Receiving Praise From Bowie While Confusing The Critics

In 2003, Seu Jorge was at home, in Rio de Janeiro, playing FIFA on his PlayStation. The phone kept ringing and ringing in the background, but he didn't want to leave his game to answer it. Eventually, his then-wife got home and answered the phone. "She comes in from the kitchen, and she's making this really crazy face," recalls the 47-year-old Brazilian musician. "I'm like, 'What? Who's on the phone?' And she's like, 'Some American guy wants you to be in his film'."

That American guy was filmmaker Wes Anderson, "his film" The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou. Anderson asked Jorge if he knew David Bowie — "I said, 'Yeah, I know David Bowie: blonde hair, two different colour eyes…'" — but, upon suggesting that Jorge cover David Bowie's songs, in Portuguese, as sambas, Anderson discovered Jorge didn't really know Bowie.

"I grew up in Rio de Janeiro, in the favela," Jorge explains, "and black people in the favela don't listen to much rock'n'roll at all. So, David Bowie I only understood through Let's Dance. Because Let's Dance was produced by Nile Rodgers from Chic. I knew him, also, as an actor, from [The] Last Temptation Of Christ, playing [Pontius Pilot]. I didn't know David Bowie, the real David Bowie, Ziggy Stardust and Lady Stardust, until Wes Anderson introduced me."

Following their phone call, Anderson sent Bowie's music on CD to Jorge, but the singer still required some convincing. "The first song I hear is Changes, and it blew my mind. I call [Anderson] back and say, 'Are you sure about this? You really want me to take this classic song and re-write it, just me on a guitar, in Portuguese?'"

Soon thereafter, Jorge found himself on location in Italy, part of a vast ensemble (including Australia's Cate Blanchett and Noah Taylor), shooting Anderson's wackadoo seafarin' saga; where he was a Brazilian sailor, Pele dos Santos, who would play Bowie songs on acoustic guitar. "It was an amazing experience, because everyone was so kind to me, everyone wants me on the movie," Jorge recounts. "But I don't speak English at the time. The only languages I speak are Portuguese and French. No one on the movie [set] is speaking French, only Italian and English. I was completely alone. For six months in Italy, living in Rome, Naples, and six villages along the Amalfi Coast. Anjelica Huston, when Wes Anderson gives directions I don't understand, she speak with me in French. That really helped."

Fifteen years on, Jorge encounters …Life Aquatic… fans wherever he goes. "After so many years, people still love this movie," he says. Fans grow up with this movie. When they show it, now, the audience is full of so many red hats."

When Jorge recorded his Portuguese versions of Bowie songs as The Life Aquatic Studio Sessions, Bowie loved them; praising "this new level of beauty which he has imbued them with". Funnily enough, critics in Brazil weren't so kind, partly because Anderson's film had never been released there, creating "confusion" as to his covers album. "All the critics hated it. They give me one star. 'Seu Jorge has gone crazy! What's he doing with all this Bowie stuff? Why did he not translate the songs into Portuguese with real poetry?' People didn't understand, this is not my idea! This idea is Wes Anderson's!"

Despite the fact that Bowie loved these versions, Jorge never met him. "When I was filming …Life Aquatic…, that's when [Bowie] was recording the album Reality," Jorge offers. "Then, he discovered he was sick. I tried to contact him, propose some things to him, but his people told me, 'Oh, Jorge, he's sick. He's just worried about his health'. So I decided that I would give him his privacy and, from that, I never got to meet him."

When Bowie passed away, two years ago, he died two days before Jorge's father. In his grief, Jorge was inspired to revisit Bowie's songs, performing his …Life Aquatic… versions on stage in tribute to both. "David Bowie is an icon," Jorge preaches. "He's a world legend. People love and respect him. The most beautiful thing, when I play the show, is that everyone is so quiet. It's like they're being still, because they want to feel his spirit."