Genius

Previously, on Genius...

You are a genius, Maya.

Come here.

You have children, women you love.

Some things are more important than art.

Not to me.

Pablo?

You must be Marie-Thérèse.

The mother of his child, the woman he is going to marry.

Perhaps you should pay a visit to his wife and inform her of

this... expectation.

Pablo Picasso, meet Henri Matisse.

40 years on, and the great Henri

Matisse is still trying to outdo me.

As artists, we must demand nothing less than the perpetual,

immoral subversion of the existing order.

I hope she makes you happy.

You will get married, and you will have a family but not with me.

I'm about to leave for The Front.

I was hoping you would paint my portrait?

The woman I love is dying.

You think I want to paint your goddamn portrait?

Maybe I should be a soldier.

Well, then you will be general,

and if you're a priest, you will be pope.

I had a vision.

Jesus appeared to me.

I want you to stay away from Picasso.

Stop!

I have missed you, terribly.

I only want you, Françoise.

Let's make a baby.

You were the one who wanted children, Pablo,

but I didn't agree to give up my work,

so I could cater to all your needs.

Monsieur Picasso, uh... Jean Cocteau.

I once asked you to paint my portrait, but it was a terrible time for you.

Uh, listen, I know how fond you are of painting harlequins, so I thought...

well, um...

Cocteau has asked me to design a ballet.

Sets, costumes, all of it.

Do you know much about the ballet?

No, but that is exactly why I'm drawn to it.

A chance to work in a new medium, Rosi and I won't be doing it alone.

Cocteau will be writing the scenario.

He's brilliant. Satie is composing.

Diaghilev's company will be dancing...

You don't enjoy sharing the footlights, Pablo.

I worked with Braque for years, didn't I?

His eyesight has returned.

Make peace with him.

Make some art with him.

Braque wants nothing to do with me,

and even if he did, I'm bored with Cubism.

It's too easy for me.

There's no satisfaction in it any more.

So instead you want to sew tutus and paint backdrops?

It's much more than that, Rosi.

Imagine...

instead of depicting multiple perspectives on a flat surface,

I can make a painting that actually moves, breathes,

keeps turning into another painting.

Clever, but for a painting to

sell, it only needs one discerning buyer.

For a ballet to be a success, it must be admired by the masses.

They may not understand what you're trying to do.

They never do, not at first.

This war is going to be over soon, Pablo.

The people are going to start buying again.

And if you spent the next few months creating some inventory,

we could make real money.

"Inventory?"

I do not work in a factory...

Of course not. It's a figure of speech...

And I do not need money.

I need a new challenge.

And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and one...

I'm still struggling with shape and movement,

but once I spend more time with the music,

experimenting with materials, watching rehearsals.

Um, it goes like this.

Ah, it looks like a man wearing...

a building.

Exactly.

Picasso wants to tear down the walls between, uh, set and costume,

between onstage and backstage.

And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

Between reason and insanity?

Well, it will certainly shake the establishment...

Ah, Olga Khokhlova.

Your eye's as good as your reputation would suggest, Monsieur Picasso.

She's so elegant.

Yes, I have high hopes for her.

Well, I look forward to seeing what you dream up next.

One, two threee four, five, six, seven and eight.

One, two, three...

Pablo, don't waste your time.

Why not?

Russian aristocracy.

She must be looking for a duke or a viscount,

not a controversial Spanish painter, hmm?

And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight...

You have much better lines than the lead dancer.

Do not let her hear you say that.

Why not? It's the truth.

Stagehands who critique dancers may find themselves painting scenery

at the burlesque in Naples.

I like the burlesque.

Well, I am sure you must return to work on this abstract fiasco.

You don't like the designs?

No, not at all.

Now, if you'll excuse me.

Oh, Mademoiselle Khokhlova, I see you've met our designer,

the great Pablo Picasso.

It seems Monsieur Picasso was too modest to mention that.

Ah, I can assure you there is nothing modest about Pablo Picasso.

Pablo, come with me.

I need you to help me persuade Satie that

a typewriter and a pistol must be added

to the percussion section.

Satie will have to wait.

I promised to escort Mademoiselle Khokhlova back to her hotel.

I had to be measured for my costume today.

Apparently you intend to dress me in cardboard.

Have you not had enough of pink tutus?

I prefer classical art to little boxes.

Ah, so you do know cubism.

Yes, and I know the cancan as well, but I dance in the ballet.

I want to paint you.

I suppose Parisian women find that offer irresistible.

Usually.

Thank you for the escort, and good night.

You are not going to make this easy for me, are you?

No, Monsieur Picasso, I'm not.

I thought you had forgotten me entirely.

Oh, nonsense.

I would never miss one of our lunches.

Please, yes.

Yes, I suppose I should be grateful.

You do give me your undivided attention, once a week, for an hour.

Ugh, Olga, please, let's just enjoy...

Huh?

I saw you in that horrid Life Magazine...

with her.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry, uh...

I can't help it if the press insists on publishing all these stories in the...

First that stupid girl, then that insane photographer, and now...

you leave me to rot in a dingy hotel.

It's the best hotel in Paris.

While you cavort for all the world to see with your latest mistress and

her two urchins.

You mean my children.

What about our son?

When was the last time you saw him?

I see Paulo when I can.

He's a grown man who doesn't want to be around...

Yes, with a wife and a child of his own.

We are your family too, Pablo.

Of course you are, of course.

Olga, please, don't cry okay?

Please, please, don't cry.

Don't cry, please.

You are still my wife.

The only Madame Picasso, nothing, nothing will ever change that.

But we'll never go back to the way things were, will we?

Whore!

Claude, come. Let's go home.

Stay away from him!

Do you hear me?

He's my husband, not yours!

Pablo.

Olga followed me again, screaming at me.

It terrified the children.

I'm-I'm-I'm sorry.

You know that she is not well.

I don't understand why you let these women hang on.

Well, they are part of my life.

I can't just cut them out.

So instead you run back and forth between them...

give each one of them just enough so she feels she's the most important.

I try to keep them separate, make things easy.

You know? To avoid confusion.

Do you understand?

There is nothing easy about this, Pablo.

Nothing.

And Olga, for one, seems to be very confused

about it, and I can't take it anymore...

not with two little ones.

We'll go away from the city.

We'll go to the beach, away from Olga.

How many of the other dancers in the company have sat for you?

You want the truth?

Certainly.

No one actually sits for me anymore.

Because you only do abstractions.

Because I work from memory.

The moment I saw the curve of your neck, the color of your cheek,

your face was etched in my mind.

Hmm, then why am I frozen here with a stiff back?

Would you have agreed to spend time with me otherwise?