You've seen Grey Gardens too many times when...

You've seen Grey Gardens too many times when you see Little Edie in fashion everywhere. Clearly it's debatable whether Tyra Banks was influenced by Edie when she slipped into a miniskirt and wrapped her head in a scarf before eliminating girls on America's Next Top Model, but at the very least it's interesting that someone mentally connected Tyra's attire to Edie's.

Look at these two images, and squint a little... Edie's there.

Just replace the white scarf with an American flag:

From Yahoo! News - The Week in Photos, by Alexander Demianchuk

A woman waving a white handkerchief walks in front of a formation of riot policemen during a protest in St. Petersburg April 15, 2007. Russian riot police beat anti-Kremlin demonstrators with batons in the tourist heart of St Petersburg on Sunday, a day after authorities snuffed out a similar protest in Moscow.

And cats are the ultimate Edie fashion accessory:

From Cute Overload, by on April 2007

Please! Put some pants on [Part II]

And that layered skirt? Who's the queen of layering?

Actually, I back my first statement. You haven't seen Grey Gardens enough if you don't see Little Edie in fashion everywhere!

Many thanks to Lynne for having seen Grey Gardens enough times to mentally reference Edie when she saw the images in this post and send them in!

Source: here and here

Three days left to win tickets to Grey Gardens the Musical

Grey Gardens the Musical is having a Mother's Day contest for tickets to see the musical. All you need is a photo of you and your "Mother Darling" and a short (we're talking 200 words max) paragraph about why you two are peas in a pod!

I'm not sure if raccoons are eligible.

Best of luck!

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Edie's fashion sense appears on reality TV shows

Oddly enough, fashion inspired (I believe) by Little Edie's Grey Gardens costumes have popped up on reality TV shows America's Next Top Model and Top Design. First, ANTM...

From FourFour, by Rich Juzwiak, on 16 April 2007

...kinda. Because we should probably talk about this:

A reader, Lisa, wrote to me and said that between the head covering and the miniskirt...

...Tyra's a ringer for Little Edie Beale. I say add a twist of Aladdin, and we've got a deal. I mean, you know she was just dying to balance a sword in her palm the whole time.

Brilliant!

And there's also this, as seen on Bravo's Top Design

From the Top Design website

What's that? Why, it's Kelly Wearstler channeling this one of Edie's fab outfits:

From The Beales of Grey Gardens

Edie wears it better.

Sorry I don't have a better picture of it, but, trust me... Kelly's wearing a tablecloth, too.

Source: here and here

Al Maysles in Los Angeles tonight

Al Maysles, the cameraman for Grey Gardens, will be giving a talk in Los Angeles tonight. It's unclear whether Grey Gardens will screen as a part of this overview.

"... the dean of documentary filmmakers, Albert Maysles."

- The New York Times, May 6, 2002

Oscar®-nominated documentary filmmaker Albert Maysles will present an overview of his work and discuss his particular approach to the documentary form in an evening of conversation and film clips as the Academy’s spring 2007 John Huston Lecture on Documentary Film.

As Direct Cinema pioneers Albert Maysles and his brother David were among the first to make nonfiction feature films (Grey Gardens, Gimme Shelter, Salesman) in which the drama of life unfolds without scripts, sets, interviews or narration. Albert Maysles’ first film, Psychiatry in Russia (1955), was made during his transition to documentary filmmaking after three years of teaching psychology at Boston University. His collaborations with his brother David helped bring the “cinéma vérité” style to American moviemaking. In the 1960s the Maysles created acclaimed documentaries on producer Joseph E. Levine (Showman), Marlon Brando (Meet Marlon Brando) and Truman Capote (With Love from Truman), culminating in their classic Salesman, about door-to-door Bible salesmen.

The 1970s saw the release of two famous and markedly different features from the Maysles. Gimme Shelter depicted the notorious Rolling Stones concert at Altamont and was a revealing portrait of lead singer Mick Jagger. Grey Gardens looked at the lives of the Beales, two eccentric, reclusive relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy. The film is one of the most popular documentaries of all time, even inspiring a current Broadway musical.

