Edith Little Edie Bouvier Beale (1917-2002) is best known for her appearance in the critically acclaimed 1975 film Grey Gardens, a documentary by Albert and David Maysles that explored the reclusive lives of Beale and her mother Big Edie, the first cousin and aunt of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, respectfully. Over the past three decades, the film and its eccentric stars have become cult icons, inspiring fashion tributes by the likes of Phillip Lim and John Galliano, a hit Broadway musical adaptation that swept up three Tony Awards in 2007, and an upcoming HBO movie starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange as the famed odd couple.
Edith Bouvier Beale of Grey Gardens: A Life in Pictures, the latest installment in a series that includes photo-biographies of John F. Kennedy, Pope John Paul II, Grace Kelly, Marilyn Monroe, and others, presents the most in-depth look at the life of Little Edie since the Maysles’ film vaulted her into the public consciousness. Conceived by members of the Beale family, the book traces a line from Edie’s childhood through her heady days as a young socialite and her later years at Grey Gardens, the decrepit East Hampton estate where she and her mother lived in near-total isolation for decades. Featuring over 150 newly uncovered photographs and letters, Edith Bouvier Beale of Grey Gardens offers unprecedented access to the personal history of this twentieth-century woman of mystery.