A new trend on the fall festival circuit this year is the biopic of the unknown hero, something that seems unthinkable now in the digital age. There’s One Life, about the Schindler-like achievements of Nicholas Winton, who saved nearly 700 Jewish children from certain death in German-occupied Prague. There’s Rustin, about the gay, Black activist who organized the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom — literally, right down to the toilet facilities — and had to wait 50 years for an official thank-you.
And there’s also Lee, which is slightly different from these previous two films in that its subject — photographer and former model Lee Miller — is pretty well known in all the fields she’s associated with, mostly in the world of art. But Ellen Kuras’ film is a thoughtful attempt to step back from what Miller actually did and to focus on the way she actually did it,...
And there’s also Lee, which is slightly different from these previous two films in that its subject — photographer and former model Lee Miller — is pretty well known in all the fields she’s associated with, mostly in the world of art. But Ellen Kuras’ film is a thoughtful attempt to step back from what Miller actually did and to focus on the way she actually did it,...
- 9/17/2023
- by Damon Wise
- Deadline Film + TV
If there were an award for the most cinematic cigarette-sucking on film, “Lee” would be a shoo-in. Over the course of the nearly two-hour biopic, Kate Winslet, who stars as the war photographer Lee Miller, is consistently depicted amid a cloud of smoke, satisfying her oral fixation. Sometimes she puffs urgently, seeking to ease her jittery anxiety. In other scenes, she takes her time, her dramatic drags and pregnant pauses signaling that this lady has seen some things, kept some secrets, and survived it all.
Directed by the legendary cinematographer Ellen Kuras, “Lee” is one of the most conventional biopic exercises this year. The film is framed by a long conversation in 1977 between an elderly Lee (Winslet in makeup) and a young journalist, Antony (Josh O’Connor), seeking to chronicle Lee’s life. The pair chat in a moodily lit living room, Antony hunched over piles of Lee’s old photographs as the photographer,...
Directed by the legendary cinematographer Ellen Kuras, “Lee” is one of the most conventional biopic exercises this year. The film is framed by a long conversation in 1977 between an elderly Lee (Winslet in makeup) and a young journalist, Antony (Josh O’Connor), seeking to chronicle Lee’s life. The pair chat in a moodily lit living room, Antony hunched over piles of Lee’s old photographs as the photographer,...
- 9/13/2023
- by Natalia Winkelman
- Indiewire
To mark the release of Studiocanal’s Vintage Classics’ 4k restorations of three comedies directed by Muriel Box available in the UK from 14 August, we have Blu-Ray box sets to give away to 2 lucky winners.
Studiocanal are pleased to announce their Vintage Classics release of brand new 4k restorations of three comedies directed by Muriel Box, one of Britain’s earliest trailblazing female directors who remains to date the most prolific UK female director in history. Muriel Box’s The Passionate Stranger, The Truth About Women and Rattle Of A Simple Man will be available in the UK on DVD and, for the first time in the UK, on Blu-ray and Digital from 14 August.
The Passionate Stranger (1957) centres around happily married house-wife Judith Wynter (Margaret Leighton) who keeps the fact she is a best-selling author of steamy romance novels, a closely guarded secret. As her husband Roger (Ralph Richardson), recovers from a serious illness,...
Studiocanal are pleased to announce their Vintage Classics release of brand new 4k restorations of three comedies directed by Muriel Box, one of Britain’s earliest trailblazing female directors who remains to date the most prolific UK female director in history. Muriel Box’s The Passionate Stranger, The Truth About Women and Rattle Of A Simple Man will be available in the UK on DVD and, for the first time in the UK, on Blu-ray and Digital from 14 August.
The Passionate Stranger (1957) centres around happily married house-wife Judith Wynter (Margaret Leighton) who keeps the fact she is a best-selling author of steamy romance novels, a closely guarded secret. As her husband Roger (Ralph Richardson), recovers from a serious illness,...
- 8/13/2023
- by Competitions
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Jamie Reid, the artist and graphic designer whose work for the Sex Pistols defined the punk aesthetic, has died at 76.
His gallerist, John Marchant, confirmed his death. In a statement, he was described as an “artist, iconoclast, anarchist, punk, hippie, rebel and romantic. Jamie leaves behind a beloved daughter Rowan, a granddaughter Rose, and an enormous legacy.”
Reid met future Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren at Croydon Art School. That relationship blossomed into a collaboration on artwork for the Sex Pistols.
Reid’s best known work was for the Sex Pistols covers including the pink and yellow text of their only album, “Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols,” and “God Save the Queen,” the hit single banned by the BBC. The latter featured a Cecil Beaton photo portrait of Queen Elizabeth II defaced by Reid.
He also contributed the smashed empty picture frame for “Pretty Vacant,” and...
His gallerist, John Marchant, confirmed his death. In a statement, he was described as an “artist, iconoclast, anarchist, punk, hippie, rebel and romantic. Jamie leaves behind a beloved daughter Rowan, a granddaughter Rose, and an enormous legacy.”
Reid met future Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren at Croydon Art School. That relationship blossomed into a collaboration on artwork for the Sex Pistols.
Reid’s best known work was for the Sex Pistols covers including the pink and yellow text of their only album, “Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols,” and “God Save the Queen,” the hit single banned by the BBC. The latter featured a Cecil Beaton photo portrait of Queen Elizabeth II defaced by Reid.
He also contributed the smashed empty picture frame for “Pretty Vacant,” and...
- 8/10/2023
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Exclusive: Here’s the striking first official image of Kate Winslet as Lee Miller in feature Lee.
The image, shot during filming on location in Croatia, shows Oscar winner Winslet as the pioneering American photographer who covered WWII in Europe for British Vogue.
Filming is ongoing on the directorial debut of respected cinematographer Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind).
The film is not being called a biopic by Winslet and the producers, but it does explore the most significant decade of Lee Miller’s life. As a middle-aged woman, she refused to be remembered as a model and male artists’ muse and defied expectations by travelling to Europe to report from the frontline. There, in part as a reaction to her own well-hidden trauma, she used her Rolleiflex camera to give a voice to the voiceless. What Lee captured on film in Dachau and throughout Europe was shocking and horrific.
The image, shot during filming on location in Croatia, shows Oscar winner Winslet as the pioneering American photographer who covered WWII in Europe for British Vogue.
Filming is ongoing on the directorial debut of respected cinematographer Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind).
The film is not being called a biopic by Winslet and the producers, but it does explore the most significant decade of Lee Miller’s life. As a middle-aged woman, she refused to be remembered as a model and male artists’ muse and defied expectations by travelling to Europe to report from the frontline. There, in part as a reaction to her own well-hidden trauma, she used her Rolleiflex camera to give a voice to the voiceless. What Lee captured on film in Dachau and throughout Europe was shocking and horrific.
- 10/27/2022
- by Andreas Wiseman
- Deadline Film + TV
Ex-Sex Pistol John Lydon went by Johnny Rotten during the 1970s golden age of punk and famously gave angry, snarled voice to the era’s anti-monarchist sentiment with the band’s scabrous musical indictment “God Save the Queen.”
Times — and Johnny — have changed.
Today Lydon released a short and very sweet statement to honor Queen Elizabeth II, who died Thursday.
Queen Elizabeth II Death: Obituary, Photo Gallery, Reaction & More
“Rest in Peace Queen Elizabeth II,” Lydon wrote on his website and in a tweet. “Send her victorious.” He accompanied the message with a classic Cecil Beaton portrait of the Queen, sans the safety pin piercing that became an iconic punk image. (See the post below.)
“Send her victorious” is a quote from Britain’s national anthem “God Save The Queen”:
God save the Queen!
Send her victorious,
Happy and glorious,
Long to reign over us,
God save the Queen.
Times — and Johnny — have changed.
Today Lydon released a short and very sweet statement to honor Queen Elizabeth II, who died Thursday.
Queen Elizabeth II Death: Obituary, Photo Gallery, Reaction & More
“Rest in Peace Queen Elizabeth II,” Lydon wrote on his website and in a tweet. “Send her victorious.” He accompanied the message with a classic Cecil Beaton portrait of the Queen, sans the safety pin piercing that became an iconic punk image. (See the post below.)
“Send her victorious” is a quote from Britain’s national anthem “God Save The Queen”:
God save the Queen!
Send her victorious,
Happy and glorious,
Long to reign over us,
God save the Queen.
- 9/9/2022
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Lenka Peterson, whose Broadway performances included a 1984 Tony-nominated turn in the musical Quilters, co-starring roles with Shelley Winters, Lillian Gish and Colleen Dewhurst in plays with creative teams including Truman Capote and Arthur Penn, died Sept. 24 in her sleep at home in Roxbury, Connecticut. She was 95.
Her death was announced by her family, including daughter, actress Glynnis O’Connor.
In addition to her stage work, Peterson appeared in an extensive roster of film and television projects, spanning more than 50 years beginning with a small role in director Elia Kazan’s 1950 film Panic in the Streets (Peterson was a charter member of The Actors Studio) and continuing through the 2006 remake of All The King’s Men starring Sean Penn, Jude Law and Kate Winslet.
Born Lenka Isacson in Omaha, Nebraska, Peterson moved to New York City following World War II to pursue a stage career, and soon landed...
Her death was announced by her family, including daughter, actress Glynnis O’Connor.
In addition to her stage work, Peterson appeared in an extensive roster of film and television projects, spanning more than 50 years beginning with a small role in director Elia Kazan’s 1950 film Panic in the Streets (Peterson was a charter member of The Actors Studio) and continuing through the 2006 remake of All The King’s Men starring Sean Penn, Jude Law and Kate Winslet.
Born Lenka Isacson in Omaha, Nebraska, Peterson moved to New York City following World War II to pursue a stage career, and soon landed...
- 10/5/2021
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Over the course of just three features, filmmaker Lisa Immordino Vreeland has already made a stamp on that documentary subgenre culture hounds find most irresistible — the 20th-century personality portrait — taking names we know well and sharing the private realms of their creative worlds. With “Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation,” she delivers two titans for the price of one, drawing parallels between novelist Truman Capote and playwright Tennessee Williams, whose real-life friendship-cum-rivalry serves as a natural dummy on which to hang a tailored homage to this quintessential pair of queer literary pioneers.
The trouble — and it’s no small obstacle — is that unlike Immordino Vreeland’s previous subjects, Capote and Williams were wordsmiths, not visual artists, which makes them harder to represent on screen. As such, the resulting project feels better suited to book form than that of a feature-length movie, and the devices she uses, like hiring “The Boys in the Band...
The trouble — and it’s no small obstacle — is that unlike Immordino Vreeland’s previous subjects, Capote and Williams were wordsmiths, not visual artists, which makes them harder to represent on screen. As such, the resulting project feels better suited to book form than that of a feature-length movie, and the devices she uses, like hiring “The Boys in the Band...
- 6/18/2021
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation director Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams: “He was always a mise-en-scène of himself, while Tennessee was just there.” Photo: courtesy of Getty Images
In Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s universal and revealing Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation, Truman Capote notes that Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Carl Van Vechten, Charles Baudelaire, Marcel Proust, and Cole Porter would have loved Studio 54, and Tennessee Williams states “I think the most moving writer to me that ever lived was Chekhov.” The director of Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict, and Love, Cecil on Cecil Beaton captures the spirit of strong individuals of the 20th century like no other documentarian.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland with Anne-Katrin Titze on Dick Cavett and David Frost: “We had Truman first and when we added Tennessee in the mix, we saw that we had another great interview.
In Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s universal and revealing Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation, Truman Capote notes that Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Carl Van Vechten, Charles Baudelaire, Marcel Proust, and Cole Porter would have loved Studio 54, and Tennessee Williams states “I think the most moving writer to me that ever lived was Chekhov.” The director of Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict, and Love, Cecil on Cecil Beaton captures the spirit of strong individuals of the 20th century like no other documentarian.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland with Anne-Katrin Titze on Dick Cavett and David Frost: “We had Truman first and when we added Tennessee in the mix, we saw that we had another great interview.
- 6/12/2021
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Anthony Powell, a three-time Oscar winner whose costume designs helped bring Indiana Jones to rugged life and Broadway’s Norma Desmond to extravagant excess, died Sunday. He was 85.
The Costume Designers Guild 892 confirmed the news on Monday night, on their official Facebook page. “Legendary English costume designer Anthony Powell passed away last weekend. He will be celebrated in a small, private gathering due to Covid restrictions and is survived by two nieces,” they said. “Anthony Powell’s passion for his work and for his friends was boundless. The Costume Designers Guild sends our condolences to everyone who enjoyed the pleasure of his company and his unforgettable designs.”