The Maysles’ collaborations include several films about the artist Christo; they received an Academy Award® nomination in the Documentary Short Subject category for Christo’s Valley Curtain (1973). Although David died in 1987, their company, Maysles Films, is as prolific as ever. Among its later projects is the Oscar-nominated feature LaLee’s Kin: The Legacy of Cotton (2001), which Albert Maysles photographed and co-directed.

The Academy’s John Huston Lecture on Documentary Film is a series named to honor Huston’s legacy as witnessed in his controversial World War II documentaries Report from the Aleutians (1943), The Battle of San Pietro (1944) and Let There Be Light (1946). The Battle of San Pietro was not shown publicly until 1945, when General George Marshall removed its “classified” status. Let There Be Light was banned for decades by the U.S. War Department, the very agency that commissioned it, before it was finally released in 1980.

Tickets are $5 for the general public and $3 for Academy members and students with a valid ID. Tickets for this event will be available beginning April 2, at the Academy during regular business hours, by mail (HTML or PDF format), or on the night of the screening, if still available. Please note, we do not take phone reservations or any credit cards. If ordering by mail, please remember to include a self-addressed, stamped envelope along with your personal check made out to THE ACADEMY FOUNDATION. On the day of the event, doors open at 6:30 p.m.

The Linwood Dunn Theater is located at the Academy’s Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study, 1313 North Vine Street, Hollywood, CA 90028. Parking is available behind the building through the entrance on Homewood Avenue.

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Panel on the making of Grey Gardens the Musical

This looks to be very interesting!

From The REELot Spot for Independent Writers, by john BAT, on 7 April 2007

Free Panel - “Grey Gardens: The Creation of a Musical”

The Living Room for Artists Inc / Summer Play Festival (SPF) and The Mayor’s Office of Film, Theatre, and Broadcasting (MOFTB) will present its first panel of 2007 – a case study examining the Broadway hit, “Grey Gardens: The Musical” - on Saturday, April 14. Titled “Grey Gardens: The Creation of a Musical”, the panel is designed to examine the development process of a musical, from its origins off-Broadway, to its opening night on Broadway. The panel will be moderated by Katherine Oliver, Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting. Panelists include Michael Greif (Director), Randall Wreghitt (Producer), Scott Frankel (Music), Michael Korie (Lyrics), and Christie Evangelisto (Director of Musical Theater Programming, Playwrights Horizons).

The free panel will take place on April 14 from 10:00am-11:30am, at the Acorn Theatre at Theatre Row, at 410 West 42nd Street (between 9th and 10th Avenues). Guests should RSVP to message@film.nyc.gov by April 12.

This panel is the fifth in a series addressing careers in theatre management, theatrical production and support, and acting.

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Are the Beales ''losers''?

In some sense, yes.

There's a fascinating article in the New York Times about this. Our Beales are mentioned throughout it, quoted below.

From The New York Times, by Charles Isherwood, on 8 April 2007

Take a Bow, Loser, the Spotlight’s Yours

The career as an opera singer didn’t quite pan out. Neither did the marriage. As a mom she was pretty much a washout too, unless you consider keeping your adult daughter caged in a filthy house in East Hampton a mark of accomplishment.

Her daughter’s path through life has not exactly taken her to the heights either. A furtive stab at a life in showbiz fizzled quickly. The fancy fiancé got the heebie-jeebies. Now her single mark of distinction is a flair for repurposing textiles.

And yet these two hapless, hopeless women, the junior and senior Edith Beales, are ensconced in that generally most sunny and celebratory of entertainment vehicles, an old-school Broadway book musical. Serenading audiences at the Walter Kerr Theater eight times a week, they charm as they disarm in the ballad of wasted lives and blighted hopes that is “Grey Gardens.”

Behold a new face of the Broadway musical, bearing a wry comic grimace that reflects the new mood abroad in America. A country renowned — for good or ill — as the land that enshrined success as a prize to be cherished above all others has lately evinced a sneaky fascination with failure. The losers on “American Idol” are almost as famous as the winners — sometimes more so. Kicked off one contest show, a new-minted pseudo-celebrity becomes a star of the next. Paris Hilton’s very pointlessness constitutes the whole of her appeal; no one really wants her to acquire a talent.

“Grey Gardens,” with its tale of vertiginous downward mobility, is a cultural artifact expressing the new mood perfectly. The singing Beales, more lovable in the musical than in the documentary film it is based on, embody the idea that glorying in your freakishness or failure may be healthier — and dammit, more American! — than scurrying from the spotlight in shame.

