I was never a big Captain and Tennille fan but I have always liked Stiller & Meara, mostly separately but also together when I could catch clips and appearances of their old act from the 1970s. They were not like Sonny & Cher and yet similar in their comedic put-downs. They were both popular around the same time; however Stiller & Meara were more narrowly perfected and cerebral and Sonny & Cher more widely vaudevillian (singers as part-time comedians).

As I watched Stiller and Meara: Nothing Is Lost I had a notebook and pen out and ready to try to capture some other similarities; but by the time the credits rolled, I had not a single mark of ink down.

The Stiller/Meara family story is one unto itself. You could see them having overlapping struggles maybe with the Bonos, both couples being parents and on the road all the time, all their children having to deal with fans interrupting family moments in public spaces, parents always hustling for the next job. But these are a very different families and the couples had unique relationships (all three of them).

I remember thinking, there’s not really much fundamental emotional overlap here.

But then the credits rolled and from the very first few bars I exclaimed, “This is a Cher song! What??”

Not only were the credits rolling over a Cher song, but it was the only solo number from the debut Sonny & Cher album, Look at Us, and so although only Cher sings it, the song is credited as Sonny & Cher. It’s Cher’s cover of the Righteous Brothers’ “Unchained Melody,” which is such a classic. Why pick the very obscure Cher version? It wasn’t a hit. It wasn’t even a single. Mr. Cher Scholar wondered if it was chosen because the Cher version sounded more convincingly and innocently in love. But it’s also kind of rough. Cher’s vocal is at times out of control.

I hear the track as having been softened for the credits, her big note not so shrill and a fix put on the blip at the end.

Undoubtedly, this a great song, but still what an obscure choice for Ben Stiller’s movie about his family. I mean the lyrics kind of match the early love letters recited in the movie between Jerry Stiller to Anne Meara and maybe the couple did feel a kinship with Sonny & Cher as another showbiz couple of the day. Or maybe Stiller and Meara simply loved Cher’s version of the song? Or maybe the kids picked it because it reminded them of their parents, either their relationship with each other or the need the kids felt for more attention from their parents. There are a lot of ways to read this.

But wow. I was gobsmaked.

Beyond that, the movie did resolve for me what kept Stiller and Meara together in a marriage so long (until her death) and how this differed from Sonny & Cher and Captain & Tennille. The very obvious difference being that both Sonny and Cher and Toni Tennile and Daryl Dragon were in lopsided emotional relationships which faltered because one half (in each case the husband) wasn’t fully invested in it the marriage.

Jerry Stiller is another character entirely. He seems to have had much more self awareness, to me, than the other two men. For example, Meara had solo goals. She wasn’t as invested in their act as a couple. But what saved them was that they both had better communication skills. Just communication period, you could say, which is what the other couples struggled with. And both Stiller and Meara were committed enough to the marriage to go through years of couples therapy and one-on-one therapy to keep the relationship working. I can’t see Sonny or Daryl Dragon doing this.

One of my favorite parts of the documentary was at the end. Jerry Stiller is being interviewed for what seems like one of the last times. He’s in a chair and kind of feeble and he says, “I met Anne Meara. That was a big thing. She was the most unbelievable person in the world, Anne Meara. I never met anybody like her in my life.” The way he says it, too, that it’s still incredible to him.

Anne Meara really shines in the documentary, not only by her natural comedic timing but just her force of personality. She isn’t a typical Hollywood star. That Jerry Stiller could appreciate how unique she was, especially in a world where social pressure often discourages men from even acknowledging the value in that let alone choosing to love it, was very, very moving. It marks Jerry Stiller as extraordinary, too. And it looks like he was sure about the value of Anne Meara until the day he died.

 

Cher’s versions of “Unchained Melody”