The new book, Letters of Little Edie Beale: Grey Gardens and Beyond, collected and edited by Walter Newkirk, is a sequel to memoraBEALEia: A Private Scrapbook About Little Edie Beale of Grey Gardens.
It is now available for purchase exclusively on www.authorhouse.com.
http://www.authorhouse.com/Bookstore/ItemDetail.aspx?bookid=58386 . Within the next 30-45 business days, it may be purchased on amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com, target.com, and in bookstores nationwide.
The HBO movie Grey Gardens, directed by Michael Sucsy featuring
Drew Barrymore as Little Edie and
Jessica Lange as her mother Big Edie, was broadcast on HBO Television during April and May 2009 and is now available on DVD.
The film was nominated for 17 Emmy Awards and won the Television Critic's Award for Best Television Movie. It received Emmy Awards as Best Television Movie, Best Actress in a TV Movie -
Jessica Lange, Best Supporting Actor in A Television Movie -
Ken Howard, Best Prosthetic Makeup, Best Hair Design, and Best Set Decoration.
Letters of LIttle Edie Beale contains approximately 100 transcripts of the most engaging and entertaining cards and letters written to Walter Newkirk by Edie Beale from 1977-1987 and from 2000 up until a few months before Edie's death in 2002. In her letters Edie discusses politics,
Bill Clinton, John McCain, 9/11, Cher, Elian Gonzalez,the Grey Gardens documentary and musical, her first cousins Jackie Kennedy Onassis and
Lee Radziwill,
Andy Warhol, and more.
Miss Beale is best known for her participation in the legendary documentary Grey Gardens (1976). In the early 1970s, Edie Beale and her mother Edith
Bouvier Beale -- the aunt of Mrs. Onassis - former society ladies - were living in a cat-infested, filthy, crumbling estate called Grey Gardens in East Hampton on Long Island which was raided by health authorities several times for unsanity living conditions. Finally, an eviction was pending until Mrs. Onassis helped clean up the house.
The documentary about the Beale's reclusive lives together in that house also 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. It was nominated for 10 Tony Awards, and won 3 awards for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress in a Musical; and Best Costumes.
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.
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 in 1983, and died there in January 2002.
Newkirk's tape recorded interview with Edie Beale from 1976 along with copies of her letters were given to director Michael Sucsy as part of the intensive research for the new HBO film. Mr. Newkirk is mentioned by Suscy during the director's audio commentary on the DVD, and listed in the film credits under Research Assistance.
Walter Newkirk was inspired to compile the collection of letters from Little Edie in his new book by Barry Qualls, Vice President and Professor of English at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He first became acquainted with Professor Qualls as a freshman at Rutgers in 1972 as a student in his class.
The Rutgers professor is a fan of the Broadway musical Grey Gardens, and read memoraBEALEia. He wrote to the author and said he liked the book, but like many other readers and Grey Gardens fans, he wanted more.
The author dedicates this book to Edie Beale, whose spirit and life on stage and film touches many people nationally and internationally. Letters From Little Edie Beale is also dedicated to Rutgers University and the Rutgers Daily Targum for their marvelous and steadfast support of Newkirk's books. The Targum was, in fact, the genesis of his first book, and
The catalyst for his friendship with Edie Beale.
The book will feature several pages of art related to Edie and Grey Gardens including works from artists nationwide: Anthony "Tonyboy" Alansky, Don Duga, Giovanni Gelardi, Deborah Heikkila, Stefano Imbert,Beau & Julia Kelley, Jeanne A, Kosfeld, Xris Kessler, Richard LaRovere, Bruce Lennon, ,Lucas F. Natali,
Peter Petraitis, Andrew Wargo, and Lois Wright.
Playwright Joe Landry is currently writing a play, Little Edie and The Rutgers Boy, based on Newkirk's CD Little Edie Live! and both of his books. Landry is the author of several plays including It's a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, which was named one of the top-ten most produced plays in the country by American Theatre magazine.
His other published plays include Reefer Madness and Vintage Hitchcock: A Live Radio Play. Joe's plays have been produced by hundreds of theatres across the country and internationally and have featured stage and screen notables including
Anthony Rapp of Broadway's Rent, Orestes Arcuni (who played "the bellhop" on the opening season episode of Mad Men),
Joe Farrell of Trading Spaces and others.
After attending
Playwrights Horizons/NYU, where his early plays were developed and produced, Joe Landry started his own theatre company, Second Guess, in Connecticut in 1995. With the encouragement of his mentor, the legendary
James B. McKenzie of Westport Country Playhouse, Joe's Second Guess produced over two dozen original plays, adaptations and revivals including Fixing Adam, Numb, Beautiful, Eve and Co. and Hollywood Babylon. Joe is a member of the
Dramatists Guild and lives in Connecticut.
Walter Newkirk, project director for Letters of Little Edie Beale, is the founder of Walter Newkirk Public Relations LLC. A graduate of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ, he worked on publicity for the film Roseland (1977), with director
James Ivory and producer Ismael Merchant, and now primarily books interviews with authors for satellite TV tours, including titles by
Martha Stewart,Valerie Bertinelli, Jenna Bush, and
Tom Clancy.
Previously, Newkirk was a publicist for The Whole Theatre in Montclair, NJ, where Academy Award winning actress
Olympia Dukakis was Artistic Director. He also worked in public relations for The Newark Museum in Newark, NJ; and the John Harms Center For The Arts in Englewood, NJ - which has since been renamed Bergen PAC; Bergen Performing Arts Center on projects with His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama,
Sarah Jessica Parker,
Charles Osgood, and
Eartha Kitt.
For further information about Letters of Little Edie please visit
www.greygardensbook.com .
Title: Letters of Edie Beale: Grey Gardens and Beyond
Project Director: Walter Newkirk
Publisher: Authorhouse
Pub Date: October 2009
Price: $25 & s&h www.authorhouse.com; $40 all other retail outlets (discounts are at retailer's discretion)
Pages: 88 pages with w/ color illustrations
ISBN: 9781438939261
