The strength and shame of uncut apron strings
Grey Gardens
Directed by Albert & David Maysles
1975
It was something of a scandal: in 1972, a National Enquirer article and a series of raids from the Suffolk County Health Department revealed that Jackie Kennedy Onassis’ Aunt Edith “Big Edie” Bouvier Beale and cousin, Edith “Little Edie” Bouvier Beale were living in squalor in a dilapidated wreck of an East Hampton mansion called Grey Gardens.
Not long after, documentary filmmakers Albert and David Maysles met the Beales while researching a possible film on Jackie’s sister, Lee Radziwell. Realizing that they’d stumbled across a much more interesting family story, they spent time getting to know the Beales and shooting footage of them, culminating in the 1975 release of the documentary “Grey Gardens.” This threw a spotlight on the Beales and provided them with a certain amount of fame and notoriety. Part of the fascination for audiences was the contrast with glamorous Jackie O: how could her relatives, talented Big Edie and beautiful and stylish Little Edie, end up a couple of eccentrics living in squalor and almost complete isolation?
But “Grey Gardens” doesn’t quite answer that question. Instead, the Maysles grant us a window into their lives: it’s a quiet summer where not much happens, but we get see their peculiar and amusing habits and activities. There’s no real plot to speak of: Little Edie sits in the sun, dances, and feeds the numerous cats that seem to be all over the house. She shows off her unique fashion sense (lots of head scarves and turbans, fifties bathing suits, and big broaches). Big Edie, overweight and nearly bedridden, looks through photographs and sings old songs like “Tea for Two” as a growing pile of trash and junk accumulates around her. Little Edie throws a quiet birthday party for her mother (with a meal of Wonderbread served on fine china with plastic utensils). And the women spend lots of time reminiscing and arguing about the past.
It’s a shock to see pictures of the women when they were young. We see photographs of a youthful, slim Big Edie, scion of upper class society. She had aspirations of a singing career (she sings along with some of her own old records) before getting married. The marriage was unhappy: it’s unclear what went wrong, but the result was abandonment by her husband, divorce and her seclusion at Grey Gardens. Little Edie, always her mother’s close confidante, was a knockout. It’s easy to see why she dated Kennedy’s and Getty’s.
But all of that is just a memory: the women seem to spend most of their time in a small bedroom with twin beds, listening to the radio or records. The house is falling down around them with cats and raccoons rummaging around through the rooms. They’re peculiar, but in a strangely endearing way: you get the sense that the Maysles brothers became very fond of the Beales, even as they show funny scenes like nearsighted Little Edie, standing on a scale and trying to read it with binoculars.
It’s hard to say what’s so compelling about this movie because nothing much of consequence happens. But their loopy lifestyle slowly begins to draw you in. They’re like characters out of some kind of Victorian novel and their relationship is fascinating, codependent and loving, but full of resentment. Little Edie blames her mother for forcing her to give up her life in New York to take care of her mother in East Hampton. But there are times when you wonder who really needed to be taken care of? Perhaps the outside world proved too much for Little Edie and she needed to get back to her mother. Was it easier to live in her memories and spend her time dreaming about what might have been? After a long argument in which she denies trying to break up an engagement between Little Edie and a boyfriend, Big Edie admits, “I didn’t want my child taken away; I would have been entirely alone.”
The release of the film created a cult following for the Beales, and Little Edie became an unlikely fashion inspiration. In 1976, Big Edie passed away: based on what we see in the film, you might think that Little Edie would have fallen apart without the codependent relationship with her mother to sustain her. But instead, it was as if Little Edie had regained her freedom. She began performing a cabaret act in the city and eventually sold the dilapidated wreck of a house, moving to Florida where she lived until her death in 2002.
The oddest twist was yet to come: in 2006, a brand new musical called “Grey Gardens,” featuring singing and dancing, young and old Beales, opened on Broadway to excellent notices. I’m sure Big Edie and Little Edie would have gotten a kick out of that.
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