Facade

People who need people

Are the luckiest people in the world

We're children needing other children

And yet letting our grown-up pride

Hide all the need inside

Acting more like children than children

From the song People (sung by Barbra Streisand), Funny Girl original motion picture soundtrack (1968)

Barbra Streisand's first film role was that of Fanny Brice in this semibiographical movie account of the hit Broadway musical. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1968, an honor she shared with the late Katharine Hepburn.

That scene when Fanny sang People is one of my favorites from the movie. I think it's all because of Streisand and the song. In what should be a particularly romantic scene, with the two leads enjoying a rare moment alone, I entirely forgot about the leading man and focused on Barbra's clear, awesome voice (although I must say that's also because I'm not particularly charmed by the Don Juan type). I was compelled to ask a friend if she thinks Barbra Streisand is overrated. The answer was a clear no. I rest my case.

Fanny was funny. She was not a classic beauty but her ambition and sheer determination gave her a flourishing career in a business that normally only embraces belles and sex symbols. Then she fell in love. It didn't end well - her husband rained on her parade, that's why.

In another of my favorite scenes, Fanny comes out to greet the reporters after it became known that her husband, a pathological gambler, had been arrested for embezzlement. She was devastated while her back was turned, and then she faced the cameras with a bright smile and a handful of jokes. That's an actress for you - image is everything; reality, secondary.

Another friend told me that people who appears to be gregarious and animated all the time are sometimes the loneliest people in the world. "Fun" is their way of taking the very "nonfun" parts of their private lives. I suppose there's truth to that claim because I've seen some first hand. But it shouldn't be our business to measure our cumulative loneliness. I think maybe we should start learning how to need each other. At least until we've come full circle and being needy starts to make us unhappy and it all becomes a joke.