Powell, who won a Tony Award for the costumes of 1963’s School for Scandal, received Oscars in 1978 for Death on the Nile and in 1979 for Tess. He had received his first Academy Award for designing the costumes for Maggie Smith’s eccentric Augusta...
The Costume Designers Guild 892 confirmed the news on Monday night, on their official Facebook page. “Legendary English costume designer Anthony Powell passed away last weekend. He will be celebrated in a small, private gathering due to Covid restrictions and is survived by two nieces,” they said. “Anthony Powell’s passion for his work and for his friends was boundless. The Costume Designers Guild sends our condolences to everyone who enjoyed the pleasure of his company and his unforgettable designs.”
Powell, who won a Tony Award for the costumes of 1963’s School for Scandal, received Oscars in 1978 for Death on the Nile and in 1979 for Tess. He had received his first Academy Award for designing the costumes for Maggie Smith’s eccentric Augusta...
- 4/20/2021
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Two of the most engaging and beguiling talkers—and, oh yes, two of the better writers—of the last century share the spotlight in Truman & Tennessee: An Intimate Conversation. Good friends in real life—both were from the South and gay, had difficult upbringings, made it big with early works that were made into popular films and battled drink and drug issues—the two men make for easy and natural stablemates in Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s sympathetic and nicely shaped documentary, which takes their great talents as a given and happily refuses to sensationalize their struggles. The film world premiered at the recent Hamptons Film Festival.
Vreeland, whose previous documentaries over the past decade have focused upon Diana Vreeland (her husband’s grandmother), Peggy Guggenheim and Cecil Beaton, is right at home with fashionable greats of the past century. But in addition to the usual archival material, which includes significant...
Vreeland, whose previous documentaries over the past decade have focused upon Diana Vreeland (her husband’s grandmother), Peggy Guggenheim and Cecil Beaton, is right at home with fashionable greats of the past century. But in addition to the usual archival material, which includes significant...
- 10/19/2020
- by Todd McCarthy
- Deadline Film + TV
Shane Valentino on Gaslight, Little Women, The Wizard Of Oz, An American In Paris, Kismet, Brigadoon set designer Cedric Gibbons: “If you looked at some of his sets you could see how in static positions you can create movement with the curves.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
At the press preview for The Costume Institute’s In Pursuit Of Fashion exhibition The Sandy Schreier Collection, at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, I introduced myself to production designer Shane Valentino. We discussed the architecture of space for the show, his BAFTA nominated (with Meg Everist) work on Tom Ford’s Nocturnal Animals, the influence of Cecil Beaton and Cedric Gibbons, and Aaron Sorkin's 2020 film The Trial Of The Chicago 7.
Jessica Regan, Andrew Bolton and Sandy Schreier with The Metropolitan Museum of Art Director Max Hollein Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
After our conversation inside the Anna Wintour Costume Center, Shane introduced me...
At the press preview for The Costume Institute’s In Pursuit Of Fashion exhibition The Sandy Schreier Collection, at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, I introduced myself to production designer Shane Valentino. We discussed the architecture of space for the show, his BAFTA nominated (with Meg Everist) work on Tom Ford’s Nocturnal Animals, the influence of Cecil Beaton and Cedric Gibbons, and Aaron Sorkin's 2020 film The Trial Of The Chicago 7.
Jessica Regan, Andrew Bolton and Sandy Schreier with The Metropolitan Museum of Art Director Max Hollein Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
After our conversation inside the Anna Wintour Costume Center, Shane introduced me...
- 11/26/2019
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Scotty Bowers, a “sexual matchmaker” for dozens of stars during the Golden Age of Hollywood who wrote about his colorful — and sometimes unbelivable — life in his memoir “Full Service: My Adventures in Hollywood and the Secret Sex Lives of the Stars,” died at his Laurel Canyon home on Sunday. He was 96.
The story of his experiences was told in the 2017 documentary “Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood,” directed by Matt Trynauer, who confirmed his death.
A former U.S. Marine and gas station attendant, Bowers also worked as a bartender and as a go-fer to friend such as George Cukor. But the most notable part of his life was as a helpful procurer for everyone, he claimed, from Rock Hudson, Katharine Hepburn, Bette Davis and Elsa Lanchester to Cary Grant, Randolph Scott, Spencer Tracy and Charles Laughton.
The actors and filmmakers, who were often bound by morality clauses in their studio contracts,...
The story of his experiences was told in the 2017 documentary “Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood,” directed by Matt Trynauer, who confirmed his death.
A former U.S. Marine and gas station attendant, Bowers also worked as a bartender and as a go-fer to friend such as George Cukor. But the most notable part of his life was as a helpful procurer for everyone, he claimed, from Rock Hudson, Katharine Hepburn, Bette Davis and Elsa Lanchester to Cary Grant, Randolph Scott, Spencer Tracy and Charles Laughton.
The actors and filmmakers, who were often bound by morality clauses in their studio contracts,...
- 10/14/2019
- by Pat Saperstein
- Variety Film + TV
“ You’re a comical little geezer. You’ll look funny when you’re fifty.” James Fox as Chas to Mick Jagger as Turner in Performance.
Last weekend saw the loss of one of the UK’s finest and most admired filmmakers, Nicolas Roeg, who died at 90. 2018 also marks fifty years since the making of his first film as director, the BAFTA-nominated Performance, alongside co-director Donald Cammell starring James Fox, Mick Jagger and Anita Pallenberg.
To celebrate the anniversary a lavish 348 page book, Performance: The 50th Anniversary of the Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg Cinematic Classic, boasting over 500 images, many previously unseen by the public, will be published on 3rd December 2018, as James Kleinmann reports for HeyUGuys.
The book, by Jay Glennie, takes an in-depth look at the making of the hugely influential film, the reluctance of Warner Bros. to release it without substantial cuts, the initial critical reaction as well...
Last weekend saw the loss of one of the UK’s finest and most admired filmmakers, Nicolas Roeg, who died at 90. 2018 also marks fifty years since the making of his first film as director, the BAFTA-nominated Performance, alongside co-director Donald Cammell starring James Fox, Mick Jagger and Anita Pallenberg.
To celebrate the anniversary a lavish 348 page book, Performance: The 50th Anniversary of the Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg Cinematic Classic, boasting over 500 images, many previously unseen by the public, will be published on 3rd December 2018, as James Kleinmann reports for HeyUGuys.
The book, by Jay Glennie, takes an in-depth look at the making of the hugely influential film, the reluctance of Warner Bros. to release it without substantial cuts, the initial critical reaction as well...
- 11/28/2018
- by James Kleinmann
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Maria By Callas director Tom Volf at Bar Fiori in Langham Place on Cecil Beaton and Maria Callas: "They had photo shoots together. It's so interesting to notice all those people who were part of the same era." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
In the second half of my conversation with Tom Volf, the director of Maria By Callas and author of Maria By Callas: In Her Own Words, the two sides of the coin of Maria Callas were explored. Callas working on Pier Paolo Pasolini's Medea, why her favourite role is Norma, calling her toy poodles "my babies", Lisa Immordino Vreeland's Love, Cecil, Yorgos Lanthimos' The Favourite, and Kevyn Aucoin transforming Isabella Rossellini into Maria Callas as seen in Tiffany Bartok's Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story, all came up, taking us into a kind of time travel back to the golden age.
Maria Callas...
In the second half of my conversation with Tom Volf, the director of Maria By Callas and author of Maria By Callas: In Her Own Words, the two sides of the coin of Maria Callas were explored. Callas working on Pier Paolo Pasolini's Medea, why her favourite role is Norma, calling her toy poodles "my babies", Lisa Immordino Vreeland's Love, Cecil, Yorgos Lanthimos' The Favourite, and Kevyn Aucoin transforming Isabella Rossellini into Maria Callas as seen in Tiffany Bartok's Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story, all came up, taking us into a kind of time travel back to the golden age.
Maria Callas...
- 11/21/2018
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
In “The Times of Bill Cunningham,” the late New York Times fashion photographer Bill Cunningham appears before us as a blissed-out aging choirboy. He sits in his small apartment, surrounded by file cabinets jammed with his work, a geek in his element, with a shock of gray hair and two jutting front teeth that give him a big rabbity smile so eager it’s giddy — and the thing is, he means it. That antic grin lights up the room.
“The Times of Bill Cunningham” is the second documentary to be made about the Times’ legendary on-the-street photographer and shutterbug of society, and it contains a revealing story about the first, “Bill Cunningham New York.” That film was released in 2011, when Cunningham was in his early eighties (he died in 2016), and it was a profile made with his ardent approval and cooperation. So you’d assume that he might have wanted...
“The Times of Bill Cunningham” is the second documentary to be made about the Times’ legendary on-the-street photographer and shutterbug of society, and it contains a revealing story about the first, “Bill Cunningham New York.” That film was released in 2011, when Cunningham was in his early eighties (he died in 2016), and it was a profile made with his ardent approval and cooperation. So you’d assume that he might have wanted...
- 10/13/2018
- by Owen Gleiberman
- Variety Film + TV
“Maria by Callas,” an adoring profile of the Greek-American opera legend, is a one-sided documentary, using Callas’ own words in journals, letters and interview appearances to narrate her personal history. Yet this is not meant as criticism; it’s only fair that Callas’ voice finally gets heard off the stage, given how much the tabloids reinforced her image as a tempestuous diva, when the real person was much more complicated. First-time director Tom Volf plainly adores Callas — sometimes to a fault — but his film stands as a necessary corrective to decades of bad press. It’s an unalloyed tribute to her as a musical genius who gave all of herself to the public. Opera aficionados will be first in line when Sony Pictures Classics releases the film in early November, but the doc doubles as an accessible primer for the less schooled, too, with an abundance of classic recordings on the soundtrack.
- 9/11/2018
- by Scott Tobias
- Variety Film + TV
No one tells stories like Scotty Bowers. Dishy, sordid, and deliciously off-color, his firsthand accounts reveal a different side of the Dream Factory from the one that studios so carefully manufactured in their heyday, with Bowers at the epicenter as a kind of benevolent matchmaker. That’s an image director Matt Tyrnauer is all too eager to perpetuate in “Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood,” which plays like a cheeky behind-the-scenes/in-the-bedroom companion to “The Celluloid Closet,” casting Bowers as a pioneering sexual revolutionary who bent over backward to help A-list gays and lesbians feed their desires off-screen.
That may be true, but it wouldn’t be incorrect to call him what he was: a procurer to the stars, tickled in his old age to spill the beans on who was gay, who was bisexual, and who were the “big users,” with the appetites to service 15 young men in...
That may be true, but it wouldn’t be incorrect to call him what he was: a procurer to the stars, tickled in his old age to spill the beans on who was gay, who was bisexual, and who were the “big users,” with the appetites to service 15 young men in...
- 7/25/2018
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Rupert Everett as the voice of Cecil Beaton for Love, Cecil: "I always wanted him. That was my first instinct. I love him." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
In the second half of my conversation with the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, Lisa Immordino Vreeland discusses more about her latest documentary Love, Cecil and the connections to Rupert Everett, Robin Muir, and Paul Lyon-Maris.
We also spoke about Cecil Beaton as the production and costume designer for Vincente Minnelli's Gigi with Leslie Caron and Louis Jourdan, his stormy relationship with George Cukor on My Fair Lady, a Manolo Blahnik comment quoting Beaton on a Gary Cooper photograph, and an upcoming Truman Capote project.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Cecil Beaton: "What interested me was that he really wanted to put everything on a stage. His whole life...
In the second half of my conversation with the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, Lisa Immordino Vreeland discusses more about her latest documentary Love, Cecil and the connections to Rupert Everett, Robin Muir, and Paul Lyon-Maris.
We also spoke about Cecil Beaton as the production and costume designer for Vincente Minnelli's Gigi with Leslie Caron and Louis Jourdan, his stormy relationship with George Cukor on My Fair Lady, a Manolo Blahnik comment quoting Beaton on a Gary Cooper photograph, and an upcoming Truman Capote project.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Cecil Beaton: "What interested me was that he really wanted to put everything on a stage. His whole life...
- 7/18/2018
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
by Glenn Dunks
Cecil Beaton was a dandy. He was an elegant fop, an aesthete, a bright young thing, a (mostly) homosexual. These are all words used to describe him in Love, Cecil, a charming bio-doc from director Lisa Immordino Vreeland. They are words not used in malice, but in reverence to a man whose singular attitudes flew in the face of what men were ‘supposed’ to be. Cecil Beaton had about him an air of posh aristocracy that belied his place in society, but which would ultimately allow him to become ingratiated into the inner-sanctum of Britain’s upper-class (including right up the Queen herself), the world of celebrity, and even the Academy as the Oscar-winning designer behind Gigi and My Fair Lady. He also just happens to be one of the great photographers of the 21st century
Love, Cecil is Vreeland’s most accomplished film to date...
