Comments on: Grey Gardens -- The Return of the Marble Faun.

Grey Gardens -- The Return of the Marble Faun.

rokabiri — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 17:16:19 -0800

"The trouble is, he's madly in love with Edie." Not quite. Jerry Torre, the teenage handy man from Grey Gardens, describes his relationship with Little Edie Bouvier Beale as more of a "sibling rivalry." Be sure to check out Grey Gardens the musical and the remake that's in the works.

By: cilantro

cilantro — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 17:34:38 -0800

Oh my goodness, I love this movie so much. I'm like a Grey Gardens evangelist. Thanks so much.

By: kittyb

kittyb — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 18:19:48 -0800

"The relatives didn't know that they were dealing with a staunch character!" Oh, Grey Gardens, how I love this film so madly. I was just reading the New York Times review of the new musical -- with audio slideshow! -- and was not pulverized by this latest thing.

By: soiled cowboy

soiled cowboy — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 18:54:21 -0800

I have full faith that Drew Barrymore will ensure the dramatization of this story to be a complete and total fuck up.

By: visit beautiful mount weather!

visit beautiful mount weather! — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 18:57:40 -0800

this is a damn good film, as are most by the Maysles. thanks rokabiri! . . . but a musical???? eh . . .

By: visit beautiful mount weather!

visit beautiful mount weather! — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:00:21 -0800

its documentary nature alone should assure any attempt at dramatizing it to be a complete and total fuck up! but yeah, barrymore can't help matters

By: visit beautiful mount weather!

visit beautiful mount weather! — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:01:10 -0800

ensure? "i'm totally high right now"

By: visit beautiful mount weather!

visit beautiful mount weather! — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:02:43 -0800

"Gimme Shelter: The Musical of the Story of the Music!!!"

By: stagewhisper

stagewhisper — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:09:23 -0800

Fascinating story. Full disclosure, I freelanced on the musical that is currently at Playwrights Horizons (in prop land) and hadn't heard of the documentary until I started to go through the documentary in order to take notes. Disturbing story, great film. I always figured when I was younger I'd grow up to be an eccentric like Edie. Sadly, this hasn't happened since what I didn't realize then was that the difference between eccentric and crazy is a trust fund.

By: loquacious

loquacious — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:11:31 -0800

I love the movie. I love the movie lots. But... and it's at this point I'm at an astonishing loss for words that aren't profane or otherwise gross in precision. But I'll try. A musical? WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU SMOKING YOU STUPID SELF-FELLATING SPANKMEISTERS? A dramatized remake!? ARE YOU ON GLUE? Are the solvents finally turning your collective non-brain into a finely pulped liquid mush? Drew? WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK, DREW? DECLINE THE PROJECT. DECLINE! RUN! FUCK THE CONTRACTS. RUN, GODDAMNIT, RUN! I've known about this for a few weeks now, but... it just boggles my FUCKING MIND that somehow some stupid someone somewhere completely failed to grasp the point that the whole beauty of the movie Grey Gardens is that it was real. That it was a stark, unforgiving, practically naked documentary. That the charms of Grey Gardens lie entirely in this unforgiving framing, this unapologetic view of someone's life, the questioning of what sanity is or isn't, what it may or may not be, and how it (sometimes brutally) forced the viewer to question not only their own sanity, but their very defininition of sanity. Damn, I need a cigarette. And fresh pants. I think I just gurned in distaste so hard I soiled my trousers.

By: visit beautiful mount weather!

visit beautiful mount weather! — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:27:50 -0800

loquacious said it better than i . . .

By: ltracey

ltracey — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 19:35:52 -0800

OK, I understand the initial dubiousness with which the idea of a "Grey Gardens" musical is met with, BUT please consider that Doug Wright wrote the book, so it can't be all bad. (Wright has won a Pulitzer and Tony for I Am My Own Wife, wrote the play and screenplay for Quills, and is an unbelievably gifted man. I attended the Dramatic Writing Program with him @ NYU and was awed as an undergrad at his grace and talent.)

By: red cell

red cell — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 20:11:24 -0800

loquacious, why change your pants? You could just as easily take your cape and wear it as a skirt ... Thank you all for the perfect thought tonight before bed. I'll have beautiful dreams of Little Edie performing "We All March Together."

By: Toolshed

Toolshed — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 21:51:27 -0800

Why the concerns about Drew Barrymore? She seems a perfect choice in a way, given her pedigree (Hollywood, along with politics, being an accepted place where an American faux-aristocracy can flourish), her early dissolute period and her considerable abilities as actress. Remember, Grey Gardens is hardly straight documentary or realistic in any naive sense. The Bouvier sisters perform themselves with relish, camping it up (think Tom Jones) and stylizing what may have been a more boring or drab reality. Take that Jackie, with your Oleg Cassini sunglasses and boyish hips. Musical? What musical? That's about a bad idea as turning bad T. S. Eliot poems about cats, written in his decrepitude, into a spandex-covered, method-acting (you want the scratching post, show us how much you NEED the scratching post) nightmare crossbreeding of A Chorus Line and Little Friskies. No one could be that stupid or tasteless. What just happened?