Birdman plays with the idea of the status afforded to so many white men — their apparently seamless cultural privilege. Riggan Thomson (Michael Keaton) is an aging actor grasping onto the last bits of celebrity he garnered by donning the cape of a movie superhero. That franchise ended decades ago, along with any artistic credibility he had possessed beforehand.
He is viewed raging against his current insignificance. In this tantrum of self-importance, Riggan is mounting a play based on a Raymond Carver piece that he has adapted, is directing, and is also starring in. The film takes place in the few days leading up to the opening night on Broadway. It is a last ditch effort; all his energy, celebrity connections, fortune, and sanity are buried in this process. Birdman illustrates this delusional drive to matter to the world — Riggan's world — to rise above commonality and be something grander. It’s a crazy notion, and it’s also megalomania, and we see it so much among men like him.
Despite his status — his treasure trove of privilege — there is pain there and there is struggle. It’s interesting to think on this narrative as a that of a man with his back against the wall, his sanity on a razor’s edge. He is balancing between two extremes — that of stubbornly believing himself the center of the world, and that of realizing how tiny and unimportant he is amidst the whole of existence. And we watch Riggan oscillate between the two. He wildly fumbles and protests against the pigeonhole life has given him to fill, an identity he had a lot to do with carving out. It’s an exhilarating process to observe, so strange and so funny. There’s something so wonderfully refreshing about a film that bears witness to its own insignificance in the realm of the universe. A tiny blip on the radar screen of eternity.
*dialogue from the film
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