Austin360 blogs > Out & About > Archives > 2009 > April > 10 > Entry
Translating ‘Grey Gardens’
Some stories resist translation. They unspool effortlessly in one medium, then snarl fiendishly in another.
How else to treat aristocratic Edith (“Big Edie”) and Edith (“Little Edie”) Bouvier Beale — relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — who had withdrawn to their weed-throttled, cat-infested East Hamptons estate, virtually penniless, but unwilling to leave their home?
After all, the invalid would-be singer and erratic would-be dancer (pictured) had lost touch with what most people would consider reality. The elder Beale rarely moved from her sickbed, controlling her adult daughter through alternating affection and verbal laceration; the younger pranced around in swaddled fabric, flirting with any available man and whispering to the camera as if she were starring in a Hollywood movie.
To portray these peculiar women with anything other than aesthetically distancing documentary dryness might appear disrespectful, like making a ballet out of photographer Diane Arbus’ equally sensitive, but unsettling portraits of mentally challenged children.
More to come …
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