He gives it to the waitress and says, “By the way, this is a very good wine. Jim Morrison and I were sitting at a table in the back room at Max’s, and he pees into a bottle of wine. Not crazy to be crazy.ĭanny Fields (music manager, publicist, writer): The back room was everything you have ever heard, with all manner of crazy things taking place.Ĭrazy, but beautiful. But it wasn’t the ‘stars’ who made the back room what it was it was the sheer freedom that it represented. Lou Reed would be there, Iggy Pop, John Cale, whoever. Sylvain Sylvain (future guitarist for the New York Dolls): Max’s was like one of the lower circles of Dante’s inferno filled with Bosch and Breughel characters. It was an iconic time and place to be in history for music and the arts. Hendrix sent a glass of wine over to me one night. On any night, you could be sitting across from Dali, Fellini, Jane Fonda, Mick Jagger, Janis Joplin. As it gained global fame, the more famous found it as a refuge. In the mid-to-late sixties, Max’s back room comprised the Factory people, actors, writers, and artists. Everybody went to Max’s and everything got homogenized there. Teenyboppers and sculptors, rock stars and poets from St Mark’s Place, Hollywood actors checking out what the underground actors were all about, boutique owners and models, modern dancers and go-go dancers. Max’s was the exact spot where Pop Art and Pop Life came together. Sure, Max’s had a lunch restaurant downstairs and a bar in the front… but the back room? Its contribution to history is immense.Īndy Warhol (visual artist, film director): It’s difficult to describe the importance of that back room. He took me to the notorious back room of Max’s Kansas City at 213 Park Ave South. My first date with Eric was shortly after I saw him in the movie. He went on to star in other Warhol films, most notably one of the most successful Warhol movies, ‘Lonesome Cowboys’ (1968), as well as San Diego Surf (1968) and Heat (1972). It was his talent for dance that caught the eye of Andy Warhol: after seeing Eric dancing at an Exploding Plastic show at Warhol’s bar and discotheque, The Dom, in April 1966, Warhol asked him to be in one of his underground films.Įric agreed and made his film debut in 1967’s Chelsea Girls with Nico, and quickly became a Factory regular. As a young boy, he trained as a classic ballet dancer – allegedly because his construction-worker father wanted to correct Eric’s gauche pigeon-toed stance. 1968 – 1970: Eric Emerson (Part 1) – The Back Room at Max’s Kansas CityĮric was born in New Jersey in 1945. He was the most beautiful man on the planet.Īndy Warhol with Factory entourage, including Eric Emerson (back row, second from left) In fact, I fell in love with Eric twice: first on screen, and then off-screen after I met him in person.Įric was crazy, wild, and raw… yet innocent at the same time. I fell in love with the film’s star, Eric Emerson. We went for a viewing of the new Warhol film, Lonesome Cowboys. It was on the sixth floor of the Decker Building at 33 Union Square West. I mean what does a girl in Queens know? So I enrolled in the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan.Īs part of one of our classes, our teacher took us to Andy Warhol’s Factory. I just knew I wanted to do something artistic with my life but I didn’t know what. He was a guitarist who became known as ‘Fast Eddy’ on the punk scene. My parents were John and Julia Gentile, and they were busy. I was born Elda Rose Gentile on Novem– and I was one of eight siblings… there was John, Julie, Peter, Diane, Eddy, Denise and Bobby. Photo credits to the wonderful Meryl Meisler, Allan Tannenbaum, Bob Gruen, and Roberta Bayley.Īnd thanks to the excellent Magic Tramps website. We have since contacted other people who knew and worked with her to create a fuller picture of who she was and what she did. The Rialto Report spoke to Elda several year ago and found her to be excellent company – generous, open, and happy to share her memories. So why is Elda’s life usually relegated to a footnote in someone else’s story? There’s even a case to be made that without Elda, the superstar band Blondie would not have existed.Īnd then there is the untold story of her adult film career. She made stage costumes that inspired the flamboyant look of various bands when rock was at its most visual. She appeared in influential theater pieces and on the hallowed stages of CBGB and Max’s Kansas City. She had long relationships with legendary Andy Warhol superstar Eric Emerson, New York Dolls guitarist Sylvain Sylvain, and New York punk darling Television’s Richard Hell. The remarkable life and career of Elda Stilletto reads like a history of the 1970s New York music scene: she was a ubiquitous Zelig operating in a vibrant period when the city’s artistic world was at its most creative and exciting.Įlda was a proto-feminist trailblazer, part of the Warhol, glitter rock, and punk movements.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |