist and her daughter, Lena Dunham.

“Lena got super involved when I was working on the film,” Simmons explains. “She says the movie inspired her to pursue her videos, her film “Tiny Furniture,” and her TV show [the HBO series, “Girls"].”

In 2015, Simmons produced another film, “My Art,” shot in Cornwall with real people in place of puppets. Robert Clohessy and other professional actors who happen to live in the town played roles (with a cameo by RI favorite Parker Posey). That film went to the Venice and Tribeca film festivals, and is available on iTunes and Amazon Prime.

With her doll-dummy-mannequin phase over, a musical lookback long in the can, and her more current dive into photo-based portraiture, what’s she working on now?

“I’m working on getting through the pandemic,” Simmons says, only a little facetiously. "I’ve been reading and thinking, having my own personal age of enlightenment.”