Cecil Beaton was a dandy. He was an elegant fop, an aesthete, a bright young thing, a (mostly) homosexual. These are all words used to describe him in Love, Cecil, a charming bio-doc from director Lisa Immordino Vreeland. They are words not used in malice, but in reverence to a man whose singular attitudes flew in the face of what men were ‘supposed’ to be. Cecil Beaton had about him an air of posh aristocracy that belied his place in society, but which would ultimately allow him to become ingratiated into the inner-sanctum of Britain’s upper-class (including right up the Queen herself), the world of celebrity, and even the Academy as the Oscar-winning designer behind Gigi and My Fair Lady. He also just happens to be one of the great photographers of the 21st century
Love, Cecil is Vreeland’s most accomplished film to date...
- 7/3/2018
- by Glenn Dunks
- FilmExperience
Two impressive new openings build on the ongoing response to two stellar documentaries already doing strong box office. “Leave No Trace” (Bleecker Street) from acclaimed director Debra Granik (“Winter’s Bone”) and “Three Identical Strangers” (Neon), a compelling documentary about three triplets reunited in early adulthood, both opened well in initial dates (in many of the same theaters).
With documentaries “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” (Focus Features) and “Rbg” (Magnolia) both expanding well, the specialized market is improving this summer. However, it’s still difficult for most leading titles playing in a few hundred theaters, even backed by great reviews, to get over the modest $3 million mark. It is critical that a few break through.
Opening
Three Identical Strangers (Neon) – Metacritic: 79; Festivals include: Sundance, Seattle 2018
$163,023 in 5 theaters; PTA (per theater average): $32,605
Although they aren’t well-known icons like the smash “Rbg” and “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?...
With documentaries “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” (Focus Features) and “Rbg” (Magnolia) both expanding well, the specialized market is improving this summer. However, it’s still difficult for most leading titles playing in a few hundred theaters, even backed by great reviews, to get over the modest $3 million mark. It is critical that a few break through.
Opening
Three Identical Strangers (Neon) – Metacritic: 79; Festivals include: Sundance, Seattle 2018
$163,023 in 5 theaters; PTA (per theater average): $32,605
Although they aren’t well-known icons like the smash “Rbg” and “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?...
- 7/1/2018
- by Tom Brueggemann
- Indiewire
limited
Dark River
Clio Barnard writes and directs this mystery drama about a woman (Ruth Wilson) who returns home to claim her family farm.
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Summer of ’67 [pictured]
Sharon Wilharm writes and directs this historical romantic drama about three women coping with the social upheaval of Vietnam-era America.
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Leave No Trace
Debra Granik writes and directs this drama about a teenage girl (Thomasin McKenzie) who lives off the grid with her Ptsd-afflicted veteran father.
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Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story
Tiffany Bartok directs this documentary about the legendary makeup artist.
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Love, Cecil
Lisa Immordino Vreeland directs this documentary about Oscar-winning Hollywood costume designer Cecil Beaton.
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Woman Walks Ahead
Susanna White directs this historical docudrama about portrait painter Catherine Weldon (Jessica Chastain). (male writer)
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Hover
Cleopatra Coleman writes and stars in this sci-fi thriller about a woman investigating mysterious deaths in an ecologically ravaged future.
Dark River
Clio Barnard writes and directs this mystery drama about a woman (Ruth Wilson) who returns home to claim her family farm.
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Summer of ’67 [pictured]
Sharon Wilharm writes and directs this historical romantic drama about three women coping with the social upheaval of Vietnam-era America.
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Leave No Trace
Debra Granik writes and directs this drama about a teenage girl (Thomasin McKenzie) who lives off the grid with her Ptsd-afflicted veteran father.
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Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story
Tiffany Bartok directs this documentary about the legendary makeup artist.
find cinemas
Love, Cecil
Lisa Immordino Vreeland directs this documentary about Oscar-winning Hollywood costume designer Cecil Beaton.
find cinemas
Woman Walks Ahead
Susanna White directs this historical docudrama about portrait painter Catherine Weldon (Jessica Chastain). (male writer)
find cinemas
Hover
Cleopatra Coleman writes and stars in this sci-fi thriller about a woman investigating mysterious deaths in an ecologically ravaged future.
- 6/30/2018
- by MaryAnn Johanson
- www.flickfilosopher.com
“Love, Cecil” demonstrates how a documentary can be a magical experience. I went into the film barely having heard of Cecil Beaton, who (as I learned) was one of the most incandescent photographers who ever lived. The reason I state my ignorance in such blunt terms — hey, I’m a film critic, not a photography scholar — is that for me, as I suspect will be the case for many others, the movie’s splendor lies in the sensation of being washed over by an elated experience of discovery.
The documentary tells the story of Beaton’s life, and it’s a moving and majestic one that spans many of the revolutions in perception that defined the 20th century. Yet “Love, Cecil” is rooted in the mind-bendingly eclectic splendor of Beaton’s images. He was a visionary fashion photographer, a fearless journalist of war, an indelible chronicler of celebrity, and — through...
The documentary tells the story of Beaton’s life, and it’s a moving and majestic one that spans many of the revolutions in perception that defined the 20th century. Yet “Love, Cecil” is rooted in the mind-bendingly eclectic splendor of Beaton’s images. He was a visionary fashion photographer, a fearless journalist of war, an indelible chronicler of celebrity, and — through...
- 6/30/2018
- by Owen Gleiberman
- Variety Film + TV
Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Cecil Beaton: "It was something that he was born with. That he just needed to create on multiple platforms. He's known as a photographer but he was so much more than that." Photo: Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby's
On-camera interviews with David Hockney, Leslie Caron on Vincente Minnelli's Gigi, Isaac Mizrahi, Hamish Bowles, Manolo Blahnik, David Bailey and Penelope Tree, and terrific archival footage that includes George Cukor on My Fair Lady, Truman Capote and Diana Vreeland on their take on Cecil Beaton, are skilfully combined to show us a great deal about the photographer, costume and set designer and his complicated personal life, that included a marriage proposal to Greta Garbo.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland, the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, in her latest documentary, Love, Cecil, shot by Shane Sigler (Elaine Stritch...
On-camera interviews with David Hockney, Leslie Caron on Vincente Minnelli's Gigi, Isaac Mizrahi, Hamish Bowles, Manolo Blahnik, David Bailey and Penelope Tree, and terrific archival footage that includes George Cukor on My Fair Lady, Truman Capote and Diana Vreeland on their take on Cecil Beaton, are skilfully combined to show us a great deal about the photographer, costume and set designer and his complicated personal life, that included a marriage proposal to Greta Garbo.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland, the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, in her latest documentary, Love, Cecil, shot by Shane Sigler (Elaine Stritch...
- 6/27/2018
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Love, Cecil Zeitgeist Films in association with Kino Lorber Reviewed by: Harvey Karten Director: Lisa Immordino Vreeland Screenwriter: Lisa Immordino Vreeland Cast: Rupert Everett, (narrator). Cecil Beaton, Hamish Bowles, Leslie Caron, David Hockney, Isaac Mizrahi Screened at: Critics’ link, NY, 6/15/18 Opens: June 29, 2018 “I’m an ordinary man,” explains Henry Higgins in “My Fair […]
The post Love, Cecil Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Love, Cecil Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 6/18/2018
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
Lisa Immordino Vreeland presented Love, Cecil at Sotheby's in New York Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
On a stormy spring Saturday night, Art Agency, Partners and Zeitgeist Films in association with Kino Lorber hosted a reception and preview screening of Love, Cecil at Sotheby's in New York.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland, the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, presented her documentary on Cecil Beaton narrated by Rupert Everett and edited by Bernadine Colish (Absolute Wilson).
Katharine Hepburn: Dressed for Stage and Screen at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts - Coco on Broadway, costumes by Cecil Beaton Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Through on-camera interviews with David Hockney, Leslie Caron, Isaac Mizrahi, Hamish Bowles, Manolo Blahnik, David Bailey and Penelope Tree, and terrific archival footage, including an exchange between Truman Capote and Diana Vreeland on their take on Cecil Beaton, we...
On a stormy spring Saturday night, Art Agency, Partners and Zeitgeist Films in association with Kino Lorber hosted a reception and preview screening of Love, Cecil at Sotheby's in New York.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland, the director of Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict and Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, presented her documentary on Cecil Beaton narrated by Rupert Everett and edited by Bernadine Colish (Absolute Wilson).
Katharine Hepburn: Dressed for Stage and Screen at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts - Coco on Broadway, costumes by Cecil Beaton Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Through on-camera interviews with David Hockney, Leslie Caron, Isaac Mizrahi, Hamish Bowles, Manolo Blahnik, David Bailey and Penelope Tree, and terrific archival footage, including an exchange between Truman Capote and Diana Vreeland on their take on Cecil Beaton, we...
- 5/14/2018
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Exclusive: There have been a couple of feature doc acquisitions to report. First up, Zeitgeist Films and Kino Lorber have acquired Lisa Immordino Vreeland's feature documentary Love, Cecil about production designer Cecil Beaton (Gigi, My Fair Lady). The film premiered at 2017 Telluride Film Festival. It will get a June 29 showing at the Film Society of Lincoln Center before it rolls out nationally. Next, Virgil Films acquired Augie from Oscar nominated director James Keach…...
- 3/13/2018
- Deadline
The films are Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze.
Cinetic International has licensed three titles at the Efm to Scandinavian distributor NonStop – Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze, which screened at the market on Friday.
Cinetic’s head of international Jason Ishikawa negotiated the deals with NonStop CEO Jakob Abrahamsson.
Blaze premiered in Sundance last month and earned the special jury acting prize for newcomer Ben Dickey as musician Blaze Foley. A Us deal is expected shortly.
Financial crisis documentary Abacus earned an Oscar nomination last month and has also sold to Dogwoof in the UK.
Costume designer Cecil Beaton documentary Love, Cecil premiered at Telluride and was released by StudioCanal in the UK and Germany.
Jason Ishikawa said of the deal, “NonStop Entertainment has been a great partner who is attracted...
Cinetic International has licensed three titles at the Efm to Scandinavian distributor NonStop – Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze, which screened at the market on Friday.
Cinetic’s head of international Jason Ishikawa negotiated the deals with NonStop CEO Jakob Abrahamsson.
Blaze premiered in Sundance last month and earned the special jury acting prize for newcomer Ben Dickey as musician Blaze Foley. A Us deal is expected shortly.
Financial crisis documentary Abacus earned an Oscar nomination last month and has also sold to Dogwoof in the UK.
Costume designer Cecil Beaton documentary Love, Cecil premiered at Telluride and was released by StudioCanal in the UK and Germany.
Jason Ishikawa said of the deal, “NonStop Entertainment has been a great partner who is attracted...
- 2/19/2018
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
The films are Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze.
Cinetic International has licensed three titles at the Efm to Scandinavian distributor NonStop – Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze, which screened at the market on Friday.
Cinetic’s head of international Jason Ishikawa negotiated the deals with NonStop CEO Jakob Abrahamsson.
Blaze premiered in Sundance last month and earned the special jury acting prize for newcomer Ben Dickey as musician Blaze Foley. A Us deal is expected shortly.
Financial crisis documentary Abacus earned an Oscar nomination last month and has also sold to Dogwoof in the UK.
Costume designer Cecil Beaton documentary Love, Cecil premiered at Telluride and was released by StudioCanal in the UK and Germany.
Jason Ishikawa said of the deal, “NonStop Entertainment has been a great partner who is attracted...
Cinetic International has licensed three titles at the Efm to Scandinavian distributor NonStop – Abacus: Small Enough To Jail by Steve James, Love Cecil by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, and Ethan Hawke’s Blaze, which screened at the market on Friday.
Cinetic’s head of international Jason Ishikawa negotiated the deals with NonStop CEO Jakob Abrahamsson.
Blaze premiered in Sundance last month and earned the special jury acting prize for newcomer Ben Dickey as musician Blaze Foley. A Us deal is expected shortly.
Financial crisis documentary Abacus earned an Oscar nomination last month and has also sold to Dogwoof in the UK.
Costume designer Cecil Beaton documentary Love, Cecil premiered at Telluride and was released by StudioCanal in the UK and Germany.
Jason Ishikawa said of the deal, “NonStop Entertainment has been a great partner who is attracted...
- 2/19/2018
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
They were America’s closest thing to royalty — and in 1961, President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy traveled across the pond for an extraordinary meeting with the world’s ultimate royals: Queen Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip.
But while the two ladies appeared to hit it off in person, The Crown depicts some post-visit drama between the Queen and the first lady.
