An observation on Follies and Grey Gardens- REVISED!

[jv92]

Posted: 2/17/08 at 11:24pm

I wrote this short essay on Follies and Grey Gardens this evening. I wrote it quickly and just for fun and because I've been thinking about both shows for some time now so I'm sure there are errors in it (Mea culpa) but I'd like to share it to see if anyone passionately agrees (or violently disagrees) with me. Enjoy! :)

* * *

SALLY & EDIE
It is April 4, 1971. A crowd of stars are under the marquee of the Winter Garden Theatre in New York- Mayor John Lindsay, Elaine Stritch, Ethel Merman, Betty Comden, Adolph Green and perhaps most importantly, producer-director Harold Prince and composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim.
New York in 1971 was in a pretty dismal state as was the country, but the New York theatre especially. There were hits- No, No Nannette, Prince’s own Fiddler on the Roof, Prince and Sondheim’s Company, the Lauren Bacall vehicle Applause and some others, but this was not the Broadway where you could chose between South Pacific, Death of a Salesman, A Streetcar Named Desire, The King and I, Kiss Me, Kate, Paint Your Wagon, Pal Joey and Guys and Dolls on one night!
But this opening at the Winter Garden was like the old days- big stars, hell, even the mayor! And a show called Follies. Pretty dancing girls and Sondheim trying to be Irving Berlin and George Gershwin, no? Well, not exactly. Follies, which was about how America changed (not for better, either) between the war and the Nixon era mixed in with acid-tinted nostalgia and two married couples at the rope’s end of unsuccessful matrimonies (“The musical theatre equivalent of Virginia Wolf” noted author Louis Botto wrote Prince) indeed had some lovely Berlin/Gershwin/Arlen pastiches thrown into a score filled with Sondheim’s own unique style of music and it had dancing girls, but it was not a Ziegfeld’s Follies. And that’s why it failed. Miserably. A five hundred some odd performance run isn’t so bad, you bequeath. Well, yeah. Show Boat ran about that long. But Show Boat ran in the days when two hundred performances meant a smash hit and Show Boat didn’t cost $800,000. Follies did.
And audiences (and many of the jaded- and foreign- New York press) hated Follies too!
Flash forward to 2006. It is November 2 in a very different New York. The grimey porno houses are gone. So are the hookers, squeege men and junkies. The perverse are depressed, the tourists bask in the glow of the lights of the Disneyfied Times Square. Stars are under a different marquee this evening, the Walter Kerr Theatre’s marquee to be exact. Some of those stars, comedienne/activist Rosie O’Donnell and her life partner, Kelli, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, John Patrick Shanley and oddly enough, filmmaker Albert Maysles and very oddly enough, Lee Radziwill. Maysles and Radziwill do not typically attend these sort of things, unless of course this thing is called Grey Gardens.
Yes, Maysles made (with his brother, David) the famed documentary about the reclusive Beale women (“Big” Edie and her daughter “Little” Edie) who lived in a condemned East Hampton estate in squalor for much of the 1970s (They weren’t at Follies’ opening, that’s for sure) and Ms. Radziwill, well, she was the aunt and cousin of the two women.
You’d expect the musical comedy version of Grey Gardens to be an arch, campy one- the musical theatre equivalent of a John Waters film. But despite “Little” Edie’s bizarre clothes and both ladies’ famous quips, there is a real poignancy to the film and thankfully, Scott Frankel, the composer, Michael Korie, the lyricist and Doug Wright, the librettist, understood that and, with the brilliant performances of Christine Ebersole and Mary Louise Wilson, made Grey Gardens both screamingly funny and heartbreaking (heartbreaking underlined twice).
Like Follies, Grey Gardens was about how America changed (and not for the better) between the war and the Nixon era. The ladies were a little cuckoo in the first act set in the summer 1941 in a splendidly decorated Grey Gardens with the lawn manicured and the pianist playing a song called “Two Peas in a Pod,” but the war is looming and pianist is also playing another song, this one called “Drift Away.”
By 1973, the ladies are flat out insane. “Big” Edie is a deluded old loon. Her daughter, worse (and bald). There’s no pianist, but they sing songs called “Jerry Likes My Corn” and “Another Winter in a Summer Town.” And they’re endearing too. The war changed these old broads as much as it changed the feuding couples in Follies.
What else does Grey Gardens have in common with Follies aside from its themes? Well, it lost a lot of money. Both have a huge cult following (but just a cult following, remember). The critics adored it, but the public was more interested in the bland Legally Blonde and the pretentious Spring Awakening. And it is its sequel.
Yes, Grey Gardens is the only possible sequel to Follies. I mean, they’re the same show. Sally Durant Plummer and “Little” Edie Beale are the same deluded, girlish, flirtatious, vulnerable women. Both deal with 1941 and the early 70s, albeit differently- Follies through Fellini-esque flashbacks and cross fades, Grey Gardens through two distinct acts and both deal with how World War II really ruined America- its politics, its culture and most importantly, its citizens.
You know, I wouldn't be surprised if Sally and Edie were roommates at the Barbizon...

*Any better?*

Updated On: 2/19/08 at 11:24 PM

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:16am

Two issues I have with the essay, one more important than the other.

1. "many of the jaded- and foreign- New York press) hated Follies too!"

