One Night in Chelsea: Revisiting Andy Warhol's Iconic 'Chelsea Girls'
| 04/25/18
One Night in Chelsea: Revisiting Andy Warhol's Iconic 'Chelsea Girls'
A New York Times review of Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey's 1966 underground opus The Chelsea Girls called it a "peep-show put-on." It's an apt description, given that the Factory founders basically invented reality shtick as we know it (back when Trump was dodging the draft).
Related | Prolific Gay Artist John Giorno Reflects on His New Retrospective, Andy Warhol & AIDS
As Warhol said of the movie, "After Chelsea Girls, words like degenerate and disturbing and homosexual and druggy and nude and real started being applied to us regularly."
Angelina “Pepper” Davis, Sam, Susan Bottomly, Eric Emerson, and Ingrid Superstar
Originally six hours long, but cut in half and projected split screen, the feature presents two voyeuristic windows into the legendary Hotel Chelsea, where we watch model and Velvet Underground singer Nico trim her bangs, recalcitrant socialite Brigid Berlin shoot speed, and Warhol's impossibly glamorous superstars puff cartons of cigarettes in their underwear.
Brigid Berlin
To commemorate a pristine restoration of the flick, Distributed Art Publishers (D.A.P.) and the Andy Warhol Museum are hosting a special exhibit at the MoMA in May, and releasing the gorgeous new book Andy Warhol's The Chelsea Girls ($65), complete with lush film stills, essays by fans like Gus Van Sant, and the "script" of as-heard dialogue. Finally, you and your friends can act it out in your own bed, and fight over who gets to be Edie Sedgwick.
