Stream It Or Skip It?

Paul Anka: His Way hits HBO Max after first premiering at The Toronto International Film Festival earlier this year. Directed and produced by John Maggio, the documentary is more or less told in the first person by its subject, the Canadian-American singer who parlayed his big 1950s break as a teen idol into writing huge hits for other artists – you may have heard “My Way” by some guy named Frank Sinatra – and staying active in showbiz for over seven decades. And Paul Anka, now 84, is still out on the road doing it! His Way includes commentary from Frankie Avalon, Bill Burr, music executive Irving Azoff, and Jason Bateman, who it turns out is Anka’s son-in-law.

The Gist: “Nobody knows how to make a hit record. You do the best you can. But the content and the magic that can come together, somehow the public just put their arms around it.” That’s Paul Anka in His Way, as he reflects on a remarkable career that began when pop music was in its infancy, stretched through the 20th century, and today finds the ironman entertainer still playing 140 dates a year. He’s known for performing his own songs, classic tunes like “Lonely Boy” and “Put Your Head on My Shoulder.” But Anka’s always had songwriting in his back pocket. Frank Sinatra with “My Way,” Tom Jones with “She’s a Lady,” and later-career collabos with everybody from Michael Jackson to Doja Cat. Very quickly, His Way becomes the story of a true show business animal. “Roll with the punches. Keep evolving. Every decade.”

He was actually a writer before he was a singer. The documentary takes us all the way back to the early 1950s, when Paul Anka was just a 16-year-old kid from Ottawa, Ontario. He arrived in New York City with a hundred bucks and a songwriting dream, signed a contract with ABC Records, and pretty soon was singing his first chart hit, “Diana,” on The Ed Sullivan Show. Anka was a part of a pop trend that embraced TV and radio and boosted young crooners into the spotlight – your Bobby Darins, your Frankie Avalons. But he was still writing songs, and Anka says that was “where I had a foot up.” Even back then, pop stardom was fleeting. He knew the teen market wouldn’t last, knew he’d age out of being the singer girls screamed for. And that knowledge became key to his next big move. Las Vegas in the 1960s. The Sands, Sinatra, Sammy, and Dean. The Rat Pack called Anka “The Kid,” and introduced him to all their mob friends who ran the hottest nightclubs in show business.

As His Way bounces through the decades via Anka’s memory banks, it also follows him on his 2024 world tour, where he’s still singing and sounding great. (A testament to his morning routine, a cup of olive oil with lemon.) The doc touches on his marriages and family life, too, and while it doesn’t dwell on any bad stuff, it’s clear that Anka’s version of a work-life balance has always required extra emphasis on the first part. No wonder he’s still doing it. He’s a guy who bleeds show business. To watch him tipping handshake twenties to every valet, door guy, or driver he comes into contact with is to see a little bit of that old Rat Pack flair.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of? Joan Baez: I Am A Noise comes to mind here. The 2023 documentary masterfully weaves new interviews and performances from the legendary folk singer’s 2019 farewell tour into a tapestry that encompasses Baez’s entire life. And His Way director John Maggio was also behind the camera for one of HBO’s Music Box anthology docs, Mr. Saturday Night, which profiled show biz impresario and Saturday Night Fever producer Robert Stigwood. 

Performance Worth Watching: Anka’s in his 80s, but impressively, his voice remains crystal clear. As His Way follows the singer during his recent world tour, whether he’s bringing down the house in Tokyo or doing a bang-up big band version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” at rehearsal, Paul Anka’s pipes remain huge. As Bill Burr says in the doc, “This guy’s eight decades in and he has the excitement of a young man.”  

Memorable Dialogue: “Paul Anka is an enigma to most people in this business,” says Sammy Davis, Jr. in an old piece of tape. “They say, ‘Well, why Paul Anka?’ I can answer it very simply. He cares. He cares about his art craft. He cares about what songs he writes. Paul and I have the similarity of being the type of performer that always seems to bounce back. Because somewhere along the line, we have proved to the public that we love entertaining, and we will try to offer them the best that we got going for us.”   

Sex and Skin: You’re familiar with the phenomenon, at first sight of the Beatles, of young women screaming, crying, throwing up, etc. Well, as a lot of footage in this doc of his early career illustrates, that type of pop fandom pandemonium first appeared in the 1950s with teen idols like Paul Anka. There’s a whole thing where it’s 1957 and he’s kissing cheeks and cupping chins while signing autographs. Does Benson Boone do that now?     

Our Take: His Way shares with the recent Billy Joel doc the same perspective: theirs. The guys who are the subject of the documentary are also narrating it, telling the story, and in that they are free to skim or skip or edit whatever they like from their lives and careers. Anka also wrote an autobiography about a decade ago, My Way, when he had a mere six decades of showbiz under his belt, so His Way can sometimes feel like an oral version of the history he’s told before. But he’s got it down pat, ticking off the highlights and hits of his work life with the easy, practiced sense of somebody who’s comfortable in the public eye. Maybe he’s leaving a few curveballs and setbacks out, but he’s definitely an engaging narrator. Anka’s got as many anecdotes about being naked in a sauna with Sinatra as he does sparkling recollections of touring Japan in 1958. 

As a guy whose job has only ever been showbiz, it’s also interesting to consider the course of music through his veteran eyes. Of particular note is Anka’s take on the British Invasion of the mid-1960s. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones – guys with guitars and their own material that knocked his ass off the radio. (“I’m looking at something I couldn’t do.”) Paul Anka is too much of an entertainer to dwell on the doubt, but it’s a nice dynamic the doc establishes, as he considered what might have been his end. What did he do instead? He went home and wrote “My Way,” an utterly timeless song, for the Chairman of the Board. Not bad for a second or third act.

Our Call: Stream It! Paul Anka: His Way reveals a few showbiz tidbits and fun stories from the singer and songwriter’s many, many decades in the business. “How do you keep the dream going?” Anka once asked himself. This doc shows us the answer. 

Johnny Loftus (@johnnyloftus.bsky.social) is a Chicago-based writer. A veteran of the alternative weekly trenches, his work has also appeared in Entertainment Weekly, Pitchfork, The All Music Guide, and The Village Voice.