“Piece by Piece” came out on Oct. 11, 2024 and tells the story of a young Pharrell Williams, growing up in Atlantis, in the suburbs of Virginia Beach. The biopic is animated with lego, however it contrasts from movies such as “The Lego Movie,” as it’s in a documentary format, rather than a fun narrative.
This artistic choice was the perfect decision for themes the movie portrays, Williams describes his relationship with music as him being able to see large, colorful visuals while listening. He would sit in front of a speaker just staring into them for hours.
To him this was normal, however; Williams has a condition called synesthesia that makes him see colors while listening to music, a condition many musicians have. This choice is also reflected whenever Williams talks about beats he produced or songs he’s written, as in the movie they appear as small, glowing lego structures.
From a young age, people close to him knew he was a different kid. Williams was so entranced by music, he recounted how he used to take pillows just to pretend they were a drum kit. This love of music would lead him to get a snare drum from his grandma and attend a band camp, where he met a young Chad Hugo, who would become a core member of their band, The Neptunes.
Williams got an opportunity at a young age to work with one of the top names at the time, Teddy Riley, who had recently moved to Virginia Beach. Riley had hosted a talent show at Willaims’ high school, with the winner being hired at his studio.
Williams and The Neptunes won the contest among the rest of the high school. He produced his first hit song, “Rump Shaker” working with Riley, which would be the first of many of Williams’ tracks to capture audiences worldwide.
His success with Riley was short-lived, due to Riley’s reluctance to let Williams create his own music, so he had to find another way to make a name for himself in the music world. He kept making beats and eventually found an unlikely manager, Rob Walker.
Walker was an intern for a bigger artist Williams was trying to contact. He would never get through to this artist and Walker would always pick up. After a multitude of calls, they became friends through this abnormal interaction and Williams asked him to be his manager.
Walker would hand out beats Williams made to any artists he could find, hoping he could land someone to pick it up. The first artist to pick him up was N.O.R.E., with the single “Superthug,” and after releasing it, big names in the industry reached out to work with the up and coming Williams and The Neptunes.
Everyone who worked with them believed Williams’ beats were different from content already on the market. Once “Superthug” dropped, his name was heard by the top artists, all wanting to get a cut of this young star’s talent.
“Piece by Piece” does an excellent job of telling this narrative of how Williams grew up and spread his name as best as he could. After gaining traction in the industry, Williams put out his first song that he produced and wrote lyrics for, “Frontin’,” which turned out to be a massive hit in the industry.
“‘Frontin’ is the missed opportunity of a lifetime, he was supposed to become a solo artist after that song,” TV producer Mimi Valdes said in the documentary.
Soon after this large-scale success, Williams’s grandmother fell ill; she had been one of the most influential figures in his life, as she gave him a snare drum that opened his access to music. This moment brought what was really important to Williams and his music back to the forefront after straying away from creating.
Williams was afraid. The traction and weight of the massive audience after “Frontin’” was too much for him at the moment. His first taste of being a solo artist forced him to face the reality that he was just unready for this big leap. So in response, he wouldn’t create another solo song until three years later, resulting in the people who were once there for him, leaving.
Williams’s band, The Neptunes, broke up due to his sudden shift to marketing only himself in the public eye. This, in addition to advice from greedy businessmen, he was lost for true musical influence and motivation, trying to achieve the standards of what was popular or money making at the time.
While in this creative drought, Williams was called to write a song for the second Despicable Me movie, where after several rejected attempts to write the song, he became inspired by his son to create the song “Happy.”
This song was extremely well received by audiences, not just as a song in a movie, but worldwide. In the interview, they showed clips from people around the world recreating the music video in true lego form, and Williams recounted feeling staggered by the emotions the song brought out in people.
Shortly after this segment Williams talks about how much his success was impacted by the support from friends and family around him. He describes the other side of this song and how people would come to him and say how this song got them through really tough times.
He wanted to again create something to lift people up when in tough times, to do this, he wrote the hook for Kendrick Lamar’s big hit, “Alright.” A song to speak out against police brutality during the Black Lives Matter movement of the late 2010s.
The biopic ends with the Lego film crew and Williams back in his home of Virginia Beach, where he ends with another thank you to his grandmother and once again describing his outlook on life. His belief is that one can take things and build it back up better than it was before, much like a Lego build.
This movie concludes with a concert on Virginia Beach, where he plays a song Williams made for the movie, also titled “Piece by Piece.” The movie was well received by audiences, earning 83% on rotten tomatoes and 90% from Fandango.
With the movie’s great acting, writing and comedic effect, as well as good reviews, it’s shocking that it turned out to be a box office bomb, only grossing $10.1 million on a $16 million budget.
