Nov. 14, Rhonda Garelick, distinguished professor of English and journalism at SMU Dallas, for a column about the newly released Hulu documentary on the late Lady Bird Johnson, “The Lady Bird Diaries,” which focuses on her White House years. Published in the New York Times ‘Face Forward’ column under the heading Listening to Lady Bird Johnson, in Her Own Words: https://tinyurl.com/yx52wdv8
Lady Bird Johnson embodied contradiction, cloaking her gravitas in Southern charm. Even her name made that clear. From infancy onward, Claudia Alta Taylor (born in 1912) was known to everyone as Lady Bird, a lighthearted, whimsical nickname — invented by her nursemaid — that belied her grit, intellect and ambition. Now, a new documentary on Hulu, “The Lady Bird Diaries,” focuses on her White House years and captures the surprising influence and power that this gentle, smiling woman wielded over her husband.
Based on 123 hours of private audio diaries recorded by Mrs. Johnson (and embargoed until her death, in 2007, at 94), the film is told from the first lady’s point of view, and largely in her own recorded voice — a honeyed Texas drawl — interspersed with contemporaneous news footage. There are, however, virtually no outside perspectives or critiques offered. The film takes us inside Mrs. Johnson’s mind and keeps us firmly there.
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