Turning a Blind Eye: Nicholas Vazsonyi feels short-changed by a new documentary on Max Lorenz

The Life and Times of Max Lorenz is structured as a conventional documentary: a chronological presentation of the career and personal story of the famed Heldentenor Max Lorenz (1901–75). Archival footage and sound recordings – mostly from the 1930s and 40s – are accompanied by a narrative voice-over, intermingled with excerpts from two television interviews with the elderly Lorenz and current personal reminiscences by celebrity singers, as well as accounts from Lorenz experts like Walter Herrmann. Of course, what makes the whole thing unconventional is the story of Max Lorenz itself. An outed homosexual who married a Jewish woman at a time when either one of these could have had disastrous consequences for a career, if not one’s existence, Max Lorenz nevertheless managed to reach the very height of his fame during the Nazi years and even reportedly saved his wife from arrest and deportation. How so?