Christine Ebersole’s loony Little Edie Beale feels just as entitled to our attention as that cousin of hers who did so well. (You know, Jackie Kennedy Onassis?) And after a strange but lively evening in the haunted house of her soul, we cannot but agree.

And later...

The Beales of “Grey Gardens,” which has deepened and sharpened in its move to Broadway this season, are peculiarly apt as embodiments of this American bad mood in the 21st century. Their disappointed lives were tangentially connected to the saga of the iconic Kennedys that dominated the most hopeful postwar years of the 20th. At the end of the musical’s first act Little Edie is jilted by Joseph Kennedy Jr., who would go on to die heroically in combat in World War II. And Jacqueline Bouvier and her sister, Lee, appear as excited youngsters in thrall to their glamorous cousin.

In the years in between Acts I and II little Jacqueline grew up to marry John F. Kennedy and become first lady. After her husband’s death she burnished his legend by making the comparison between his brief but idealistic reign and the shining nobility of the court of King Arthur. The connecting tissue was of course the Broadway musical “Camelot,” which opened shortly after Kennedy was elected to the presidency. Try to imagine a 21st-century musical paying sincere tribute to the tragic but inspiring story of these Kennedys, and your mind goes blank. The macabre Beales somehow speak more captivatingly to the current moment.

But it is worth making the distinction between a comic but empathetic regard for people mishandled by life — an attitude exemplified by entertainments like “Little Miss Sunshine” and the musical version of “Grey Gardens” — and a similar but nastier impulse in current culture: the raging tide of schadenfreude that drives the pervasive coverage of celebrity meltdowns and mishaps.

And finally...

When the musical of “Grey Gardens” was first announced, I was apprehensive that it might turn out to be a stage version of those voyeuristic forays into the sad lives of pseudo-celebrities. The 1975 Maysles brothers’ documentary that inspired it is a cult favorite, but the camera can be a merciless instrument. The pathos of Little and Big Edie, immured in squalor that is all too crisply captured on film, was for me a little hard to take, colorful characters though they were.

What saves the musical from being a morbid exercise in secondhand camp is the leavening warmth and feeling its authors, Doug Wright (book), Scott Frankel (music) and Michael Korie (lyrics), bring to the task of chronicling the Beales’ unfulfilled lives. Imagining a back story of family strife and disappointment for both the junior and senior Edies, they remind us that life’s knocks have a way of warping all of us — even the most privileged — into slight (or sometimes extreme) caricatures of ourselves. In the second act, when the Beales have been transformed into a pair of living ghosts haunting a decaying mansion, the songs they sing open windows into their hearts, softening their gargoylishness.

As absurd as they appear the Beales are comfortingly human too. Their decline from hopeful dreamers to withdrawn oddballs may be extreme, but it traces in unusually gothic style an arc that shapes many a human journey. The lives we live as adults are rarely in neat accord with the heady dreams of youth. The seismic change that occurs in the fortunes of the Beales while the audience is chatting away merrily at intermission is a sneaky metaphor for the stealthy progress of fate in our own lives.

Few will leave the theater thinking: Little Edie Beale, c’est moi! But everyone of a certain age (say 30) has probably lived through a few of those startling moments when you take stock of your life as it is and wonder: How did I get here, exactly? When did the curves come that moved me away from one destiny and toward another? I guess it all must have happened during intermission.

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Grey Gardens fashion spread & article in BON Magazine

Gorgeous, gorgeous stuff! Thanks to the anonymous contributor who sent me the link!

From BON Magazine

Galna Grey Gardens

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Christine Ebersole on PBS tonight

For those of you who haven't seen Christine promoting the musical, I'm always struck by how eloquently and positively she talks about the Beale women.

From Playbill, by Andrew Gans, on 2 April 2007

Grey Gardens Star Ebersole to Be Featured on WNET's "New York Voices"

WNET/Thirteen's "New York Voices" series will feature an interview with Tony Award winner Christine Ebersole, who is currently starring in the new Broadway musical Grey Gardens.