The Buckingham Palace visit is the subject of a season 2 episode of the Golden Globe-winning drama, which returned to Netflix December 8. The episode features guest stars Michael C. Hall as JFK and Jodi Balfour as Jackie,...
But while the two ladies appeared to hit it off in person, The Crown depicts some post-visit drama between the Queen and the first lady.
The Buckingham Palace visit is the subject of a season 2 episode of the Golden Globe-winning drama, which returned to Netflix December 8. The episode features guest stars Michael C. Hall as JFK and Jodi Balfour as Jackie,...
- 12/11/2017
- by Stephanie Petit
- PEOPLE.com
Rupert Everett narrates designer Cecil Beaton’s diaries in Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s sympathetic study of his life and influence on British style
Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s previous documentary was a portrait of art patron Peggy Guggenheim, and this study of Cecil Beaton is in the same celebratory mode. This was the British designer, photographer, social alpinist and Bright Young Thing who suffered a scandal after making an antisemitic slur in the 1930s, but after his craven, miserable (and sincere) apology for this silly shock tactic, he enjoyed royal patronage from the then Queen Elizabeth and was rehabilitated with the approach of war, during which he took valuable reportage pictures for Life magazine. He went on to create the look for the movie version of My Fair Lady, and maintained his own slightly quaint neo-Edwardian aesthetic for fashion magazines well into the swinging 60s. The film is intelligent, thorough and sympathetic,...
Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s previous documentary was a portrait of art patron Peggy Guggenheim, and this study of Cecil Beaton is in the same celebratory mode. This was the British designer, photographer, social alpinist and Bright Young Thing who suffered a scandal after making an antisemitic slur in the 1930s, but after his craven, miserable (and sincere) apology for this silly shock tactic, he enjoyed royal patronage from the then Queen Elizabeth and was rehabilitated with the approach of war, during which he took valuable reportage pictures for Life magazine. He went on to create the look for the movie version of My Fair Lady, and maintained his own slightly quaint neo-Edwardian aesthetic for fashion magazines well into the swinging 60s. The film is intelligent, thorough and sympathetic,...
- 12/1/2017
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
It’s that time of the year again. Every fall, New York City becomes the focal point for any and every fan of non-fiction cinema, as one of the year’s most prestigious documentary festivals is finally, again, set to take the city by storm. Doc NYC is now in its eighth edition, and this is one of their best, and largest, lineups to date.
Broken down into over 15 different sections and sidebars, Doc NYC 2017 features everything from short films to films looking at art, design, music and social activism, just to name a few. There are sections like Metropolis, a competition sidebar featuring films set in and about New York City, as well as the Short List, a section of the best documentaries curated from the year so far. It’s a dense, broadly reaching festival with films from across the globe and that defy definition.
Besides films from...
Broken down into over 15 different sections and sidebars, Doc NYC 2017 features everything from short films to films looking at art, design, music and social activism, just to name a few. There are sections like Metropolis, a competition sidebar featuring films set in and about New York City, as well as the Short List, a section of the best documentaries curated from the year so far. It’s a dense, broadly reaching festival with films from across the globe and that defy definition.
Besides films from...
- 11/9/2017
- by Joshua Brunsting
- CriterionCast
New York City’s annual Doc NYC festival kicks off this week, including a full-to-bursting slate of some of this year’s most remarkable documentaries. If you’ve been looking to beef up on your documentary consumption, Doc NYC is the perfect chance to check out a wide variety of some of the year’s best fact-based features. Ahead, we pick out 14 of our most anticipated films from the fest, including some awards contenders, a handful of buzzy debuts, and a number of festival favorites. Take a look and start filling up your schedule now.
Doc NYC runs November 9 – 16 in New York City.
“EuroTrump”
Donald Trump may seem like a sui generis figure, a one-of-a-kind monster who was forged in a perfect storm of racism, tweets, and chaos, but history suggests that he’s really just a new breed of an old type. You don’t even have to look...
Doc NYC runs November 9 – 16 in New York City.
“EuroTrump”
Donald Trump may seem like a sui generis figure, a one-of-a-kind monster who was forged in a perfect storm of racism, tweets, and chaos, but history suggests that he’s really just a new breed of an old type. You don’t even have to look...
- 11/7/2017
- by Kate Erbland, David Ehrlich, Jude Dry, Anne Thompson, Chris O'Falt, Michael Nordine and Jenna Marotta
- Indiewire
My Fair Lady is back in Cineplex theatres as part of our Classic Film SeriesMy Fair Lady is back in Cineplex theatres as part of our Classic Film SeriesIngrid Randoja - Cineplex Magazine10/11/2017 1:20:00 Pm
By 1964, Hollywood’s Golden Age was coming to an end. The studio system was collapsing and counterculture pics such as Dr. Strangelove and The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night were attracting younger audiences. However, Hollywood could still count on musicals to draw crowds, especially those based on Broadway hits.
My Fair Lady was a smashing success on stage, which is why Warner Bros. paid an unheard of $5-million for the film rights. The story, based on George Bernard Shaw’s play "Pygmalion", finds arrogant professor of phonetics Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison) wagering that he can train cockney flower seller Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) to speak and act like a lady. Under his sometime cruel tutelage,...
By 1964, Hollywood’s Golden Age was coming to an end. The studio system was collapsing and counterculture pics such as Dr. Strangelove and The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night were attracting younger audiences. However, Hollywood could still count on musicals to draw crowds, especially those based on Broadway hits.
My Fair Lady was a smashing success on stage, which is why Warner Bros. paid an unheard of $5-million for the film rights. The story, based on George Bernard Shaw’s play "Pygmalion", finds arrogant professor of phonetics Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison) wagering that he can train cockney flower seller Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) to speak and act like a lady. Under his sometime cruel tutelage,...
- 10/11/2017
- by Ingrid Randoja - Cineplex Magazine
- Cineplex
The Hamptons International Film Festival announced that audience awards for its just-concluded 25th edition went to French comedic drama Mr. and Mrs. Adelman and Cecil Beaton bio-doc Love, Cecil. Long Shot, directed by Jacob Lamendola, captured the audience prize for best short film. Nicolas Bedos directed Adelman, while Lisa Immordino Vreeland directed Love, Cecil. The festival ran Oct. 5-9. Artistic director David Nugent said the festival had “a diverse lineup that was…...
- 10/10/2017
- Deadline
Manolo Blahnik in the documentary Manolo: The Boy Who Made Shoes For Lizards. Courtesy of Music Box Films.
There is a quote near beginning of the documentary Manolo: The Boy Who Made Shoes For Lizards from Marilyn Monroe: “Give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world.” Designer Manolo Blahnik seems to have taken that message to heart.
Manolo Blahnik, white-haired, sharp-tongued, fussily dressed, with round black frame glasses, seems to barely tolerate being photographed, telling him the film is “taking as long to make as Gone With The Wind.” The scene which sets up a snapshot of his personality – funny, sharp-witted, not suffering fools gladly – and restless nature. A quick montage of celebrities touting his shoes is capped by the filmmaker coaxing Manolo to tell an oft-told tale. When he was a boy growing up in Spain’s Canary Islands, he would make shoes for lizards.
There is a quote near beginning of the documentary Manolo: The Boy Who Made Shoes For Lizards from Marilyn Monroe: “Give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world.” Designer Manolo Blahnik seems to have taken that message to heart.
Manolo Blahnik, white-haired, sharp-tongued, fussily dressed, with round black frame glasses, seems to barely tolerate being photographed, telling him the film is “taking as long to make as Gone With The Wind.” The scene which sets up a snapshot of his personality – funny, sharp-witted, not suffering fools gladly – and restless nature. A quick montage of celebrities touting his shoes is capped by the filmmaker coaxing Manolo to tell an oft-told tale. When he was a boy growing up in Spain’s Canary Islands, he would make shoes for lizards.
- 10/6/2017
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Most younger audience members probably would draw a blank at the name Cecil Beaton, but he was a major figure in the arts for almost 60 years. Love, Cecil, one of the most engaging documentaries shown at this year’s Telluride Film Festival, should help to restore a bit of his reputation.
Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland made earlier docs about fashion maven Diana Vreeland (her husband’s grandmother) and art collector Peggy Guggenheim, so she’s revisiting comfortable terrain here and trains an affectionate but unsentimental eye on Beaton. He is probably best known for designing Oscar-winning films Gigi and My Fair Lady,...
Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland made earlier docs about fashion maven Diana Vreeland (her husband’s grandmother) and art collector Peggy Guggenheim, so she’s revisiting comfortable terrain here and trains an affectionate but unsentimental eye on Beaton. He is probably best known for designing Oscar-winning films Gigi and My Fair Lady,...
- 9/6/2017
- by Stephen Farber
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
‘Love, Cecil’: Tender And Lush Documentary Is A Moving, But Conventional Portrait [Telluride Review]
Few artists have made a claim for so drastically altering the shape of their medium than Cecil Beaton, the fashion photographer turned war photographer turned royal photographer turned costume and production designer, who arguably forever reshaped the concept of possibility in the static image. Beaton faced his share of adversity and controversy, rubbed shoulders with the biggest stars and the Queen herself, and generally lived the sort of bohemian life that artists dream of.
Continue reading ‘Love, Cecil’: Tender And Lush Documentary Is A Moving, But Conventional Portrait [Telluride Review] at The Playlist.
Continue reading ‘Love, Cecil’: Tender And Lush Documentary Is A Moving, But Conventional Portrait [Telluride Review] at The Playlist.
- 9/5/2017
- by Gary Garrison
- The Playlist
The Telluride Film Festival has announced its 2017 lineup. As usual, the exclusive Colorado gathering features a range of buzzy fall season movies, including many films also premiering in Venice and Toronto as well as others resurfacing from earlier in the year, just in time for awards season. Filmmakers in this year’s program range from Alexander Payne to Angelina Jolie. The festival will also honor cinematographer Ed Lachman, actor Christian Bale, and screen a new cut of Francis Ford Coppola’s 1984 Harlem musical “The Cotton Club.”
One of the bigger films to make the cut in this year’s lineup should take no one by surprise: “Downsizing” (12/22, Paramount), Payne’s long-gestating near-future workplace satire starring Matt Damon, will screen at the festival where Payne has been a regular for years (both as a filmmaker and audience member). The movie opened the Venice Film Festival earlier this week, and was followed...
One of the bigger films to make the cut in this year’s lineup should take no one by surprise: “Downsizing” (12/22, Paramount), Payne’s long-gestating near-future workplace satire starring Matt Damon, will screen at the festival where Payne has been a regular for years (both as a filmmaker and audience member). The movie opened the Venice Film Festival earlier this week, and was followed...
- 8/31/2017
- by Eric Kohn and Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
Dona Nelson: Models Stand Close to the Paintings Thomas Erben Gallery, NYC Through May 6th, 2017
Dona Nelson is showing new paintings at Thomas Erben Gallery. There is no other artist in America that is a "modern painter" in so many different ways without losing her centre.
Trying to subvert its meaning seems to be part of the definition of what modern art is. There doesn't seem to be an accurate way to define an activity that is made up of a system or interelating systems that has occasional contradictions built into it, But art doesn't seem the worse for it. Modern painting in particular is like a series of interconnected temples where people are constantly entering and trying to knock down a load bearing pillar to see if it still stands or if it's now something else. It's quite often a sign that that particular approach is thriving.
Part of...
Dona Nelson is showing new paintings at Thomas Erben Gallery. There is no other artist in America that is a "modern painter" in so many different ways without losing her centre.
Trying to subvert its meaning seems to be part of the definition of what modern art is. There doesn't seem to be an accurate way to define an activity that is made up of a system or interelating systems that has occasional contradictions built into it, But art doesn't seem the worse for it. Modern painting in particular is like a series of interconnected temples where people are constantly entering and trying to knock down a load bearing pillar to see if it still stands or if it's now something else. It's quite often a sign that that particular approach is thriving.
Part of...
- 4/17/2017
- by Millree Hughes
- www.culturecatch.com
Lord Snowdon, the former husband of Princess Margaret, died peacefully at his home on Friday, a family spokesman said. He was 86.
Antony Charles Robert Armstrong-Jones, known as Lord Snowden, wed the princess in 1960. They had two children before divorcing in 1978.
Before marrying Snowdon, Margaret had a highly-publicized relationship with Capt. Peter Townsend. The couple’s doomed love affair is featured on the hit Netflix series, The Crown.
“During the 60s, before their marriage started going wrong, they were royalty’s golden couple,” Margaret’s biographer Christoper Warwick tells People of the royal and Lord Snowdon. “Stories about them were legion,...
Antony Charles Robert Armstrong-Jones, known as Lord Snowden, wed the princess in 1960. They had two children before divorcing in 1978.
