Tag Archives: Truman Capote

DVDs, Movies

“That Summer” offers the first glimpse into the lives of Edith and Edie Beale

Welcome to Grey Gardens . . . as you’ve never seen it.|

Three years before Albert and David Maysles’ landmark documentary introduced the world to Edith and Edie Beale—the unforgettable mother and daughter (and Jackie O. relatives) living in a decaying dream world on Long Island—renowned photographer Peter Beard chronicled life at their crumbling estate during the summer of 1972.

For the first time ever, in That Summer (IFC Films), director Göran Olsson assembles this long-lost footage, featuring glimpses of luminaries like Andy Warhol, Mick Jagger and Truman Capote, into a one-of-a-kind family portrait bursting with the loving squabbles, quotable bon mots and impromptu musical numbers that would make Big and Little Edie beloved cultural icons.

Great, gossip and a bit garish.

Books

Need an escape from politics? Here’s a trio of good reads

Feeling exhausted from all the recent headlines?  Need an escape from politics?  Bad weather putting you in a bad mood?  Forget forking over big bucks to go for some R&R . . . you can savor R&R by Reading & Rereading. What better way to escape than reading a good book?

We offer a trio of our picks this month. Drawing you into a world of art and beauty, Alyson Richman’s The Velvet Hours (Berkley, $16) is inspired by the true-life story of a sumptuous Paris apartment that was mysteriously shuttered for seventy years right before the eve of WWII, and once belonged to the elusive courtesan, Marthe de Florian.  The novel is a mesmerizing journey of one woman’s reinvention from an impoverished childhood to art collector and muse.

Distract yourself with a glamour and flair with Melanie Benjamin’s Swans of Fifth Avenue (Bantam, $16).  This scandalous, riveting novel about the “New York’s Swans of the 1950’s and the scandalous headline-making, and enthralling friendship between literary legend Truman Capote and socialite Babe Paley.

If you’re still looking to journey further, try Dinah Jefferies’ The Tea Planter’s Daughter (Lake Union Publishing, $14.95). Set in ’20s Ceylon, a young Englishwoman marries a charming tea plantation and widower, only to discover he’s keeping terrible secrets about his past, including what happened to his first wife, that lead to devastating consequences.