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Poor Little Rich Girl (1965)

to JUNE 19/20, 1965: POOR LITTLE RICH GIRL PREMIERES AT ASTOR PLACE PLAYHOUSE

BW/Sound/66 mins at 24 fps
Edie Sedgwick and Chuck Wein (off screen)
(filmed March-April 1965)

Edie Sedgwick in Vogue

Edie Sedgwick as a "youthquaker" in Vogue magazine (1 August 1965)

Andy Warhol:

"Whatever anyone may have thought, the truth is I never gave Edie a drug, ever. Not even one diet pill. Nothing. She certainly was taking a lot of amphetamine and downs, but she certainly wasn't getting them from me. She was getting them from that doctor who was shooting up every Society lady in town." (POP108)

Poor Little Rich Girl was originally conceived as part of a series of films featuring Edie Sedgwick which Warhol started shooting in March 1965 called The Poor Little Rich Girl Saga. It included Restaurant, Face, and Afternoon, as well as this film. The title is the same as a 1936 movie starring Shirley Temple who Andy idolized in his childhood. (FAW20)

The film takes place in Edie's apartment. Andy and Gerard shot two rolls (approx. 70 mins) of Edie as "she lay on her bed, talked on the phone and walked around her room, showing off her clothes and describing how she had spent her entire inheritance in six months." (L&D221)

When the rolls were processed, they were completely out of focus because of a problem with the camera lens. They re-shot the two long takes, adding it to the first reel so that the first 33 minutes of the film are completely out of focus as Edie wakes up, orders coffee and orange juice, smokes cigarettes does her excercises, takes pills and puts on make-up - all done in silence, except for the background music of an Everly Brothers album. (FAW22/L&D221)

Gary Comenas
Warholstars

to JUNE 19/20, 1965: POOR LITTLE RICH GIRL PREMIERES AT ASTOR PLACE PLAYHOUSE

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