Before marrying Snowdon, Margaret had a highly-publicized relationship with Capt. Peter Townsend. The couple’s doomed love affair is featured on the hit Netflix series, The Crown.
“During the 60s, before their marriage started going wrong, they were royalty’s golden couple,” Margaret’s biographer Christoper Warwick tells People of the royal and Lord Snowdon. “Stories about them were legion,...
- 1/13/2017
- by Erin Hill
- PEOPLE.com
From Cecil Beaton and Edith Head to Sandy Powell and Colleen Atwood, the work of costume designers is crucial to the look of the characters of any movie.
The Academy Award for Best Costume Design is given out annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for the best achievement of film costume design of the previous year. Films that are eligible for the award must meet a series of criteria, including the requirement that the costumes must have been “conceived” by a costume designer.
None is more important than the costumes and fashion in the upcoming Absolutely Fabulous, provided by artists Rebecca Hale, Giles Deacon and Charlotte Sewell.
Appropriate for their big screen debut, Edina and Patsy are still oozing glitz and glamour, living the high life they are accustomed to; shopping, drinking and clubbing their way around London’s trendiest hotspots.
Blamed for a major incident at an uber fashionable launch party,...
The Academy Award for Best Costume Design is given out annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for the best achievement of film costume design of the previous year. Films that are eligible for the award must meet a series of criteria, including the requirement that the costumes must have been “conceived” by a costume designer.
None is more important than the costumes and fashion in the upcoming Absolutely Fabulous, provided by artists Rebecca Hale, Giles Deacon and Charlotte Sewell.
Appropriate for their big screen debut, Edina and Patsy are still oozing glitz and glamour, living the high life they are accustomed to; shopping, drinking and clubbing their way around London’s trendiest hotspots.
Blamed for a major incident at an uber fashionable launch party,...
- 6/23/2016
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Cinetic’s international sales division led by new arrival Jason Ishikawa has launched sales in Cannes on Lisa Immordino Vreeland’s upcoming Love Cecil.
Roghts have gone to Studiocanal for the UK and Germany on the project, which presents a portrait of famed photographer and Oscar-winning costume designer Cecil Beaton, who shot iconic images of celebrities and also won two Oscars for costume and set design.
Cinetic is also handling world rights on a documentary in post about Franca Sozzani, the famed editor of Vogue Italia. Francesco Carrozzini directs and Amy Berg produces.
Cinetic is screening two Tribeca documentaries: Obit, directed by Vanessa Gould, and Betting On Zero, directed by Ted Braun. Cinetic said Us buyers were in talks on both titles.
The Us sales division is handling Below Her Mouth, which Elle Driver sells internationally and screens in the market.
Roghts have gone to Studiocanal for the UK and Germany on the project, which presents a portrait of famed photographer and Oscar-winning costume designer Cecil Beaton, who shot iconic images of celebrities and also won two Oscars for costume and set design.
Cinetic is also handling world rights on a documentary in post about Franca Sozzani, the famed editor of Vogue Italia. Francesco Carrozzini directs and Amy Berg produces.
Cinetic is screening two Tribeca documentaries: Obit, directed by Vanessa Gould, and Betting On Zero, directed by Ted Braun. Cinetic said Us buyers were in talks on both titles.
The Us sales division is handling Below Her Mouth, which Elle Driver sells internationally and screens in the market.
- 5/14/2016
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
Lee Radziwill spent the better part of her youth in the shadow of her sister and former first lady Jackie Kennedy. After years of having to "walk three steps behind," it took a tragic incident for Radziwill to finally find the light. In a interview with Vanity Fair, the socialite alluded to feeling "free" after the death of John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1963. "There were so many things I couldn't do when my brother-in-law was president," she told the magazine. "Finally, I'm free." Although Radziwill, 83, spoke about her freedom following his death, the job of offering her sister consolation was now upon her,...
- 4/28/2016
- by Naja Rayne, @najarayne
- PEOPLE.com
Lee Radziwill spent the better part of her youth in the shadow of her sister and former first lady Jackie Kennedy. After years of having to "walk three steps behind," it took a tragic incident for Radziwill to finally find the light. In a interview with Vanity Fair, the socialite alluded to feeling "free" after the death of John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1963. "There were so many things I couldn't do when my brother-in-law was president," she told the magazine. "Finally, I'm free." Although Radziwill, 83, spoke about her freedom following his death, the job of offering her sister consolation was now upon her,...
- 4/28/2016
- by Naja Rayne, @najarayne
- PEOPLE.com
Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation by Cecil Beaton
This week marks the 90th birthday of her majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
Elizabeth Alexandra Mary was born in 1926. The Queen celebrates two birthdays each year: her actual birthday on the 21st of April and her official birthday on the second Saturday in June. (Trooping of the Colours)
She is the world’s oldest reigning monarch as well as Britain’s longest-lived. In 2015, she surpassed the reign of her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria, to become the longest-reigning British monarch and the longest-reigning queen regent in world history.
Looking to celebrate her Majesty’s birthday? First, everyone rise for the national anthem of the United Kingdom.
God save our gracious Queen!
Long live our noble Queen!
God save the Queen!
Send her victorious,
Happy and glorious,
Long to reign over us:
God save the Queen!
For more on the Queen’s schedule, visit the official site: www.
This week marks the 90th birthday of her majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
Elizabeth Alexandra Mary was born in 1926. The Queen celebrates two birthdays each year: her actual birthday on the 21st of April and her official birthday on the second Saturday in June. (Trooping of the Colours)
She is the world’s oldest reigning monarch as well as Britain’s longest-lived. In 2015, she surpassed the reign of her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria, to become the longest-reigning British monarch and the longest-reigning queen regent in world history.
Looking to celebrate her Majesty’s birthday? First, everyone rise for the national anthem of the United Kingdom.
God save our gracious Queen!
Long live our noble Queen!
God save the Queen!
Send her victorious,
Happy and glorious,
Long to reign over us:
God save the Queen!
For more on the Queen’s schedule, visit the official site: www.
- 4/18/2016
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
A new exhibition looks at Hollywood actor Marilyn Monroe through the lens of the artists she inspired and worked alongside. More than 100 paintings and photographs, including by Andy Warhol and photographers Cecil Beaton and Henri Cartier-Bresson, chart her rise through the Hollywood ranks as well as her lasting influence on popular culture. Curator Bianca Acimovic says the public’s fascination with Monroe flourished after her death and her ability to inspire decades of artists sees works from as recent as 2010 in the exhibition. ‘She became the ultimate muse,’ Acimovic says
Marilyn: Celebrating an Icon is at Murray Art Museum Albury from 12 February to 8 May
Continue reading...
Marilyn: Celebrating an Icon is at Murray Art Museum Albury from 12 February to 8 May
Continue reading...
- 2/10/2016
- by Monica Tan
- The Guardian - Film News
The archive producers on award-winning documentaries about Amy Winehouse and Ayrton Senna have joined forces to launch a production company and archive research firm.
Paul Bell, whose credits include ground-breaking archive docs Amy and Senna, and fellow archive producer James Hunt, the former head of archive at Princess Productions, set up Dog and Duck Films last month.
The duo aim to act as a “hive mind” to help TV and film productions work with archive footage, as well as producing their own TV shows and films.
“I have described what I do as ‘make films without a camera’, and part of our aim is to do that,” said Bell.
“The other side is about working with talented film-makers who might be baffled by archive, which is an industry we understand. It’s about finding new stories – Amy and Senna were historical documentaries but they were also new stories.”
Dog and Duck is currently working on feature doc about...
Paul Bell, whose credits include ground-breaking archive docs Amy and Senna, and fellow archive producer James Hunt, the former head of archive at Princess Productions, set up Dog and Duck Films last month.
The duo aim to act as a “hive mind” to help TV and film productions work with archive footage, as well as producing their own TV shows and films.
“I have described what I do as ‘make films without a camera’, and part of our aim is to do that,” said Bell.
“The other side is about working with talented film-makers who might be baffled by archive, which is an industry we understand. It’s about finding new stories – Amy and Senna were historical documentaries but they were also new stories.”
Dog and Duck is currently working on feature doc about...
- 12/3/2015
- ScreenDaily
Totally and tragically unconventional, Peggy Guggenheim moved through the cultural upheaval of the 20th century collecting not only not only art, but artists. Her sexual life was -- and still today is -- more discussed than the art itself which she collected, not for her own consumption but for the world to enjoy.
Her colorful personal history included such figures as Samuel Beckett, Max Ernst, Jackson Pollock, Alexander Calder, Marcel Duchamp and countless others. Guggenheim helped introduce the world to Pollock, Motherwell, Rothko and scores of others now recognized as key masters of modernism.
In 1921 she moved to Paris and mingled with Picasso, Dali, Joyce, Pound, Stein, Leger, Kandinsky. In 1938 she opened a gallery in London and began showing Cocteau, Tanguy, Magritte, Miro, Brancusi, etc., and then back to Paris and New York after the Nazi invasion, followed by the opening of her NYC gallery Art of This Century, which became one of the premiere avant-garde spaces in the U.S. While fighting through personal tragedy, she maintained her vision to build one of the most important collections of modern art, now enshrined in her Venetian palazzo where she moved in 1947. Since 1951, her collection has become one of the world’s most visited art spaces.
Featuring: Jean Dubuffet, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Alberto Giacometti, Arshile Gorky, Vasil Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Willem de Kooning, Fernand Leger, Rene Magritte, Man Ray, Jean Miro, Piet Mondrian, Henry Moore, Robert Motherwell, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Kurt Schwitters, Gino Severini, Clyfford Still and Yves Tanguy.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland (Director and Producer)
Lisa Immordino Vreeland has been immersed in the world of fashion and art for the past 25 years. She started her career in fashion as the Director of Public Relations for Polo Ralph Lauren in Italy and quickly moved on to launch two fashion companies, Pratico, a sportswear line for women, and Mago, a cashmere knitwear collection of her own design. Her first book was accompanied by her directorial debut of the documentary of the same name, "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel" (2012). The film about the editor of Harper's Bazaar had its European premiere at the Venice Film Festival and its North American premiere at the Telluride Film Festival, going on to win the Silver Hugo at the Chicago Film Festival and the fashion category for the Design of the Year awards, otherwise known as “The Oscars” of design—at the Design Museum in London.
"Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict" is Lisa Immordino Vreeland's followup to her acclaimed debut, "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel". She is now working on her third doc on Cecil Beaton who Lisa says, "has been circling around all these stories. What's great about him is the creativity: fashion photography, war photography, "My Fair Lady" winning an Oscar."
Sydney Levine: I have read numerous accounts and interviews with you about this film and rather than repeat all that has been said, I refer my readers to Indiewire's Women and Hollywood interview at Tribeca this year, and your Indiewire interview with Aubrey Page, November 6, 2015 .
Let's try to cover new territory here.
First of all, what about you? What is your relationship to Diana Vreeland?
Liv: I am married to her grandson, Alexander Vreeland. (I'm also proud of my name Immordino) I never met Diana but hearing so many family stories about her made me start to wonder about all the talk about her. I worked in fashion and lived in New York like she did.
Sl: In one of your interviews you said that Peggy was not only ahead of her time but she helped to define it. Can you tell me how?
Liv: Peggy grew up in a very traditional family of German Bavarian Jews who had moved to New York City in the 19th century. Already at a young age Peggy felt like there were too many rules around her and she wanted to break out. That alone was something attractive to me — the notion that she knew that she didn't fit in to her family or her times. She lived on her own terms, a very modern approach to life. She decided to abandon her family in New York. Though she always stayed connected to them, she rarely visited New York. Instead she lived in a world without borders. She did not live by "the rules". She believed in creating art and created herself, living on her own terms and not on those of her family.
Sl: Is there a link between her and your previous doc on Diana Vreeland?
Liv: The link between Vreeland and Guggenheim is their mutual sense of reinvention and transformation. That made something click inside of me as I too reinvented myself when I began writing the book on Diana Vreeland .
Can you talk about the process of putting this one together and how it differed from its predecessor?
Liv: The most challenging thing about this one was the vast amount of material we had at our disposal. We had a lot of media to go through — instead of fashion spreads, which informed The Eye Has To Travel, we had art, which was fantastic. I was spoiled by the access we had to these incredible archives and footage. I'm still new to this, but it's the storytelling aspect that I loved in both projects. One thing about Peggy that Mrs. Vreeland didn't have was a very tragic personal life. There was so much that happened in Peggy's life before you even got to what she actually accomplished. And so we had to tell a very dense story about her childhood, her father dying on the Titanic, her beloved sister dying — the tragic events that fundamentally shaped her in a way. It was about making sure we had enough of the personal story to go along with her later accomplishments.
