“mother wanted me to come out in a kimono so we had quite a fight”
Lately, I have become obsessed with Big and Little Edie Beale of Grey Gardens. Reading Gail Sheehy’s original article from New York Magazine got me hooked, then I watched parts of the documentary (I still haven’t had time to buy the whole thing…shameful, I know) and watched the new HBO movie, which was surprisingly quite good. Drew Barrymore who knew.
The myth of Grey Gardens, the story of Jackie O’s aunt and cousin who lived as recluses in squalor until authorities forced them to clean up their decaying East Hampton mansion, grew in popularity in the 1970s after documentarians the Maysles brothers made the eponymous documentary. The documentary consists of the brothers simply filming the women in their natural habitat. It has since become a cult classic revered by old and young hipsters of the pretentious variety. The Beales are great to watch. They are both funny and sad, women so consumed by their own vices that the have secluded themselves, becoming pariahs in the world of the Bouviers, Beales and, of course, Kennedys. One feels voyeuristic watching them. You watch their fights. You watch Little Edie’s desperate desire to be free. It almost seems like you are intruding. These are not happy people. These are people with deep and troubling problems.
But we as a society often find entertainment in other peoples’ troubles. It’s a sort of schadenfreude that is inherent in our blood. Let’s take for instance the current fascination with the relationship troubles of Jon and Kate Gosselin, of the popular reality show Jon and Kate Plus 8. Jon and Kate had mediocre ratings when it was just a show about a couple with eight children, but now that Jon and Kate are on the verge of a separation, it’s a media frenzy. Us Weekly has run either seven or eight covers just on the pair.
After watching Grey Gardens my mother remarked that one feels a little bit creepy looking in on the lives of the Edies. She added, is watching them really that different than watching Jon and Kate? And it’s true, it’s really not that different, other than the fact that one is regarded as high art and the other is regarded as popular television. You really can’t accept one without accepting the other.
