Hillbilly Elegy True Story: What The Film Changes Regarding J.D. Vance's Family
Director Ron Howard uses some creative license in Netflix's adaptation of J.d. Vance's memoir to put together this reconciling of lifestyles.
J.D. Vance Memoir Translation
Making improvements that would result in a better movie is part of every writer's job when translating stories to the big screen; Ron Howard's 2020 adaptation of J.d. Vance's memoir Hillbilly Elegy is no exception. Howard re-ordered and embellished some story points to affix a more suitable cinematic structure, even while the vivid Appalachian characters that make up J.D.'s family retain their essence in many respects. It's important to look at what's real and what isn't even if these tweaks most certainly couldn't save Hillbilly Elegy from poor reviews.
Life Before Politics by J.D. Vance
Hillbilly Elegy leaps back and forth between J.D. as an adult and as a child in Middletown, Ohio. During the future politician's childhood, J.D.'s mother Beverly battles poverty, drug abuse, and a revolving door of boyfriends/husbands. Lindsay and J.D., her two children, then spend much of their adult life in the movie negotiating their mother's relapse since flashbacks reveal Beverly's ongoing drug addiction. In most respects, each of the Hillbilly Elegy's characters stays true to their nature; but, certain aspects and story points vary between the actual narrative and the movie.
J.D. Vance's Battles with Poverty
Given Hillbilly Elegy's main focus and narrator, most of its changes clearly affect J.D. Indeed, he grew up in Middletown, Ohio, following the migration from Kentucky by his Mamaw and Papaw seeking a better life for their family. At Yale, J.D. also came across several examples of elitist bias, including the dismissive remarks regarding state institutions shown in the movie and the silverware confusion. Yes, the same Kavanaugh of SCOTUS confirmation meltdown fame — his girlfriend Usha is very much real, having clerked for then-Judge Kavanaugh and helped J.D. adjust to the upper-class dogma.
Most of the variations arise in the present timeline of Hillbilly Elegy. Vance describes in his memoir his mother's several relapses, but nowhere is mentioned of him going home hours before a last interview to place Beverly in a rehab center. Not a real part of the narrative are the four credit cards he uses to cover Beverly's stay expenses either.
Dramatic tension is raised by the conflict between J.D.'s fear of his turbulent past and Usha's offers of support. These components help Vance's character to be positioned between Mamaw's insistence that family is "the only thing worth a goddamn" and his aspirations of breaking out from the cycle of poverty. Though Hillbilly Elegy faced strong criticism for its "pick-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps" philosophy, the way the 2020 film dramatizes the conflict the source material suggests helps to clarify it.
Problems with Addiction: Beverly Vance
A character apparently drowning in the suffering of her own design begs questions about the reality of Beverly's representation in the contentious film Hillbilly Elegy. Still, the movie gets more accurate than one could have imagined seeing what has been labeled as "poverty porn." In his early years, J.D. watched his mother arrested several times. The film chooses one of those events to dramatize in a sequence whereby J.D. runs into a nearby house seeking refuge from a violent Beverly (though Vance's snap-acquittal of his mother is dubious).
Although J.D. Vance's mother Beverly obviously battled addiction, Adams's performance suggests a deeper mental illness not mentioned in the book. Beverly did get fired after roller-skating across the hospital where she worked as a nurse. Her marriage to her dialysis center boss and array of boyfriends are true. J.D.'s later misbehavior also quite closely reflects the actual narrative.
Drug issues mostly define where the film veers from the true narrative. Although J.D. Vance's mother Beverly obviously battled addiction, Adams's performance suggests a deeper mental illness not mentioned in the book. Vance links her turn-on- a-dime mood swings—which she attributes to the drugs—suggestive of a character who was sick far before succumbing to heroin. Though it doesn't exactly line up with the author's work, this choice accentuates the character's spirit in Hillbilly Elegy.
The Part Bonnie "Mamaw" Vance Plays in J.D.'s Life
Eight-time Oscar-nominated actress Glenn Close disappears into Bonnie "mamaw" Vance's sharp-tongued, chain-smoking matriarch in Hillbilly Elegy. From the actual narrative, Mamaw's cheeky venom and strict will to put Vance on the correct path directly reflect Mamaw did, in fact, cover the mother void for J.D. during some of his childhood while his mother battled her addiction. Actually, Beverly was asking J.D. for clean urine, which inspired her to bring the boy under her roof and straighten him. Her trademark hostility helped her to famously scare off his ne'er-do-well friends.
J.D. cannot fairly be expected to know the specifics of her past, but the book directly quotes Mamaw's childhood and marriage flashbacks. She did set her drunk husband on fire, as promised should he keep returning home in such a state; their daughters stopped him from suffering any Freddy Krueger-level burns. Lindsay does, as best as Vance understands it, experience violence and hardship in her own childhood. Sadly dead in 2005, Mamaw may be the most well-preserved major character in Netflix's poorly received 2020 book adaptation.
Glenn Close has had a great career in theater, television, and movies, but one film brought her a very unusual and contradictory success.
Lindsay Vance's Stories
Many of the Hillbilly Elegy flashbacks show J.D.'s sister almost constantly trying to leave the house and away from her family. This captures her actual attempt to flee her dysfunctional family via her own marriage. By the time J.D. had begun his downturn around age 15, shown in the movie as him smoking, drinking, and engaging in vandalism, Lindsay had moved out and started a successful marriage of her own.
Like J.D. and Beverly, Lindsay's character's error in the Ron Howard film results mostly from the present-day chronology. Lindsay did phone J.D. to let him know about their mother's overdose while he was at Yale, but she did not ask him to come home right away. Concerned about Lindsay's situation stressing her and that she had to manage it alone, J.D. returned several weeks later.
Papaw by J.D. Vance
James Lee "Papaw" Vance, J.D.'s grandfather, dies in 1997, thus he is hardly seen and referenced in Hillbilly Elegy. At the time of Papaw's death, J.D. was about 13 years old and was much closer to his grandmother than he was to his grandfather. The 2020 biopic features flashbacks to Mamaw's turbulent marriage to her husband including the moment she set him on fire. Mamaw warned Papaw she would kill him should he ever come home intoxicated once more. She so set him on fire when he did. Papaw did, however, only get minor burns.
J.D. Vance's After Hillbilly Elegy Life
Following their 2013 Yale Law School graduation, one year later J.D. and Usha were married in Kentucky. They later moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, in 2018 to be close to his family and to settle down in a place where they could raise their children. J.D. Vance and his wife Usha ultimately had three children — Ewan, born in June 2017, Vivek, in February 2020, and Mirabel, born in December 2021.
As for their careers, Usha worked as a lawyer at the law firm of Munger, Tolles & Olson before resigning in 2024. J.D. is now the junior senator for Ohio. However, J.D.'s political career is swiftly accelerating as Donald Trump chose him as his vice presidential running mate in 2024. Therefore, a lot has changed for the Vance family following Hillbilly Elegy.
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Directed by Ron Howard for release on Netflix, Hillbilly Elegy is a Drama film released in 2020 and stars Amy Adams and Glenn Close. The plot is based on author J.D. Vance's memoir of the same name and follows a family as they attempt to deal with their mother's unstable lifestyle.
