American Symphony
Directed by Matthew HeinemanWhere to Watch American Symphony
- Kevin WardJuly 2, 2025Didn’t love this as much as I thought I would. It didn’t have as much of a narrative through line as I thought it would. I know docs can veer off from what the filmmaker set out to capture. In fact, that’s one of the things I love about them. But this never really felt like it had a focus. We get Jon Batiste and Suleika Jaouad and their relationship, Batiste setting out to compose an American Symphony, Suleika’s battle with a recurrence of cancer, Batiste’s grammy wins and performance, and the performance of the symphony at Carnegie Hall. As presented, there never really feels like a connection between any of these segments. In some ways, it kind of just feels like any other celebrity reality show. Both Jon and Suleika seem like genuinely lovely human beings. The segments that depict the couple coping with Suleika’s cancer is the most emotionally moving, but on the whole I wasn’t all that engaged with the film.
American Symphony Trivia
American Symphony was released on November 29, 2023.
American Symphony was directed by Matthew Heineman.
American Symphony has a runtime of 1h 44m.
American Symphony was produced by Lauren Domino, Joedan Okun, Matthew Heineman.
In 2022, musician Jon Batiste finds himself the most celebrated artist of the year with eleven Grammy nominations including Album of the Year. In the midst of that triumph John embarks on his most ambitious challenge to date, composing an original symphony. This trajectory was upended when Batiste's life partner best-selling author Suleika Jaouad learns that her long-dormant cancer has returned.
The key characters in American Symphony are Self (Jon Batiste), Self (Suleika Jaouad), Self (Lindsey Byrnes).
American Symphony is rated PG-13.
American Symphony is a Documentary, Biography, Music film.
American Symphony has an audience rating of 7.4 out of 10.