Gushing over Grey Gardens

This is a missive I hammered out to my old college friend Timothy Brod who went to high school with Michael Sucsy, the director of the HBO Grey Gardens film.


 Dear Tim,

 You can tell Michael (Sucsy) he ought to be canonized as far as I'm concerned. See, like Edie, it can be said that I "only care about three thigns, the Catholic church, swimming and dancing.". Michael Sucsy has done an absolutely superb job, heaven on earth, no less of brining the sacred Edies to the narrative screen.

I have been waiting for this film to come alive since I first heard of Edie sometime in 2001 after I moved back to San Francisco. With my life up in arms again, I depended on everything Edie to right my world. I had never related to someone as much as I felt infinitely drawn as she described the revolutionary costume. Dressed for battle, she wore her full length glove to hide the fist raised in protest against the establishment that espoused long established norms of what we as people were supposed to abide by.

When I stumbled upon a niche market crowd of Edie followers, we traded observations on a Yahoo chat group. There were people from the East coast that included someone who had met the Edies personally. His name is Walter Newkirk and he has since published a number of Edie related treasures from his own dealings with the mavens.  He was the first person to tell me about the narrative film that was rumored to be brewing in pre-production.  Starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, I was thankful that it wasn't going to feature Julie Christie, because like Edie, although I'm not disputing that she is a splendid actress, if anyone's going to play Edith Beale, it ought to be Edith Beale, (or the closest living portrayal available)

For Christmas that year, I received a copy of Little Edie, Live, -- Newkirk's original college interview that he completed at Grey Gardens while he was a student at Rutgers University.

And as I've related before, there is evidence that my path was destined to cross with the Edies in the scene from the documentary where Big Edie writes the check to Brooks Hyer for $25 for three cuttings. It is dated September 13, 1973, two days before I was born. I knew the film Walter spoke of and the one I would be reading about in the trades would simply have to come to fruition for the universe to be right. And when you told me that the director was an old friend of yours, I knew that it was a Divine message that it was all meant to be. Because you are such an old and very special friend in my life and someone who has  known me since I was barely 20, the fact that Michael Sucsy was someone close to your life seemed entirely apropos. I am only a degree away from direct affiliation with the film. And how exciting is it that you had lunch with Michael and Christine Ebersole after the Broadway debut. Because I can't afford trips to Great White Way to attend Broadway shows, I am relegated to watching clips of the musical on Youtube but when I saw Christine sing Around the World as Little Edie, I cried real tears when she sang of Edie's plans to hang the birdcage for a bird that flew away. Like her, I have put many plans on the shelf that I mean to complete someday. When Edie feuded with her mother and acted out by singing "incorrectly" I knew it was a last ditch effort to stage rebellion.

I lamented her lost suitors one by one all the way down the Getty because I understand that she was a staunch character who didn't simply want to marry a stockbroker she had played tennis with at the Maidstone Club since she was `12 years old. I have scoured the Internet for scenes from the musicals first act when Big Edie sang melodies for the Junior League with George Gould Strong. Not in 20 years did he and Edie ever get along. And although it may be a hard pill to swallow, no more than the pate was really giblets for the cat, I understand how easy it is to become accustomed to one's environment even when it turns into squalor. I have adjusted to the bottom when my environment has turned to squalor more times than I care to remember and I can truly see how the mess just gradually overtook the Edies existence while they lived in blissful ignorance around it.
In the words of Big Edie, "Everything is good that you didn't do. But at the time, you didn't want it. You can't go around saying, 'sure I feel gorgeous right now.', because everyone thinks and feels differently, don't they."
And because of that, I shall have no regrets. I finally feel like the missing piece of my relationship with the Edies is bringing closure. The documentary is the historical corrective account  and the first record but Michael Sucy's adaptation will dance the Edies in mainstream culture and live into eternity. They'll go together like birds of feather, two peas in a pod, tea for two, two for two. And I loathe Marlene Dietrich, says Edie.