World War II alone was such a huge part of her story, opening an important art gallery in London, where she showed Kandinsky and other important artists for the first time. The amount of material to distill was a tremendous challenge and I hope we made the right choices.
Sl: How did you learn make a documentary?
Liv: I learned how to make a documentary by having a good team around me. My editors (and co-writers)Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt and Frédéric Tcheng were very helpful.
Research is fundamental; finding as much as you can and never giving up. I love the research. It is my "precise time". Not just for interviews but of footage, photographs never seen before. It is a painstaking process that satisfies me. The research never ends. I was still researching while I was promoting the Diana Vreeland book. I love reading books and going to original sources.
The archives in film museums in the last ten years has changed and given museums a new role. I found unique footage at Moma with the Elizabeth Chapman Films. Chapman went to Paris in the 30s and 40s with a handheld camera and took moving pictures of Brancusi and Duchamps joking around in a studio, Gertrude Stein, Leger walking down the street. This footage is owned by Robert Storr, Dean of Yale School of Art. In fact he is taking a sabbatical this year to go through the boxes and boxes of Chapman's films. We also used " Entre'acte" by René Clair cowritten with Dadaist Francis Picabia, "Le Sang du poet" of Cocteau, Hans Richter "8x8","Gagascope" and " Dreams That Money Can Buy" produced by Peggy Guggenheim, written by Man Ray in 1947.
Sl: How long did it take to research and make the film?
Liv: It took three years for both the Vreeland and the Guggenheim documentary.
It was more difficult with the Guggenheim story because there was so much material and so much to tell of her life. And she was not so giving of her own self. Diana could inspire you about a bandaid; she was so giving. But Peggy didn't talk much about why she loved an artist or a painting. She acted more. And using historical material could become "over-teaching" though it was fascinating.
So much had to be eliminated. It was hard to eliminate the Degenerate Art Show, a subject which is newly discussed. Stephanie Barron of Lacma is an expert on Degenerate Art and was so generous.
Once we decided upon which aspects to focus on, then we could give focus to the interviews.
There were so many of her important shows we could not include. For instance there was a show on collages featuring William Baziotes , Jackson Pollack and Robert Motherwell which started a more modern collage trend in art. The 31 Women Art Show which we did include pushed forward another message which I think is important.
And so many different things have been written about Peggy — there were hundreds of articles written about her during her lifetime. She also kept beautiful scrapbooks of articles written about her, which are now in the archives of the Guggenheim Museum.
The Guggenheim foundation did not commission this documentary but they were very supportive and the film premiered there in New York in a wonderful celebration. They wanted to represent Peggy and her paintings properly. The paintings were secondary characters and all were carefully placed historically in a correct fashion.
Sl: You said in one interview Guggenheim became a central figure in the modern art movement?
Liv: Yes and she did it without ego. Sharing was always her purpose in collecting art. She was not out for herself. Before Peggy, the art world was very different. And today it is part of wealth management.
Other collectors had a different way with art. Isabelle Stewart Gardner bought art for her own personal consumption. The Gardner Museum came later. Gertrude Stein was sharing the vision of her brother when she began collecting art. The Coen sisters were not sharing.
Her benevolence ranged from giving Berenice Abbott the money to buy her first camera to keeping Pollock afloat during lean times.
Djuana Barnes, who had a 'Love Love Love Hate Hate Hate' relationship with Peggy wrote Nightwood in Peggy's country house in England.
She was in Paris to the last minute. She planned how to safeguard artwork from the Nazis during World War II. She was storing gasoline so she could escape. She lived on the Ile St. Louis with her art and moved the paintings out first to a children's boarding school and then to Marseilles where it was shipped out to New York City.
Her role in art was not taken seriously because of her very public love life which was described in very derogatory terms. There was more talk about her love life than about her collection of art.
Her autobiography, Out of This Century: Confessions of an Art Addict (1960) , was scandalous when it came out — and she didn't even use real names, she used pseudonyms for her numerous partners. Only after publication did she reveal the names of the men she slept with.
The fact that she spoke about her sexual life at all was the most outrageous aspect. She was opening herself up to ridicule, but she didn't care. Peggy was her own person and she felt good in her own skin. But it was definitely unconventional behavior. I think her sexual appetites revealed a lot about finding her own identity.
A lot of it was tied to the loss of her father, I think, in addition to her wanting to feel accepted. She was also very adventurous — look at the men she slept with. I mean, come on, they are amazing! Samuel Beckett, Yves Tanguy, Marcel Duchamp, and she married Max Ernst. I think it was really ballsy of her to have been so open about her sexuality; this was not something people did back then. So many people are bound by conventional rules but Peggy said no. She grabbed hold of life and she lived it on her own terms.
Sl: You also give Peggy credit for changing the way art was exhibited. Can you explain that?
Liv: One of her greatest achievements was her gallery space in New York City, Art of This Century, which was unlike anything the art world has seen before or since in the way that it shattered the boundaries of the gallery space that we've come to know today — the sterile white cube. She came to be a genius at displaying her collections...
She was smart with Art of the Century because she hired Frederick Kiesler as a designer of the gallery and once again surrounded herself with the right people, including Howard Putzler, who was already involved with her at Guggenheim Jeune in London. And she was hanging out with all the exiled Surrealists who were living in New York at the time, including her future husband, Max Ernst, who was the real star of that group of artists. With the help of these people, she started showing art in a completely different way that was both informal and approachable. In conventional museums and galleries, art was untouchable on the wall and inside frames. In Peggy's gallery, art stuck out from the walls; works weren't confined to frames. Kiesler designed special chairs you could sit in and browse canvases as you would texts in a library. Nothing like this had ever existed in New York before — even today there is nothing like it.
She made the gallery into an exciting place where the whole concept of space was transformed. In Venice, the gallery space was also her home. Today, for a variety of reasons, the home aspect of the collection is less emphasized, though you still get a strong sense of Peggy's home life there. She was bringing art to the public in a bold new way, which I think is a great idea. It's art for everybody, which is very much a part of today's dialogue except that fewer people can afford the outlandish museum entry fees.
Sl: What do you think made her so prescient and attuned ?
Liv: She was smart enough to ask Marcel Duchamp to be her advisor — so she was in tune, and very well connected. She was on the cutting edge of what was going on and I think a lot of this had to do with Peggy being open to the idea of what was new and outrageous. You have to have a certain personality for this; what her childhood had dictated was totally opposite from what she became in life, and being in the right place at the right time helped her maintain a cutting edge throughout her life.
Sl: The movie is framed around a lost interview with Peggy conducted late in her life. How did you acquire these tapes?
Liv: We optioned Jacqueline Bogard Weld’s book, Peggy : The Wayward Guggenheim, the only authorized biography of Peggy, which was published after she died. Jackie had spent two summers interviewing Peggy but at a certain point lost the tapes somewhere in her Park Avenue apartment. Jackie had so much access to Peggy, which was incredible, but it was also the access that she had to other people who had known Peggy — she interviewed over 200 people for her book. Jackie was incredibly generous, letting me go through all her original research except for the lost tapes.
We'd walk into different rooms in her apartment and I'd suggestively open a closet door and ask “Where do you think those tapes might be?" Then one day I asked if she had a basement, and she did. So I went through all these boxes down there, organizing her affairs. Then bingo, the tapes showed up in this shoebox.
It was the longest interview Peggy had ever done and it became the framework for our movie. There's nothing more powerful than when you have someone's real voice telling the story, and Jackie was especially good at asking provoking questions. You can tell it was hard for Peggy to answer a lot of them, because she wasn't someone who was especially expressive; she didn't have a lot of emotion. And this comes across in the movie, in the tone of her voice.
Sl: Larry Gagosian has one of the best descriptions of Peggy in the movie — "she was her own creation." Would you agree, and if so why?
Liv: She was very much her own creation. When he said that in the interview I had a huge smile on my face. In Peggy's case it stemmed from a real need to identify and understand herself. I'm not sure she achieved it but she completely recreated herself — she knew that she did not want to be what she was brought up to be. She tried being a mother, but that was not one of her strengths, so art became that place where she could find herself, and then transform herself.
Nobody believed in the artists she cultivated and supported — they were outsiders and she was an outsider in the world she was brought up in. So it's in this way that she became her own great invention. I hope that her humor comes across in the film because she was extremely amusing — this aspect really comes across in her autobiography.
Sl: Finally, what do you think is Peggy Guggenheim's most lasting legacy, beyond her incredible art collection?
Liv: Her courage, and the way she used it to find herself. She had this ballsiness that not many people had, especially women. In her own way she was a feminist and it's good for women and young girls today to see women who stepped outside the confines of a very traditional family and made something of her life. Peggy's life did not seem that dreamy until she attached herself to these artists. It was her ability to redefine herself in the end that truly summed her up.
About the Filmmakers
Stanley Buchtal is a producer and entrepreneur. His movies credits include "Hairspray", "Spanking the Monkey", "Up at the Villa", "Lou Reed Berlin", "Love Marilyn", "LennoNYC", "Bobby Fischer Against the World", "Herb & Dorothy", "Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present"," Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child", "Sketches of Frank Gehry", "Black White + Gray: a Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe", among numerous others.
David Koh is an independent producer, distributor, sales agent, programmer and curator. He has been involved in the distribution, sale, production, and financing of over 200 films. He is currently a partner in the boutique label Submarine Entertainment with Josh and Dan Braun and is also partners with Stanley Buchthal and his Dakota Group Ltd where he co-manages a portfolio of over 50 projects a year (75% docs and 25% fiction). Previously he was a partner and founder of Arthouse Films a boutique distribution imprint and ran Chris Blackwell's (founder of Island Records & Island Pictures) film label, Palm Pictures. He has worked as a Producer for artist Nam June Paik and worked in the curatorial departments of Anthology Film Archives, MoMA, Mfa Boston, and the Guggenheim Museum. David has recently served as a Curator for Microsoft and has curated an ongoing film series and salon with Andre Balazs Properties and serves as a Curator for the exclusive Core Club in NYC.
David recently launched with his partners Submarine Deluxe, a distribution imprint; Torpedo Pictures, a low budget high concept label; and Nfp Submarine Doks, a German distribution imprint with Nfp Films. Recently and upcoming projects include "Yayoi Kusama: a Life in Polka Dots", "Burden: a Portrait of Artist Chris Burden", "Dior and I", "20 Feet From Stardom", "Muscle Shoals", "Marina Abramovic the Artist is Present", "Rats NYC", "Nas: Time Is Illmatic", "Blackfish", "Love Marilyn", "Chasing Ice", "Searching for Sugar Man", "Cutie and the Boxer"," Jean-Michel Basquiat: the Radiant Child", "Finding Vivian Maier", "The Wolfpack, "Meru", and "Station to Station".
Dan Braun is a producer, writer, art director and musician/composer based in NYC. He is the Co-President of and Co-Founder of Submarine, a NYC film sales and production company specializing in independent feature and documentary films. Titles include "Blackfish", "Finding Vivian Maier", "Muscle Shoals", "The Case Against 8", "Keep On Keepin’ On", "Winter’s Bone", "Nas: Time is Illmatic", "Dior and I" and Oscar winning docs "Man on Wire", "Searching for Sugarman", "20 Ft From Stardom" and "Citizenfour". He was Executive Producer on documentaries "Kill Your Idols", (which won Best NY Documentary at the Tribeca Film Festival 2004), "Blank City", "Sunshine Superman", the upcoming feature adaptations of "Batkid Begins" and "The Battered Bastards of Baseball" and the upcoming horror TV anthology "Creepy" to be directed by Chris Columbus.
He is a producer of the free jazz documentary "Fire Music", and the upcoming documentaries, "Burden" on artist Chris Burden and "Kusama: a Life in Polka Dots" on artist Yayoi Kusama. He is also a writer and consulting editor on Dark Horse Comic’s "Creepy" and "Eerie 9" comic book and archival series for which he won an Eisner Award for best archival comic book series in 2009.
He is a musician/composer whose compositions were featured in the films "I Melt With You" and "Jean-Michel Basquiat, The Radiant Child and is an award winning art director/creative director when he worked at Tbwa/Chiat/Day on the famous Absolut Vodka campaign.
John Northrup (Co-Producer) began his career in documentaries as a French translator for National Geographic: Explorer. He quickly moved into editing and producing, serving as the Associate Producer on "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel" (2012), and editing and co-producing "Wilson In Situ" (2014), which tells the story of theatre legend Robert Wilson and his Watermill Center. Most recently, he oversaw the post-production of Jim Chambers’ "Onward Christian Soldier", a documentary about Olympic Bomber Eric Rudolph, and is shooting on Susanne Rostock’s "Another Night in the Free World", the follow-up to her award-winning "Sing Your Song" (2011).