Understandably you chose to approach FOLLIES and GREY GARDENS from the American perspective. You are right in that Sondheim was making a comment in the way America had changed and what the pursuit of the American dream had done to these four people. However, to imply that foreign people can't "get" FOLLIES or are able to easily dismiss it is preposterous. I am as foreign as it gets, I was born and raised in South America, and came here in my mid teens. Yet FOLLIES is probably one of the shows that move me the most (second to CAROLINE OR CHANGE), you don't have to be an American to understand Sondheim's critique to certain facets of American society.

2. "By 1973, the ladies are flat out insane."

This is debatable. I think it is way too easy to assume that the Edies are "flat out insane." First of all, what defines sanity? What defines madness? I think these are valid questions posed by both the documentary and the musical. The Edies are eccentric of course but who is to say that what they were doing wasn't what made sense in their situation. In their circumstances they might chosen the only path that made sense to THEM. Does this make them insane? Perhaps they just understood the fallacy of the American dream to such an effect that they stopped trying to be part of a system that could never really accept them as a divorcee, a single unsuccessful performer, etc. I don't buy the whole "insanity" argument.

I find the way you connect Sally to Little Edie to be quite interesting, and if you used more examples I'm sure you could make a solid argument. Yet, I find Sally to have a sort of feigned innocence, calculating personality, and dark edge that I don't find in Little Edie. If Sally Durant...Plummer had been the one with her bags packed, standing at the door, having her mother crying for help, I believe she would have closed the door and left (with Benjamin Stone's address jotted down on a little paper inside her coat's pocket), not turned around and gone to help her.

[jv92]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:20am

I love "Big" and "Little" Edie, truly I do, but I think they had mental issues, as did Sally Durant. The three ladies all lived in the past. But thank you for your astute response, ray. I truly appreciate it.
And my "foreign" quip was a more of at swipe at Clive Barnes, not foreigners in general. There are many people who were not born in this country who "get" and love Follies and I think that's wonderful. And then there are the people who don't, but who don't just go "Well, I didn't get it, but it was alright", but violently dismiss it as Barnes did and continues to do.

[LadyRosecoe]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:23am

Two points to elaborate on yours Ray-

1) For my Re-defining "Crazy" in Film and Lit. class, I actually did my final paper on the Beales of Grey Gardens. I do believe like you said that they chose the path that suited them and really, while having uncommon tendencies, weren't definably crazy because that line is so thin and worn out that who is to say what is and isn't insane.

2) Although Sally is calculating and you don't think Edie is, I definitely do think there are some examples even shown in the documentary. Her relationship with her mother, whether that is what causes her to be slightly underhanded at times, certainly seems to open up the possibilities of what lies beneath the exterior that can even be an act of feigned girlish innocence as well even. It's so deep to think about and compare Sally and Edie and I completely see the composite of the two together being compared.
Updated On: 2/18/08 at 12:23 AM

[BroadwayEnthusiast2]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:24am

Don't use pronouns.

I really enjoyed the essay and I agree with what Ray said.

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:27am

Now, I never meant to say that Little Edie does not have a put-on girlish facade, but to me what Sally does is far more manipulative and more aware. Perhaps my point is that Sally has a direct goal and she won't stop at anything to achieve it (there is a reason the show was supposed to be a murder mystery), and Little Edie does it with less malice.

[ljay889]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:31am

No one responded to my Follies observation

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:32am

Awww, Ljay, I actually started responding but it was too long and I had to leave to work. I will find it and respond to it later. I love talking about FOLLIES and it was an interesting supposition.

[miss pennywise]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 12:34am

Here is a REAL photo of Little Edie in the kitchen at Grey Gardens.

Edie was not clinically "insane," but there were "issues" at play.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 9:32am

The part I don't get is why the dead Dorothy Collins and the dead Little Edie would be friends.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 9:41am

I don't get why BroadwayEnthusiast doesn't want you using pronouns. Unless he/she's saying that you have not made your pronoun-noun agreement clear...which is possible.

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 9:54am

The part I don't get is why the dead Dorothy Collins and the dead Little Edie would be friends.

I don't get that either.

[jv92]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 1:55pm

Thank you all!

[MomofOZ]

Posted: 2/18/08 at 4:29pm

"The part I don't get is why the dead Dorothy Collins and the dead Little Edie would be friends"

I'm not sure I follow that either...

My mother was nothing like Sally. The only reason they would be friends is because my mother would be unbelievably kind and caring towards Little Edie.

[jv92]

Posted: 2/19/08 at 10:04am

Alright, the last sentance is a little bizarre. I didn't know how to end it without it sounding like a High School Regents essay.
MomofOz-I wasn't saying your mom was anything like Sally. But because she created the character... oh never mind...

[jv92]

Posted: 2/19/08 at 10:11am

So...
I've revised the ending. Nobody seemed to get it, even after a while I thought it was a little weird myself and I felt as if I insulted Dorothy Collins daughter. (My appologies!)
I've fixed it, hopefully it's better. :)

[jv92]

Posted: 2/19/08 at 3:41pm

bump...

[Roscoe]

Posted: 2/19/08 at 3:54pm

I don't remember that the critics adored GREY GARDENS. They were pretty well unanimous in applauding the acting in general and Ebersole in particular, but the reaction to the show was pretty mixed, as I remember.

Maybe you should elaborate on how exactly GREY GARDENS is how the country changed between "the war and the Nixon era."

And GREY GARDENS the musical is every bit as pretentious as SPRING AWAKENING.