Summary
The raw revelation at the end of Kylie gives it unusual power as a docuseries, bolstering the image of a pop icon by revealing how even in the harshest limelight, her toughest battles were fought alone.
Over the years, many of us have become comfortable with the idea of streaming documentaries about beloved celebrities being ring-fenced puff pieces, usually intended to sell something. I will confess to having entered Kylie, a roughly chronological three-episode accounting of the Australian icon Kylie Minogue’s path from soap star to pop icon, expecting exactly this. And while there are still whiffs of it in the docuseries’ content and construction, there’s a rawness to the whole production, most especially in its final moments, that provides a different reason for being – not to mention a more robust image of a celebrity whose life has been lived in the limelight but whose most difficult battles have largely been fought in private.
The shape of things is simple – and familiar – enough. The first episode charts a largely meteoric rise from Neighbors to pop stardom; the second chronicles personal and creative reinventions to remain relevant in changing times and a stubbornly misogynistic industry; the third covers a massive comeback, her well-publicised mid-‘00s battle with breast cancer, and, tellingly, reveals a recurrence of that cancer in 2021, which was kept entirely private. Throughout each episode many of the same themes are threaded, including the distinction between Kylie’s private life and glam stage persona, a ravenous British tabloid press, and an admirable ability to remain ever relevant.
But it’s that big reveal that really separates Kylie from other similar docuseries. Its position at the very end prevents it from feeling like an icky marketing ploy, instead coming across almost as just reward for seeing things through. That sounds ghoulish, but after an earlier focus on the devastating initial diagnosis that permanently compromised her fertility, the idea that Kylie fought the second battle in private is a profound testament to her own strength and resilience. It also casts her 2023 comeback in a new light, her sixteenth album, Tension, and notably its track “Story”, finding new significance as the testimony of someone who was not only able to once again re-conquer the music industry, but also what could have been – for the second time – a death sentence.
The value of this insight alone is enough to justify all three episodes of this docuseries, which was directed by Michael Harte, who also edited Netflix’s Beckham. But it helps that the rest of it is also strong. The stuff covering Kylie’s relationship with Michael Hutchence is heavy and candid, while insights from former boyfriend Jason Donovan, rock icon Nick Cave, and sister Dannii help to provide real insight into Kylie’s career and private life, both of which are impressive. The sheer hostility of the industry and the press would have broken lesser artists, even without the personal heartbreaks and health battles she endured along the way.
And I’m not even a Kylie fan! Or, perhaps more accurately, I wasn’t when I started watching. But it’s difficult to see what Kylie has been through personally and professionally and not feel a pang of admiration for the fact that she’s still at the forefront of pop culture, recognisable everywhere and by almost everyone. That endless appeal is captured pretty adroitly in this series, which, far from being the brand exercise most people probably expected, ends up being a moving testimony on sacrifices made on the altar of stardom, and the rare kind of person who can emerge on the other side more beloved than ever.