Submarine Entertainment (Production Company) Submarine Entertainment is a hybrid sales, production, and distribution company based in N.Y. Recent and upcoming titles include "Citizenfour", "Finding Vivian Maier", "The Dog", "Visitors", "20 Feet from Stardom", "Searching for Sugar Man", "Muscle Shoals", "Blackfish", "Cutie and the Boxer", "The Summit", "The Unknown Known", "Love Marilyn", "Marina Abramovic the Artist is Present", "Chasing Ice", "Downtown 81 30th Anniversary Remastered", "Wild Style 30th Anniversary Remastered", "Good Ol Freda", "Some Velvet Morning", among numerous others. Submarine principals also represent Creepy and Eerie comic book library and are developing properties across film & TV platforms.
Submarine has also recently launched a domestic distribution imprint and label called Submarine Deluxe; a genre label called Torpedo Pictures; and a German imprint and label called Nfp Submarine Doks.
Bernadine Colish has edited a number of award-winning documentaries. "Herb and Dorothy" (2008), won Audience Awards at Silverdocs, Philadelphia and Hamptons Film Festivals, and "Body of War" (2007), was named Best Documentary by the National Board of Review. "A Touch of Greatness" (2004) aired on PBS Independent Lens and was nominated for an Emmy Award. Her career began at Maysles Films, where she worked with Charlotte Zwerin on such projects as "Thelonious Monk: Straight No Chaser", "Toru Takemitsu: Music for the Movies" and the PBS American Masters documentary, "Ella Fitzgerald: Something To Live For". Additional credits include "Bringing Tibet Home", "Band of Sisters", "Rise and Dream", "The Tiger Next Door", "The Buffalo War" and "Absolute Wilson".
Jed Parker (Editor) Jed Parker began his career in feature films before moving into documentaries through his work with the award-winning American Masters series. Credits include "Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart", "Annie Liebovitz: Life Through a Lens", and most recently "Jeff Bridges: The Dude Abides".
Other work includes two episodes of the PBS series "Make ‘Em Laugh", hosted by Billy Crystal, as well as a documentary on Met Curator Henry Geldzahler entitled "Who Gets to Call it Art"?
Credits
Director, Writer, Producer: Lisa Immordino Vreeland
Produced by Stanley Buchthal, David Koh and Dan Braun Stanley Buchthal (producer)
Maja Hoffmann (executive producer)
Josh Braun (executive producer)
Bob Benton (executive producer)
John Northrup (co-producer)
Bernadine Colish (editor)
Jed Parker (editor)
Peter Trilling (director of photography)
Bonnie Greenberg (executive music producer)
Music by J. Ralph
Original Song "Once Again" Written and Performed By J. Ralph
Interviews Featuring Artist Marina Abramović Jean Arp Dore Ashton Samuel Beckett Stephanie Barron Constantin Brâncuși Diego Cortez Alexander Calder Susan Davidson Joseph Cornell Robert De Niro Salvador Dalí Simon de Pury Willem de Kooning Jeffrey Deitch Marcel Duchamp Polly Devlin Max Ernst Larry Gagosian Alberto Giacometti Arne Glimcher Vasily Kandinsky Michael Govan Fernand Léger Nicky Haslam Joan Miró Pepe Karmel Piet Mondrian Donald Kuspit Robert Motherwell Dominique Lévy Jackson Pollock Carlo McCormick Mark Rothko Hans Ulrich Obrist Yves Tanguy Lisa Phillips Lindsay Pollock Francine Prose John Richardson Sandy Rower Mercedes Ruehl Jane Rylands Philip Rylands Calvin Tomkins Karole Vail Jacqueline Bograd Weld Edmund White
Running time: 97 minutes
U.S. distribution by Submarine Deluxe
International sales by Hanway...
Her colorful personal history included such figures as Samuel Beckett, Max Ernst, Jackson Pollock, Alexander Calder, Marcel Duchamp and countless others. Guggenheim helped introduce the world to Pollock, Motherwell, Rothko and scores of others now recognized as key masters of modernism.
In 1921 she moved to Paris and mingled with Picasso, Dali, Joyce, Pound, Stein, Leger, Kandinsky. In 1938 she opened a gallery in London and began showing Cocteau, Tanguy, Magritte, Miro, Brancusi, etc., and then back to Paris and New York after the Nazi invasion, followed by the opening of her NYC gallery Art of This Century, which became one of the premiere avant-garde spaces in the U.S. While fighting through personal tragedy, she maintained her vision to build one of the most important collections of modern art, now enshrined in her Venetian palazzo where she moved in 1947. Since 1951, her collection has become one of the world’s most visited art spaces.
Featuring: Jean Dubuffet, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Alberto Giacometti, Arshile Gorky, Vasil Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Willem de Kooning, Fernand Leger, Rene Magritte, Man Ray, Jean Miro, Piet Mondrian, Henry Moore, Robert Motherwell, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Kurt Schwitters, Gino Severini, Clyfford Still and Yves Tanguy.
Lisa Immordino Vreeland (Director and Producer)
Lisa Immordino Vreeland has been immersed in the world of fashion and art for the past 25 years. She started her career in fashion as the Director of Public Relations for Polo Ralph Lauren in Italy and quickly moved on to launch two fashion companies, Pratico, a sportswear line for women, and Mago, a cashmere knitwear collection of her own design. Her first book was accompanied by her directorial debut of the documentary of the same name, "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel" (2012). The film about the editor of Harper's Bazaar had its European premiere at the Venice Film Festival and its North American premiere at the Telluride Film Festival, going on to win the Silver Hugo at the Chicago Film Festival and the fashion category for the Design of the Year awards, otherwise known as “The Oscars” of design—at the Design Museum in London.
"Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict" is Lisa Immordino Vreeland's followup to her acclaimed debut, "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel". She is now working on her third doc on Cecil Beaton who Lisa says, "has been circling around all these stories. What's great about him is the creativity: fashion photography, war photography, "My Fair Lady" winning an Oscar."
Sydney Levine: I have read numerous accounts and interviews with you about this film and rather than repeat all that has been said, I refer my readers to Indiewire's Women and Hollywood interview at Tribeca this year, and your Indiewire interview with Aubrey Page, November 6, 2015 .
Let's try to cover new territory here.
First of all, what about you? What is your relationship to Diana Vreeland?
Liv: I am married to her grandson, Alexander Vreeland. (I'm also proud of my name Immordino) I never met Diana but hearing so many family stories about her made me start to wonder about all the talk about her. I worked in fashion and lived in New York like she did.
Sl: In one of your interviews you said that Peggy was not only ahead of her time but she helped to define it. Can you tell me how?
Liv: Peggy grew up in a very traditional family of German Bavarian Jews who had moved to New York City in the 19th century. Already at a young age Peggy felt like there were too many rules around her and she wanted to break out. That alone was something attractive to me — the notion that she knew that she didn't fit in to her family or her times. She lived on her own terms, a very modern approach to life. She decided to abandon her family in New York. Though she always stayed connected to them, she rarely visited New York. Instead she lived in a world without borders. She did not live by "the rules". She believed in creating art and created herself, living on her own terms and not on those of her family.
Sl: Is there a link between her and your previous doc on Diana Vreeland?
Liv: The link between Vreeland and Guggenheim is their mutual sense of reinvention and transformation. That made something click inside of me as I too reinvented myself when I began writing the book on Diana Vreeland .
Can you talk about the process of putting this one together and how it differed from its predecessor?
Liv: The most challenging thing about this one was the vast amount of material we had at our disposal. We had a lot of media to go through — instead of fashion spreads, which informed The Eye Has To Travel, we had art, which was fantastic. I was spoiled by the access we had to these incredible archives and footage. I'm still new to this, but it's the storytelling aspect that I loved in both projects. One thing about Peggy that Mrs. Vreeland didn't have was a very tragic personal life. There was so much that happened in Peggy's life before you even got to what she actually accomplished. And so we had to tell a very dense story about her childhood, her father dying on the Titanic, her beloved sister dying — the tragic events that fundamentally shaped her in a way. It was about making sure we had enough of the personal story to go along with her later accomplishments.
World War II alone was such a huge part of her story, opening an important art gallery in London, where she showed Kandinsky and other important artists for the first time. The amount of material to distill was a tremendous challenge and I hope we made the right choices.
Sl: How did you learn make a documentary?
Liv: I learned how to make a documentary by having a good team around me. My editors (and co-writers)Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt and Frédéric Tcheng were very helpful.
Research is fundamental; finding as much as you can and never giving up. I love the research. It is my "precise time". Not just for interviews but of footage, photographs never seen before. It is a painstaking process that satisfies me. The research never ends. I was still researching while I was promoting the Diana Vreeland book. I love reading books and going to original sources.
The archives in film museums in the last ten years has changed and given museums a new role. I found unique footage at Moma with the Elizabeth Chapman Films. Chapman went to Paris in the 30s and 40s with a handheld camera and took moving pictures of Brancusi and Duchamps joking around in a studio, Gertrude Stein, Leger walking down the street. This footage is owned by Robert Storr, Dean of Yale School of Art. In fact he is taking a sabbatical this year to go through the boxes and boxes of Chapman's films. We also used " Entre'acte" by René Clair cowritten with Dadaist Francis Picabia, "Le Sang du poet" of Cocteau, Hans Richter "8x8","Gagascope" and " Dreams That Money Can Buy" produced by Peggy Guggenheim, written by Man Ray in 1947.
Sl: How long did it take to research and make the film?
Liv: It took three years for both the Vreeland and the Guggenheim documentary.
It was more difficult with the Guggenheim story because there was so much material and so much to tell of her life. And she was not so giving of her own self. Diana could inspire you about a bandaid; she was so giving. But Peggy didn't talk much about why she loved an artist or a painting. She acted more. And using historical material could become "over-teaching" though it was fascinating.
So much had to be eliminated. It was hard to eliminate the Degenerate Art Show, a subject which is newly discussed. Stephanie Barron of Lacma is an expert on Degenerate Art and was so generous.
Once we decided upon which aspects to focus on, then we could give focus to the interviews.
There were so many of her important shows we could not include. For instance there was a show on collages featuring William Baziotes , Jackson Pollack and Robert Motherwell which started a more modern collage trend in art. The 31 Women Art Show which we did include pushed forward another message which I think is important.
And so many different things have been written about Peggy — there were hundreds of articles written about her during her lifetime. She also kept beautiful scrapbooks of articles written about her, which are now in the archives of the Guggenheim Museum.
The Guggenheim foundation did not commission this documentary but they were very supportive and the film premiered there in New York in a wonderful celebration. They wanted to represent Peggy and her paintings properly. The paintings were secondary characters and all were carefully placed historically in a correct fashion.
Sl: You said in one interview Guggenheim became a central figure in the modern art movement?
Liv: Yes and she did it without ego. Sharing was always her purpose in collecting art. She was not out for herself. Before Peggy, the art world was very different. And today it is part of wealth management.
Other collectors had a different way with art. Isabelle Stewart Gardner bought art for her own personal consumption. The Gardner Museum came later. Gertrude Stein was sharing the vision of her brother when she began collecting art. The Coen sisters were not sharing.
Her benevolence ranged from giving Berenice Abbott the money to buy her first camera to keeping Pollock afloat during lean times.
Djuana Barnes, who had a 'Love Love Love Hate Hate Hate' relationship with Peggy wrote Nightwood in Peggy's country house in England.
She was in Paris to the last minute. She planned how to safeguard artwork from the Nazis during World War II. She was storing gasoline so she could escape. She lived on the Ile St. Louis with her art and moved the paintings out first to a children's boarding school and then to Marseilles where it was shipped out to New York City.
Her role in art was not taken seriously because of her very public love life which was described in very derogatory terms. There was more talk about her love life than about her collection of art.
Her autobiography, Out of This Century: Confessions of an Art Addict (1960) , was scandalous when it came out — and she didn't even use real names, she used pseudonyms for her numerous partners. Only after publication did she reveal the names of the men she slept with.
The fact that she spoke about her sexual life at all was the most outrageous aspect. She was opening herself up to ridicule, but she didn't care. Peggy was her own person and she felt good in her own skin. But it was definitely unconventional behavior. I think her sexual appetites revealed a lot about finding her own identity.
A lot of it was tied to the loss of her father, I think, in addition to her wanting to feel accepted. She was also very adventurous — look at the men she slept with. I mean, come on, they are amazing! Samuel Beckett, Yves Tanguy, Marcel Duchamp, and she married Max Ernst. I think it was really ballsy of her to have been so open about her sexuality; this was not something people did back then. So many people are bound by conventional rules but Peggy said no. She grabbed hold of life and she lived it on her own terms.
