Personality Crisis: One Night Only

Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi capture an intimate cabaret performance by David Johansen at New York City’s storied Café Carlyle. Johansen, the lead singer of glam punk pioneers New York Dolls, emerges as a fascinating guide to his own life and philosophy. The filmmakers enhance the performance with flashes of archival footage of the artist and his city.

Performing in the early 1970s at Max’s Kansas City and the Mercer Arts Center, the New York Dolls developed a cult following, influencing bands like The Ramones, the Sex Pistols, Blondie, The Smiths, and more. The Dolls broke up after only two albums. Johansen performed solo before creating Buster Poindexter in the 1980s, singing what he describes as “Pre-Hayes Code Rock n’ Roll.”

His show at the Café Carlyle is a musical journey punctuated with storytelling about his life growing up in Staten Island, that most outer of the outer boroughs, his adventures as a teenager living in New York City during a time of radical creative and cultural upheaval. Johansen reflects on his life with wisdom and a delightful sense of the absurd.