apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Who would have thought it?

That's one lesson... There are so many others! Don't feed wild animals getting into the attic through gaping holes, don't cook corn on the cob bedside, don't wear a skirt as a headdress, etc.

In all seriousness, I'm a huge fan of the Grey Gardens documentary. It'll be interesting to see how they honored it in the movie.

i'm familiar with the story, but have not seen the doc yet. It seems that all the press surrounding this celebrates the Edie's style, rather than focusing on what made these women sink deep into the batshit crazies. LA Times had an entire article about how they were style icons. Am I missing the mark on this?

Also, that second photo looks like my parents house.... We moved into it like that and 9 years later - still the same.

I jokingly nicknamed my ground-level unit "Grey Gardens West" because I am completely hopeless at caring for the plants...they're usually either overgrown or dead.

I can handle the upkeep *inside*, though.

Letterman had Drew Barrymore on last night and she was channeling little Edie adoringly. He eventually popped the question we were all thinking, "they lived knee deep in feces! That's not normal. There had to have been some mental illness or something wrong with them."

The filmmaker insists they were not schizophrenic nor were they mentally ill; they were merely eccentric and isolated. There are just some elements of Grey Gardens that are being romanticized and idealized without scrutiny. Someone smarter than me probably can explain why that is. I'm with chusmailly: batshit crazy is batshit crazy.

I've heard so many people say they loved the documentary and thought these people were wonderful and stylish. I never understood this point of view. I thought the documentary was revolting and these two women were crazy hoarders at the very least - they never even threw out their trash. Although I've read that the daughter cared for the mother in her final years, it really seemed to me that the mother held some kind of twisted control over the daughter that was very sad.

I tried to watch the documentary a few years ago after hearing raves about how fascinating it was. I had to turn it off after about 30 minutes because I did not find the women amusing or hilarious or quirky or whatever. They were mentally ill and sad. And the fact that we have a documentary, a musical, and a movie commemorating and celebrating their "eccentricity," and yet no one was able to help them while they were alive is doubly-sad.

I can't believe that the take-away is to vacuum and dust! Clearly, the Beales had larger problems than delayed maintenance. I love the documentary and am somewhat curious about the HBO film, but I'm not convinced that it needed to be made.

But mental illness as a style inspiration seems a very callous interpretation of their situation. Of course, Bedlam was a tourist spot, back in the 1700s.

There's also an interview in last month's Vogue with Lee Radziwill (niece and cousin to the Edies) about the film.