The greater mystery of her personality and life, how a woman born with so much promise leads to such a sad and reclusive life makes Edith Bouvier Beale a fascinating story. Of course, the coat tail tie to the Bouvier-Kennedy dynasty adds impiety and interest. His story was recently told in an opera musical and won him new fans. His persona seems like something out of a novel or a story, not reality. She made me think of a lively version of Charles Dickens‘s character Miss Havisham. After her death, “Little Edie” receives some attention and is praised for having prayed for her life.
Edith Bouvier Beale was born into an aristocratic family. “Little Edie” was called by all to distinguish her from her mother, who was Edith Beale, or “Big Edie.” Edie Little’s father was a lawyer. Her mother, a classically trained singer, dreamed of a big concert career and held rehearsals in her grand East Hampton home. Jacqueline Bouvier, future First Lady and wife of Pratis. William f Kennedy was Edie Little’s cousin. The beginning was right.
Edith Bouvier Beale grew into a remarkable beauty and began modeling at the age of 17. She also acted and sang. Little Edie enjoyed the social scene and wanted to break into movies. His golden years have come. She claimed to have had marriage proposals from J. Paul Getty and Howard Hughes.
Edith Bouvier Beale’s father divorced her mother to marry and start a new family. When he died, the second family went to the inheritance. Edith, the mother of East Hampton, held the mansion which Mr. Beale had given her in marriage.
At 35 years old Edith Bouvier Beale had a good career He told the road, dreams were almost in sight. He said he had offers from both MGM and Paramount studios. Suddenly, Little Edie left Manhattan and her career in 1952 to care for her ailing, head-strong mother, who lived alone in Gray Gardens. Little Edie returned home to the house she grew up in. Here the ladies lived out of the $65,000.00 trust fund. They had few guests and lived a secluded life in the big house Little Edie’s life and heritage around her have deteriorated.
In 1971 the Department of Public Health brought care to the dire situation of Edith Bouvier Beale and her mother when she was declared unfit to live in Gray Gardens. It was filled with junk and several filth Big and Little Edie’s life in the dirt in the 1975 documentary “Grey Horti”. The drama of the mother-in-law is elaborated on a dilapidated stage. Their relationship, marked by affection, dependence, and conflict, is like something out of a Greek drama Little Edie blames her mother for her potential suitors runs away and that he can’t marry her, he often talks about running away to Paris or New York and finding the perfect Libra man.
In 1978, after her mother died, Edith Bouvier sold Beale Gray Gardens and moved to New York to restart her career. She sang in a short cabaret show. Critics closed the show, despite the fact that audiences enjoyed it. Many people who came to the show had seen the movie.
Edith Bouvier Beale had a creative and eccentric sense of style. He called his clothes “novel clothes”. She pinned a skirt with decorative plates for one inventive encounter that she wore in the documentary. Little Edie is deployed to a camera that could double as a cape. In 1997 Harper’s Bazaar developed a fashion spread by Little Edie Styles. Italian Vogue did a similar spread in 1999.
The documentary inspired the 2006 Tony-award-winning musical titled “Grey Gardens. Many of which include dialogue and lyrics from the documentary The story captures both Little Edie’s eccentric humor and the sadness of life.
Edith Bouvier Beale died at the age of 84 on November 14, 2002. She spent the last years of her life in Florida without a single cat. It’s hard to understand a life that began with so much promise only to have big dreams disappear like smoke. Little Edie runs away to dreams to escape the pain. At least that’s how we see it in the pictures. Imagination lifted her above the struggles of everyday life. Ironically, the nice fantasy was also a trap that kept her from problem solving. his house and his mother. I hope that once Little Edie is free from her she finds true peace and happiness.
Sources:
Guardian UK Obituary
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2002/feb/09/guardianobituaries
NY Times Article: The Lives
Goddess, tribute page
http://members.tripod.com/~anxietyny/goddessedie.html
NY Times Obituary
Quotes from the movie Grey
http://allmyquotes.com/quote/movie.
Return to Gray Gardens
http://nymag.com/arts/theater/features/23484/index1.html
