The Ending Of A Jazzman's Blues Explained

For those last few holdouts who still think of Tyler Perry as nothing more than the man who wears the "Madea" suit, his film "A Jazzman's Blues" will almost certainly open your eyes. 

The Netflix original has struck a poignant, resonant chord with critics and audience members, due to its masterful portrayal of both the beauty and brutality inherent in the Black American experience. Perry writes, directs, and produces the film with a deft hand, turning what could have been a boilerplate period drama into a sweeping family saga that unravels in surprisingly effective ways, revealing the insidiousness of institutionalized racism in the south.

The story of "A Jazzman's Blues" spans fifty years, from 1937 to 1987, but by the time it ends, feels as if it had covered hundreds of years worth of sentimentality and suffering. The story of jazz singer Bayou Boyd (Joshua Boone) takes him to the highest peaks and lowest valleys possible for a Black man of his era, and leaves a lot worth discussing in its wake. There is a lot to unpack in this tragic epic; here is the (spoiler-heavy) ending of "A Jazzman's Blues," explained.

As if Buster and Willie Earl needed another reason (besides their shared addiction) to abuse Hattie Mae and Bayou, "Blues" slowly reveals one: Willie Earl and Bayou have different fathers. 

The first clue comes when Buster abandons his family in Georgia for a life in Chicago. Obviously drunk and/or high, Buster chooses to spew one last stream of abuse wherever it will land, including on Bayou. "You ain't sh**," Buster says to Bayou. "Just like your black a** daddy." Though the line could be read as Buster putting himself down (out of self-pity) at the same time he puts down Bayou, the truth is more complicated.

In the midst of his deep, dark, drug-induced stupor, Willie Earl follows in Bucket's footsteps, needlessly hurling abuse at Bayou. Among other meaningful attacks, he tells Bayou that "you a half-breed, all right? My daddy ain't your daddy." 

From then on, the larger picture of the family's dynamics starts to become clear. Since Buster is Willie Earl's father, and Willie Earl is older than Bayou, that means that Hattie Mae must have cheated on Buster and conceived Bayou with another man. This of course, has bred resentment in Buster and in turn, Willie Earl, but it becomes harder to blame Hattie Mae once the truth of Buster's abuse and addiction come to light.

The obvious protagonist of "A Jazzman's Blues" is Bayou. It's his story, from when we first meet him in 1937 all the way until 1987, despite his death some 40 years ago. We watch him grow from shy, bumbling teen to explosive jazz sensation and finally to tragic martyr — as satisfying (from a storytelling standpoint) an arc as any. But if another character in the movie vies for the narrative spotlight it's Bucket, aka Leanne (Solea Pfeiffer), whose journey is no less radical and only slightly less tragic.

She was born a Black woman, orphaned when "her mama dumped her here like an empty bucket," gaining her nickname. But at some point after her romance with Bayou, she learned that her skin was pale enough for her to pass as a white woman. Whether her choice or that of her controlling mother, Bucket decided to live her life as a white woman, dropping her nickname in favor of her birth name, Leanne.

Despite all the advantages that come with being white, Leanne's choice (or perhaps, an offer she couldn't refuse) to pass brings her an almost inhuman amount of grief. From the first years of adulthood until her dying day (or at least, until 1987), Leanne is pushed around by her mother and controlling husband, and sadly, the few instances in which she is able to make any decisions of her own — all of them efforts to be with Bayou — ultimately lead to Bayou's untimely death.

The centerpiece of the ending to "A Jazzman's Blues" is the death of Bayou at the hands of Sheriff Jackson (Brad Benedict) and his mob of bloodthirsty bigots, all for the alleged — and completely false — crime of whistling at a white woman (who just so happens to be Black by birth). The events that led to such a shocking, unjust murder are numerous and worth exploring.

If Bayou commits any crime, it's continuing to act on his feelings for Leanne, knowing she is in a relationship. And though normally, this wouldn't be an offense that would prompt a murder, Leanne's beau is John Clayton (Brent Antonello), an aspiring politician and brother of Sheriff Jackson. The issue is further muddied by Leanne's dual identity. To Bayou, she's just the Black girl named Bucket he dated as a teen, but to Clayton and Jackson, she's a blue-blood southern belle named Leanne — making her union with Bayou interracial, and therefore worthy of the brothers' wrath.

Even accounting for Leanne and Bayou's affair and the brothers' misplaced hatred, Bayou might have survived if not for Willie Earl's betrayal. That betrayal only bubbled its way to Willie Earl's surface thanks to his unchecked addiction — a gift from Buster — and longtime jealousy of Bayou's smash success.

There is one major twist in "A Jazzman's Blues" that dwarfs all others: seemingly white (and most definitely bigoted) politician Johnathan Dupree is actually the secret love child of Leanne and Bayou, and is therefore himself a Black man.

When the movie opens with an elderly Hattie Mae giving Jonathan a stack of letters in 1987, neither the audience nor Jonathan himself has any reason to suspect it has anything to do with his heritage. It's worth noting, however, that Jonathan would have noticed his mother's name as the recipient of some or all of the letters (as he would only have recognized the name Leanne, not Bucket). As Jonathan reads the copious correspondence, he slowly learns the history of Bayou's family and even more slowly learns that Bucket is his mother Leanne, Leanne had an affair with Bayou, and that affair produced a son — a son with light enough skin that he could be raised as white.

The realization hits Jonathan hard and leaves his entire worldview in question. It also re-contextualizes a huge chunk of the movie's message. The arbitrary, absurd racism that dominated so many characters' lives becomes even more nonsensical when viewers learn that someone could be born one color, raised as another, and never know the difference.

The very last scene in "A Jazzman's Blues" sees Jonathan confronting his elderly mother, Leanne, with the stack of letters that prove her relationship with Bayou, confirming their Blackness. When her nurse attendant wheels her in for the conversation, she grips an old record, one she apparently brings with her everywhere and plays on a constant loop. On top of the record are paper airplanes, the product of a persistent, absent obsession of hers. Below the airplanes, you can just make out the record's name: appropriately, it's "Paper Airplanes." The record is, of course, the hit single that Bayou released as Bayou Boyd, at the peak of his fame, and it carries with it a ton of deeper implications.

On the one hand, Leanne's fixation is a clear expression of her lifelong remorse at inadvertently causing Bayou's death. On the other hand, it (alongside her behavior) suggests that she has begun losing her mental faculties with age, and as fragments of her memories are shed, the core piece of her that outlasts everything else is a love for Bayou. Pulling back further, perhaps the meaning behind the record is to demonstrate the rich, sometimes tragic history behind much of Black culture in America — even the parts of it that seem the most cheerful and rosy.