"A third of the way through Netflix's new documentary Victoria Beckham, we hear the slow, sad harmony of the Spice Girls' song "Goodbye." The 1998 ballad was the British pop group's first release after Geri Halliwell (aka Ginger Spice) made her shocking exit, and it was billed as the band's remaining members bidding a fond farewell to their friend. Here, though, the song serves a new purpose that also mirrors that of the documentary itself: allowing Beckham to bid farewell to Posh Spice."
"There was Posh, of course, the Gucci-clad yet always grumpy member of the Spice Girls, and to some, its weakest singer. (She was the only member of the group who didn't get her own verse on "Wannabe," and in 2016, she admitted that during live performances, the band's production team often turned off her microphone.) Then came Victoria Beckham the solo artist, a meandering and generally forgettable turn that she admits she mostly sleepwalked through, feeling lost."
Victoria Beckham uses a farewell to her Posh Spice persona to mark a decisive career shift. Reunion performances convinced her she no longer wished to be a performer and that the Posh character had become alien to her. Her early solo music career felt meandering and disconnected, and stage production often minimized her singing. Concurrently she inhabited the public role of wife and partner in a global power couple. She resolved to leave performance behind and immerse herself in the fashion world, intentionally stripping away previous personas to build credibility and respect as a designer.
Read at Slate Magazine
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