please visit the memoraBEALEia website at :
www.greygardensbook.commemoraBEALEia : A Private Scrapbook about Edie Beale of Grey Gardens, a new book by Walter Newkirk, celebrates and pays tribute to Edith "Little Edie" Bouvier Beale. Miss Beale was the first cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and is best known for her participation in the famous documentary Grey Gardens (1976).
The book was specifically produced for fans of Edie Beale and the film
Grey Gardens.
On April 22, 1976 college journalist Walter Newkirk traveled to Grey Gardens, the Beale estate on Long Island, to interview Edie Beale about the movie documentary
Grey Gardens, for his college newspaper,
The Rutgers Daily Targum.
In the 1970s, Edie Beale and her mother Edith Bouvier Beale -- the respective cousin and aunt of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis � former society ladies � were living in a cat-infested, filthy, crumbling estate called
Grey Gardens in East Hampton on Long Island. The film
Grey Gardens about their reclusive lives together in that house inspired a Tony Award winning Broadway musical during the 2006-2007 season by Doug Wright, Michael Korie and Scott Frankel, also called
Grey Gardens, which fictionalized the back story and decline of the women.
The interview for the Rutgers newspaper was conducted shortly after the release of the film. Newkirk and Beale kept in touch for several years, by phone and by mail. After the estate was sold and her mother died, Beale moved to New York for three years (1980-1983) and the author escorted her to luncheons, parties and special events. "Little Edie" later moved to Florida, and died in January 2002.
memoraBEALEia contains never-before-seen photographs of Edie Beale and Grey Gardens, the Rutgers Targum interview along with a few other obscure newspaper clippings, reproductions of letters written by Little Edie (and cards created by her, along with art inspired by Grey Gardens. There are also essays about Edie and Grey Gardens by photojournalist/paparazzo Ron Galella, former literary agent Pat Loud (
An American Family, PBS TV series, 1973) and the artist Maria Manhattan.
The documentary
Grey Gardens is now available on DVD.
A new movie about Edie Beale and her mother, also called
Grey Gardens, starring Drew Barrymore as Little Edie and Jessica Lange as her mother Big Edie is scheduled for release in Fall 2008.
For further information about
memoraBEALEia, please visit
www.greygardensbook.com. The book is now available for purchase on authorhouse.com, amazon.com and in bookstores nationwide. It is a collaborative effort with Walt Radomsky and Jeff Holtzman, both alumni of Rutgers University and
Rutgers Daily Targum.
Title:
memoraBEALEia
A Private Scrapbook About Edie Beale of Grey Gardens
First Cousin To First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
Author:
Walter Newkirk
Pub. Date:
April 15, 2008
Price:
$37.00 softcover (retail); $25.00 softcover on authorhouse.com
Pages:
92 pages with b&w/color photos, color illustrations
ISBN:
9781434374493
For review copy requests, email newkirkpr@aol.com
To purchase copies, call: 888-280-7715
After I saw Grey Gardens at the Paris Theatre with Pat Loud and my college friend Bob Sennett in 1976, I couldn't stop thinking about the movie or Little Edie. I loved the movie because it was shocking, funny, tender, and brimming with the love between a mother and daughter. I was also mesmerized by Edie's flamboyant wardrobe.
I became obsessed with a dream to see the Grey Gardens house, and to meet and interview Little Edie live, in person for my college newspaper, The Rutgers Daily Targum. So in the logical chain of events for a college journalist, I called the East Hampton telephone directory assistance and requested the telephone number for Edith, Edith B. or E. Beale. To my surprise, the operator gave me a phone number.
I dialed the number on one of those old black rotary telephones from the college newspaper office, and bravely introduced myself to Little Edie. She was kind and poised during our conversations, yet seemed suspicious. I guess it's understandable if your house has been raided.
After a few telephone conversations and after she discussed it with her mother, Edie finally invited me to Grey Gardens, and said I could interview her. I was eager to go.
I obtained directions from the East Hampton police and went in search of Grey Gardens with two other Rutgers students; Jeff Holtzman, a photographer for the Rutgers newspaper, and Bob Sennett, a music writer for the paper.
In the very early hours of the morning on April 22, 1976, we stopped at a Hungarian bakery near the University campus and purchased two boxes of cookies and pastries for Little Edie and Big Edie. I also packed a small cassette tape recorder, along with a special Rutgers T-shirt imprinted with the name Little Edie. Driving out to East Hampton seemed endless. We were on the road for at least three hours, and I felt anxious and impatient. I was worried we were going to get lost trying to find Grey Gardens, but we finally arrived.
It was a cold and gloomy overcast day. There was a sense of trepidation and excitement when we arrived at the house on Lily Pond Lane. I drove on to the property's grass-lined driveway and parked my car near another small sports car. This now seemed a bit scary, as we walked up to the house, and I knocked on the door. I was nervous, and glad I was not alone.
The woman who came to the door wasn't Little Edie, but someone I recognized from the movie. Her name was Lois Wright; she was one of the guests at Big Edie's birthday party in the Grey Gardens film. Lois told me Edie wasn't ready, and we could either wait on the porch or in my car. She also said we could knock on the windows with the diamond shaped panes if we needed anything. As I would soon find out, Lois was currently living with Big Edie and Little Edie in the house, with her art studio in the kitchen.
This experience was already beginning to feel bizarre and surreal. It was as if we were in a portion of the Maysles Brothers film that was edited out of the final cut or being saved for the DVD twenty-five years later.
Edie appeared on the porch within five minutes after Lois Wright spoke with me. We entered Grey Gardens through what Edie told us was "a Dutch door." The house seemed as Spartan as it did in the movie; there was little to no furniture but an overwhelming odor of cats.
My interview with Little Edie Beale was conducted with the tape recorder. I had prepared all the questions in advance.
Edie discusses the Maysles brothers, the raid, women's lib, and several other topics. Several members of the GG group heard the original tape and encouraged me to put it on CD.
I remember staying up all night in my dorm room, spending hours and hours transcribing the tape. I still have the 90 minute tape to this day, and I�m still fascinated listening to it.
We were at Grey Gardens for a few hours that day.
My article ends: "As I was leaving Grey Gardens, Miss Beale began to tell me about a beau she had from Rutgers. 'You know, I was always asking him about Rutgers because I never went there and I always wanted to go.'"
I will never forget what happened when we said our goodbyes to Edie. As I started the ignition to my car, I turned on the fan for heat, and once the hot air hit our clothes and bodies, the smell of cats was so pungent we couldn't catch our breath. It felt poisonous and caused us to choke as if we were inhaling ammonia. We laughed hysterically but were simultaneously horrified. Spontaneously and in sync, we all threw open the car doors and exited onto the lawn for a few minutes before we got back in the car.
I sent Edie the interview after it was published, and she told me she liked it. I realized how much I enjoyed my visit to Grey Gardens, and I began calling Edie on the telephone from time to time. I had to prepare for graduation within weeks and was still job hunting. Edie seemed genuinely interested in my future.
Little Edie always had a beau from Rutgers. For all intents and purposes, I became that beau. And for the next 25 years, I remained, her hypothetical, and quintessential, gentleman caller: that "boy from Rutgers" or "The Rutgers Boy" as she would refer to me in the year 2000.
