"Just so you know, we're ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."The year was 2003. The setting was a country music concert across the pond in London. A Dixie Chicks concert. And that was the statement that Natalie Maines, the lead singer of the then-very popular trio from Texas, offered to the crowd at the start of the band's sold-out international tour.
The quip was delivered on the eve of the American invasion of Iraq, and although it drew cheers from the decidedly anti-war, anti-George W. Bush British crowd, it also led to the (irrational) ire of countless so-called patriots back home.
Boy, did the boys silence the Dixie Chicks – or tried to, anyway.
Now, three years later, the Dixie Chicks are not ready to make nice. And their new documentary, Shut Up & Sing, is ready to revisit the statement heard 'round the world, the one that cut some folks so deep, the ladies went from national-anthem-singing darlings to pariahs, basically overnight.
This ought to be one of the most riveting, and controversial, films of the season – one that I trust will invite a good amount of dialogue and reflection.
Photo: The Weinstein Company.
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