Sl: You also give Peggy credit for changing the way art was exhibited. Can you explain that?
Liv: One of her greatest achievements was her gallery space in New York City, Art of This Century, which was unlike anything the art world has seen before or since in the way that it shattered the boundaries of the gallery space that we've come to know today — the sterile white cube. She came to be a genius at displaying her collections...
She was smart with Art of the Century because she hired Frederick Kiesler as a designer of the gallery and once again surrounded herself with the right people, including Howard Putzler, who was already involved with her at Guggenheim Jeune in London. And she was hanging out with all the exiled Surrealists who were living in New York at the time, including her future husband, Max Ernst, who was the real star of that group of artists. With the help of these people, she started showing art in a completely different way that was both informal and approachable. In conventional museums and galleries, art was untouchable on the wall and inside frames. In Peggy's gallery, art stuck out from the walls; works weren't confined to frames. Kiesler designed special chairs you could sit in and browse canvases as you would texts in a library. Nothing like this had ever existed in New York before — even today there is nothing like it.
She made the gallery into an exciting place where the whole concept of space was transformed. In Venice, the gallery space was also her home. Today, for a variety of reasons, the home aspect of the collection is less emphasized, though you still get a strong sense of Peggy's home life there. She was bringing art to the public in a bold new way, which I think is a great idea. It's art for everybody, which is very much a part of today's dialogue except that fewer people can afford the outlandish museum entry fees.
Sl: What do you think made her so prescient and attuned ?
Liv: She was smart enough to ask Marcel Duchamp to be her advisor — so she was in tune, and very well connected. She was on the cutting edge of what was going on and I think a lot of this had to do with Peggy being open to the idea of what was new and outrageous. You have to have a certain personality for this; what her childhood had dictated was totally opposite from what she became in life, and being in the right place at the right time helped her maintain a cutting edge throughout her life.
Sl: The movie is framed around a lost interview with Peggy conducted late in her life. How did you acquire these tapes?
Liv: We optioned Jacqueline Bogard Weld’s book, Peggy : The Wayward Guggenheim, the only authorized biography of Peggy, which was published after she died. Jackie had spent two summers interviewing Peggy but at a certain point lost the tapes somewhere in her Park Avenue apartment. Jackie had so much access to Peggy, which was incredible, but it was also the access that she had to other people who had known Peggy — she interviewed over 200 people for her book. Jackie was incredibly generous, letting me go through all her original research except for the lost tapes.
We'd walk into different rooms in her apartment and I'd suggestively open a closet door and ask “Where do you think those tapes might be?" Then one day I asked if she had a basement, and she did. So I went through all these boxes down there, organizing her affairs. Then bingo, the tapes showed up in this shoebox.
It was the longest interview Peggy had ever done and it became the framework for our movie. There's nothing more powerful than when you have someone's real voice telling the story, and Jackie was especially good at asking provoking questions. You can tell it was hard for Peggy to answer a lot of them, because she wasn't someone who was especially expressive; she didn't have a lot of emotion. And this comes across in the movie, in the tone of her voice.
Sl: Larry Gagosian has one of the best descriptions of Peggy in the movie — "she was her own creation." Would you agree, and if so why?
Liv: She was very much her own creation. When he said that in the interview I had a huge smile on my face. In Peggy's case it stemmed from a real need to identify and understand herself. I'm not sure she achieved it but she completely recreated herself — she knew that she did not want to be what she was brought up to be. She tried being a mother, but that was not one of her strengths, so art became that place where she could find herself, and then transform herself.
Nobody believed in the artists she cultivated and supported — they were outsiders and she was an outsider in the world she was brought up in. So it's in this way that she became her own great invention. I hope that her humor comes across in the film because she was extremely amusing — this aspect really comes across in her autobiography.
Sl: Finally, what do you think is Peggy Guggenheim's most lasting legacy, beyond her incredible art collection?
Liv: Her courage, and the way she used it to find herself. She had this ballsiness that not many people had, especially women. In her own way she was a feminist and it's good for women and young girls today to see women who stepped outside the confines of a very traditional family and made something of her life. Peggy's life did not seem that dreamy until she attached herself to these artists. It was her ability to redefine herself in the end that truly summed her up.
About the Filmmakers
Stanley Buchtal is a producer and entrepreneur. His movies credits include "Hairspray", "Spanking the Monkey", "Up at the Villa", "Lou Reed Berlin", "Love Marilyn", "LennoNYC", "Bobby Fischer Against the World", "Herb & Dorothy", "Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present"," Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child", "Sketches of Frank Gehry", "Black White + Gray: a Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe", among numerous others.
David Koh is an independent producer, distributor, sales agent, programmer and curator. He has been involved in the distribution, sale, production, and financing of over 200 films. He is currently a partner in the boutique label Submarine Entertainment with Josh and Dan Braun and is also partners with Stanley Buchthal and his Dakota Group Ltd where he co-manages a portfolio of over 50 projects a year (75% docs and 25% fiction). Previously he was a partner and founder of Arthouse Films a boutique distribution imprint and ran Chris Blackwell's (founder of Island Records & Island Pictures) film label, Palm Pictures. He has worked as a Producer for artist Nam June Paik and worked in the curatorial departments of Anthology Film Archives, MoMA, Mfa Boston, and the Guggenheim Museum. David has recently served as a Curator for Microsoft and has curated an ongoing film series and salon with Andre Balazs Properties and serves as a Curator for the exclusive Core Club in NYC.
David recently launched with his partners Submarine Deluxe, a distribution imprint; Torpedo Pictures, a low budget high concept label; and Nfp Submarine Doks, a German distribution imprint with Nfp Films. Recently and upcoming projects include "Yayoi Kusama: a Life in Polka Dots", "Burden: a Portrait of Artist Chris Burden", "Dior and I", "20 Feet From Stardom", "Muscle Shoals", "Marina Abramovic the Artist is Present", "Rats NYC", "Nas: Time Is Illmatic", "Blackfish", "Love Marilyn", "Chasing Ice", "Searching for Sugar Man", "Cutie and the Boxer"," Jean-Michel Basquiat: the Radiant Child", "Finding Vivian Maier", "The Wolfpack, "Meru", and "Station to Station".
Dan Braun is a producer, writer, art director and musician/composer based in NYC. He is the Co-President of and Co-Founder of Submarine, a NYC film sales and production company specializing in independent feature and documentary films. Titles include "Blackfish", "Finding Vivian Maier", "Muscle Shoals", "The Case Against 8", "Keep On Keepin’ On", "Winter’s Bone", "Nas: Time is Illmatic", "Dior and I" and Oscar winning docs "Man on Wire", "Searching for Sugarman", "20 Ft From Stardom" and "Citizenfour". He was Executive Producer on documentaries "Kill Your Idols", (which won Best NY Documentary at the Tribeca Film Festival 2004), "Blank City", "Sunshine Superman", the upcoming feature adaptations of "Batkid Begins" and "The Battered Bastards of Baseball" and the upcoming horror TV anthology "Creepy" to be directed by Chris Columbus.
He is a producer of the free jazz documentary "Fire Music", and the upcoming documentaries, "Burden" on artist Chris Burden and "Kusama: a Life in Polka Dots" on artist Yayoi Kusama. He is also a writer and consulting editor on Dark Horse Comic’s "Creepy" and "Eerie 9" comic book and archival series for which he won an Eisner Award for best archival comic book series in 2009.
He is a musician/composer whose compositions were featured in the films "I Melt With You" and "Jean-Michel Basquiat, The Radiant Child and is an award winning art director/creative director when he worked at Tbwa/Chiat/Day on the famous Absolut Vodka campaign.
John Northrup (Co-Producer) began his career in documentaries as a French translator for National Geographic: Explorer. He quickly moved into editing and producing, serving as the Associate Producer on "Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel" (2012), and editing and co-producing "Wilson In Situ" (2014), which tells the story of theatre legend Robert Wilson and his Watermill Center. Most recently, he oversaw the post-production of Jim Chambers’ "Onward Christian Soldier", a documentary about Olympic Bomber Eric Rudolph, and is shooting on Susanne Rostock’s "Another Night in the Free World", the follow-up to her award-winning "Sing Your Song" (2011).
Submarine Entertainment (Production Company) Submarine Entertainment is a hybrid sales, production, and distribution company based in N.Y. Recent and upcoming titles include "Citizenfour", "Finding Vivian Maier", "The Dog", "Visitors", "20 Feet from Stardom", "Searching for Sugar Man", "Muscle Shoals", "Blackfish", "Cutie and the Boxer", "The Summit", "The Unknown Known", "Love Marilyn", "Marina Abramovic the Artist is Present", "Chasing Ice", "Downtown 81 30th Anniversary Remastered", "Wild Style 30th Anniversary Remastered", "Good Ol Freda", "Some Velvet Morning", among numerous others. Submarine principals also represent Creepy and Eerie comic book library and are developing properties across film & TV platforms.
Submarine has also recently launched a domestic distribution imprint and label called Submarine Deluxe; a genre label called Torpedo Pictures; and a German imprint and label called Nfp Submarine Doks.
Bernadine Colish has edited a number of award-winning documentaries. "Herb and Dorothy" (2008), won Audience Awards at Silverdocs, Philadelphia and Hamptons Film Festivals, and "Body of War" (2007), was named Best Documentary by the National Board of Review. "A Touch of Greatness" (2004) aired on PBS Independent Lens and was nominated for an Emmy Award. Her career began at Maysles Films, where she worked with Charlotte Zwerin on such projects as "Thelonious Monk: Straight No Chaser", "Toru Takemitsu: Music for the Movies" and the PBS American Masters documentary, "Ella Fitzgerald: Something To Live For". Additional credits include "Bringing Tibet Home", "Band of Sisters", "Rise and Dream", "The Tiger Next Door", "The Buffalo War" and "Absolute Wilson".
Jed Parker (Editor) Jed Parker began his career in feature films before moving into documentaries through his work with the award-winning American Masters series. Credits include "Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart", "Annie Liebovitz: Life Through a Lens", and most recently "Jeff Bridges: The Dude Abides".
Other work includes two episodes of the PBS series "Make ‘Em Laugh", hosted by Billy Crystal, as well as a documentary on Met Curator Henry Geldzahler entitled "Who Gets to Call it Art"?
Credits
Director, Writer, Producer: Lisa Immordino Vreeland
Produced by Stanley Buchthal, David Koh and Dan Braun Stanley Buchthal (producer)
Maja Hoffmann (executive producer)
Josh Braun (executive producer)
Bob Benton (executive producer)
John Northrup (co-producer)
Bernadine Colish (editor)
Jed Parker (editor)
Peter Trilling (director of photography)
Bonnie Greenberg (executive music producer)
Music by J. Ralph
Original Song "Once Again" Written and Performed By J. Ralph
Interviews Featuring Artist Marina Abramović Jean Arp Dore Ashton Samuel Beckett Stephanie Barron Constantin Brâncuși Diego Cortez Alexander Calder Susan Davidson Joseph Cornell Robert De Niro Salvador Dalí Simon de Pury Willem de Kooning Jeffrey Deitch Marcel Duchamp Polly Devlin Max Ernst Larry Gagosian Alberto Giacometti Arne Glimcher Vasily Kandinsky Michael Govan Fernand Léger Nicky Haslam Joan Miró Pepe Karmel Piet Mondrian Donald Kuspit Robert Motherwell Dominique Lévy Jackson Pollock Carlo McCormick Mark Rothko Hans Ulrich Obrist Yves Tanguy Lisa Phillips Lindsay Pollock Francine Prose John Richardson Sandy Rower Mercedes Ruehl Jane Rylands Philip Rylands Calvin Tomkins Karole Vail Jacqueline Bograd Weld Edmund White
Running time: 97 minutes
U.S. distribution by Submarine Deluxe
International sales by Hanway...
- 11/18/2015
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
'Sunset Blvd.': Gloria Swanson as Norma Desmond. The Charles Brackett Diaries: Gay Rumors quashed, troubled Billy Wilder partnership discussed in Q&A with Anthony Slide See previous post: “Charles Brackett Diaries: Politics and Gossip During the Studio Era.” First of all, how did you become involved in this Charles Brackett project? And what did your editorial job entail? I discovered the diaries about six years ago when I was asked by Brackett's grandson, Jim Moore, to place a financial value on them during the process of his donating them to the Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. It was clear to me that these diaries had not only considerable financial worth, but also, and perhaps more importantly, they were primary resources in the study of Hollywood history. Happily, Charles Brackett's family (who own the copyright) gave permission for me to edit the diaries,...
- 9/25/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
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