Piece by Piece: Pharrell’s Strange New Passion Project
In a world saturated by musician biopic films, no one expected Pharrell Williams to shake things up in such an odd way. That’s a good thing, by the way.
Pharrell Williams’ self-produced documentary film Piece by Piece follows his own history and career in the music industry complete with guest appearances from fellow music producers such as Kendrick Lamar, Snoop Dogg, and even Daft Punk as was shown this Thursday. The twist no one was expecting—allegedly, not even the guests themselves—was that the entire film would be animated in the LEGO style.
In 2020, Universal acquired the film rights to the LEGO brand following a well-received three-movie tenure under Warner Bros. Pictures. Previously, the studio had released The LEGO Movie as well as its sequel, The Second Part, in addition to the spin-off film The LEGO Batman Movie. While even years later each of these films retain a fairly active fanbase of their legacy and characters, the sequel received underwhelming box office returns that led to Universal acquiring the rights. Despite reassurance that a new entry in The LEGO Movie franchise was in development, nothing came of this deal until this year when images and a trailer appeared for Piece by Piece, the Pharrell biopic that the musician himself was heavily involved with.
When the film’s first look was revealed, many were surprised, but not necessarily in a bad way. This was to be the first theatrical LEGO film since early 2019, and while the creative direction seemed different from that of the narrative-driven The LEGO Movie films, it seemed to still be there, albeit existing in a more biographical non-fictional form. This was a new spin on both the music biopic film and LEGO film, and early impressions from moviegoers seemed enthusiastic about the shake-up.
We’ll be covering the film over here once it comes out, and we have faith that Pharrell has a few more surprises left in store for us than just the initial reveal.
Piece by Piece releases in theaters on October 11th, 2024.