"New York Voices" host Rafael Pi Roman interviewed Ebersole at the Walter Kerr Theatre, where Gardens now plays after a successful Off-Broadway run at Playwrights Horizons. The interview will premiere April 6 at 10 PM ET on the PBS station.

In addition to her current Broadway roles, Ebersole, according to a press release, also "talks about balancing the demands and success of Grey Gardens with her life at home in Maplewood, New Jersey, which includes her three adopted children, her husband, her 89-year-old mother, and a menagerie of pets."

Christine Ebersole received a 2003 Tony nomination for her performance in Lincoln Center's production of Dinner at Eight. She also received a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical for her work as Dorothy Brock in the hit revival of 42nd Street. Ebersole's other Broadway credits include The Best Man, Getting Away with Murder, Harrigan 'n Hart, Camelot, Oklahoma!, On the Twentieth Century, I Love My Wife, Angel Street and the City Center Encores! productions of A Connecticut Yankee, Ziegfeld Follies of 1936, Lady in the Dark and Allegro. She was also seen Off-Broadway in Talking Heads, and her work in the Off-Broadway production of Grey Gardens brought the actress Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards.

John DeNatale is executive producer of "New York Voices." Suzanne Glickstein is producer; show producers are Bob Morris, Jim Epstein, and James Nicoloro. Scott Feinstein is editor.

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Lois Wright's Grey Gardens book is now available for purchase

Wow! Wow! Wow! I can't express how excited I am for this book to finally be available! (Let's face it--electronic books are a pain to read!) I look forward to seeing what these new images are when the book arrives!

My Life at Grey Gardens
by Lois Wright

Lois Wright's "My Life at Grey Gardens" is now available as a printed book

On behalf of Lois Wright, we would like to announce the publication of "My Life at Grey Gardens: 13 Months and Beyond" in paperback form. The text offers and intimate glimpse into the daily lives of the Beales and of Lois Wright, a friend of the Beales who was invited to live with them at Grey Gardens shortly after the Maysles' filming had ended. This new paperback version is an updated copy of last year's eBook release, and includes updated text and a few images not seen in the original eBook.

For purchase information, please visit the following link:
http://www.loiswright.net/

It seems that there are a number of Grey Gardens-related book projects in the works, but, to my knowledge this one from Lois is the first to hit the shelves. Good job, Lois!

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Grey Gardens the Musical's creative team & Al Maysles to be honored

Congratulations to the talented David and Albert Maysles, and to the creators of the Grey Gardens musical.

One point to note, however: It's not fair to say that David and Al Maysles created the documentary, without giving credit to the editors (Susan Froemke, Ellen Hovde, and Muffie Meyer). The Maysles were there for the filming, but it's the editors who made a story out of the raw footage. It's a shame that they and David Maysles won't be honored.

From Playbill, by Andrew Gans, on 2 April 2007

National Arts Club Honors Maysles and Broadway's Grey Gardens April 2

The National Arts Club honors Albert Maysles and the creative team of Grey Gardens with The Medal of Honor for Theatre April 2.

A 7 PM reception will kick off the evening at the National Arts Club, followed by dinner at 7:30 PM and tributes and presentations at 8:45 PM.

Maysles, with his late brother David, created the 1975 documentary "Grey Gardens" upon which the Broadway musical is based. The evening honors Maysles along with the creative team of the new musical: librettist Doug Wright, composer Scott Frankel, lyricist Michael Korie and director Michael Greif. Joel Vig directs the evening, which includes "tributes, stories and songs from members of the cast, the design team, and surprise guest stars [who] will give rare behind-the-scenes glimpses into the Broadway experience."

Grey Gardens charts the relationship between mother and daughter socialites Edith and Edie Beale (aunt and cousin to Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis) as they slide from the top of the Long Island social register (in the 1940s) to the bottom of the heap (in the 1970s), ultimately living together in a squalid East Hampton mansion, Grey Gardens.

The National Arts Club is located in Manhattan at 15 Gramercy Park South.

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Julia Martin's Grey Gardens art

Fantastic!

Unfortunately, most of these are already sold, but, at the time of this posting, there are two Grey Gardens paintings still available!

All I Need Is A Libra Man

Don't Drop It

Tea For Two

If Edie Were Me

Now Now Edie

I Don't Believe It

A Staunch Character

I Have To Look At Myself

Something's Slipping

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