Director Grant Gee has completed a narrative feature film titled Everybody Digs Bill Evans, marking a shift from his established documentary work on artists including Radiohead, David Bowie, and Joy Division. Rather than pursuing the traditional biopic format that traces an entire life, the film concentrates on a specific period in the musician’s history.
The film focuses on several months in 1961, a time when Evans was profoundly affected by grief following the death of his double bassist Scott LaFaro. Gee’s interest in Evans originated from a photograph by Lee Friedlander taken in late 1961 or early 1962, which showed the pianist appearing haunted despite being surrounded by smiling bandmates. The director adapted Owen Martell’s novel Intermission, which was inspired by actual events and explores Evans’s struggle during his period of inability to perform.
Norwegian actor Anders Danielsen Lie portrays Evans in the film. Lie brings multiple qualifications to the role, having worked as a general practitioner in Oslo while also maintaining musical skills and a longtime familiarity with Evans’s work. The film includes select recreations of Evans’s compositions, including his composition Waltz for Debby, written for his niece, though Gee intentionally avoids making performance sequences the focus.
Gee has noted that the film examines what occurs when musical performance ceases rather than celebrating performance itself. The work addresses Evans’s struggle with heroin addiction without applying contemporary therapeutic frameworks to the historical narrative. The project reflects Gee’s established approach to artist studies, examining how external pressures and personal crises affect creative individuals and their capacity to function outside their artistic practice.
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