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Byrne plays the unnamed narrator in True Stories and he may be the same individual from the song. He is our guide to the town, an outsider who still seems to be “in” and who knows and/or is accepted by most of those he meets. His most notable aspect, aside from the ridiculous outfits he sports in a nod to local fashion, is a stop-start deadpan vocal pattern that makes mincemeat of punctuation and renders his thoughts more rivers, than streams, of consciousness. For example:

“I had something to say (pause) about the difference between American (pause) and European cities (long pause) but I forgot what it was (pause) I have written it down somewhere at home (very long pause) Look (pause) I personally believe (medium pause) I can see Ft. Worth from here.”

It wouldn’t be appropriate to address Byrne’s acting style as such, except to note how he allows the narrator, with his complete lack of affect (and a pulse) to serve as an ideal blank slate for those around him to bounce conspiracies, rumors, and ideas off of. He is only a city slicker at surface level. To all appearances, he is as refreshingly cracked as the townspeople themselves. But who is he and why is he there? I have one theory that I will put forth at the end. But first, I want to briefly focus on the music, the cinematography, and a few of the other performances.

There are nine featured songs in the film: six are performed by cast members, one is a lip-synch at a club to a “Talking Heads” song, another is a music video/commercial featuring the members of Talking Heads performing/becoming a commercial themselves and the last is performed by the band over the closing credits. Initially, there were going to be two soundtrack albums: Sounds from True Stories, with instrumental pieces (there are over a dozen) and a few other minor songs with vocals; and an album featuring the songs as performed by the cast members. The former did come out but only on cassette and LP - it has never been released on CD - and the latter was scrapped in favor of an album featuring all nine songs being performed by Talking Heads. Thus, it is not technically a soundtrack but it is the weakest of their eight studio releases.

There is an unfettered joy in the performances by the mostly non-professional singers: John Goodman’s country-tinged growl on “People Like Us”; Annie McEnroe’s lighter than air quiver on “Dream Operator” and John Ingle’s spoken/sung throaty rasp delivery of “Puzzlin’ Evidence.” The menagerie of faces lip-synching along to “Wild Wild Life” suggests an early form of karaoke and the communal nature of passing the microphone off after a line or two reinforces the sense of community (odd though it may be) that Byrne has infused the film with. It is indeed the same joy of performance that Jonathan Demme bore witness to in filming Stop Making Sense.

For the longest time, I have bemoaned the beyond bare-bones DVD release of True Stories. No menus, no extras, full screen. For a cult film with a highly visible presence 25 years after its release to be treated so shabbily remains insulting to me. But with the chance to have seen it in the theater in 2002 in Brooklyn, with Roger Ebert interviewing Byrne, taking questions and then screening the film, it must be said that Ed Lachman’s cinematography does not suffer from being seen on the small screen.

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