Opening Statement

They are arguing again, as they always do. The older one, reminiscing of bygone days, her triumphs as a mother and a performer; the other, lamenting her failures as an ing?nue and her distance from urban utopia. Cocking her head for the benefit of the camera, the younger one sarcastically rolls her eyes at her mother, snapping, "Ah, the hallmark of aristocracy is responsibility, is that it?"

Even America has its aristocracy, the landed gentry that haunt communities like the Hamptons. Along these streets, mansions hide behind long driveways, and the wealthy count their blessings. But among these mansions lurks Grey Gardens. And its inhabitants, cousins to American royalty (does Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis ring a bell?), have fallen from grace.

The Evidence

Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter, dubbed "Little Edie." When we first meet them, Little Edie muses that the police might be coming to raid them?again?while she wonders if one of the many cats that wander in and out might have crawled into that unnerving hole in the wall, the one that keeps growing as raccoons take up residence in the attic. Like gothic outcasts from Faulkner or Hawthorne (Little Edie refers to The Marble Faun), the Beales are the trailing edge of the aristocracy, the forgotten stragglers of a dynasty. Rather than ruling on high, their natural sociability has been put to the test in coping with everyday nuisances.

In spite of this, Little Edie soldiers on. "It's awfully difficult to keep the line between the past and the present," she remarks, as she wonders if her clever attempts to make her tattered wardrobe fashionable might be too much for the hired help. What are her obligations as the last of the patricians? Must she hold up a certain standard of behavior as part of a public face, or must she retreat from the cameras in shame?

David and Albert Maysles, whose camera captured the street-level desperation of the door-to-door salesman in the cinema v?rit? classic Salesman, make their presence in Grey Gardens known from the outset. For some v?rit? purists, this might be taboo: the camera should act objectively and not interfere with the subject. When the Maysles point their camera, the soft color image captures the textures of the dilapidated home and the slow degeneration of Little Edie's beauty?the product of frustration and time. The monaural soundtrack picks up all the ambient noise: in one scene, Little Edie practices dancing the VMI Marching Song for the Maysles, mentioning that she practiced all night, but seems disappointed when the slight whine of a plane overhead draws attention away from her.
[...]
And for the royal families of America who imagine that their lives are private and protected, the great truth is this: that their final obligation, "the hallmark of aristocracy," is to dance for their real master, the camera.

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