Edie Sedgwick was a bright social butterfly whose candle of fame burned brightly at both ends in the years 1965 and 1966. Born into a wealthy White Anglo-Saxon Protestant family of impressive lineage, Edie became a celebrity due to her gamine beauty and style, and to the wealth and glamour that was attached to the rich then and always in American society. A native California (though her family's roots were in Massachusetts and New York City), she made her debut in New York in the mid-60s as very intelligent and well-spoken young lady with a certain panache that beguiled the fashionable trend-setters and those who ballyhooed those fashions and trends.
Her association with Pop Artist Andy Warhol, who had started out in commercial design and brought those techniques to the fine arts, helped secure his reputation by making him seem less ridiculous as he originally was perceived. With the glamorous Edie in tow when he made the rounds of parties and gallery openings, Warhol himself became a major trend-setter in New York as the dynamic duo generated reams of copy and free publicity. Originally an outsider, far outside the mainstream, Warhol was eventually wooed by wealthy socialites and became a major part of the art establishment. He was famous for far more than the 15 minutes prescribed by himself and was a colossus of the New York art scene at the time of his death. Edie enjoyed her life as a celebrity as Warhol's consort, but alas, her own personal fame prescription ran for 15 minutes, down in by a welter of drugs, both prescribed and obtained on the street. By the end of 1966, the transit of her star had gone into eclipse from which she never recovered. In 1966, the still-loyal Warhol approached his musical "discovery" Lou Reed, who was appearing with the Velvet Underground in Warhol-produced Plastic Exploding Inevitable (Warhol was the Velvets manager for a while) with a proposition. According to Reed, "Andy said I should write a song about Edie Sedgwick. I said 'Like what?' and he said, 'Oh, don't you think she's a femme fatale, Lou?' So I wrote 'Femme Fatale' and we gave it to Nico."Apparently, Edie's and Warhol's relationship was further strained by her dissatisfaction with her role in Warhol's new sideline. Warhol presented a week of mixed media performances at the Film-Makers' Cinematheque during the second week of February 1966, as the Plastic Exploding Inevitable morphed into "Andy Warhol Up-Tight" audio-visual show. The ad for the event promised a bill headlined by the Velvet Underground, Nico, Edie Sedgwick, and Bob Neuwirth. The Velvet Underground and Nico performed while three of Warhol's films, including "Vinyl," were projected on the back wall. The "freak out" was filmed.Warhol also appeared on local TV and announced he was sponsoring a new band, The Velvet Underground.On February 13, 1966, Edie appeared in photographs with Warhol and Chuck Wein in the "New York Times magazine." Although the Dylan film still hadn't come through, Edie remained optimistic; it was apparent to Warhol and The Factory regulars that she had a crush on the singer. However, she did not find out about his marriage to Sara Lownds until Warhol told her about it during an argument they had at a restaurant in late February 1966. Andy and his new leading cinema collaborator, Paul Morrissey, thought the Dylan crew were leading Edie on. Warhol had learned about the secret marriage from his lawyer, and when Edie was informed of the fact, she was devastated. Morrissey believes that, about Dylan, that Edie realized that "that maybe he hadn't been truthful."
However, Factory regular and Warhol superstar Gerard Malanga remembers the argument being over money.Edie had always picked up the tab when the Factory regulars hit the town, but she declined and attacked Warhol over his failure to pay her money from the films she had been in. Warhol claimed that there was no money as the films were unprofitable and told her to be patient, after which she made a phone-call, then returned to the table before leaving the restaurant. Whatever its genesis, the upshot of the argument and revelation was that Edie decided that night, right in the restaurant, to part ways with Warhol. According to Malanga, "Edie disappeared and that was the end of it. She never came back."In the tapes Edie made for "Ciao! Manhattan," she admitted that she had become addicted to her affair with Neuwirth. While they were together, she was consumed by lust, but when they were apart, she felt so empty, she turned to pills for comfort. Edie is one of the women pictured on the inner sleeve of Dylan's classic "Blonde on Blonde" album (released May 16, 1966), and she was rumored to be the inspiration of the song "Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat.". Other songs rumored to be about her were "Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again" (the reference "your debutante") and "Just Like a Woman," which was featured on the "Ciao! Manhattan" soundtrack. (Dylan biographers typically believe the song was about Joan Baez, though it likely was a synthesis of the two or them and more women).
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She tried modeling again and appeared in the March 15, 1966 edition of "Vogue." Her modeling career never took off as the professionals in the fashion industry shunned people with drug problems at the time. She then turned back to acting, auditioning for Norman Mailer for his staging of "The Deer Park," but Mailer turned her down. Edie "wasn't very good," Mailer remembered. "She used so much of herself with every line that we knew she'd be immolated after three performances" On March 3, 1966, Warhol's "Kitchen" starring Edie made its premiere at the Cinematheque. By 1966, Edie was badly addicted to drugs and was "falling apart." In six months, she spent $80,000 (approximately $475,000 in 2005 dollars, when factored for inflation. A typical breakfast in this period was a saucer filled with speed. To maintain her habit she began stealing antiques and art from her grandmother's apartment, which she sold for money. To supplement her income, she turned to dealing but got busted, was briefly incarcerated, and was put on probation for five years. As if things weren't bad enough, during the middle of one night In October 1966, Edie's apartment on East 63rd St. was set on fire by candles she always kept burning. She suffered burns on her arms, legs and back and was treated at Lenox Hill Hospital.
In 1966, Edie visited her home in California, where her drug abuse caused her to be committed to a mental hospital. After she was discharged, she moved back to New York and took a room at the Chelsea Hotel, where her drug addiction worsened. By early 1967, he drugged-fueled behavior was so erratic, Neuwirthbroke up with her. Edie subsequently took up with her fellow Warhol "superstar" Paul America. The former Paul Johnson, he claimed that he met Warhol and Edie at a bar and that he followed them home to The Factory afterwards. He and Edie Sedgwick became lovers, united in their common lust for drugs, and they lived together for a brief time at New York's Chelsea Hotel. They indulged heavily in speed, two classic co-dependents. The heavy intake of speed likely fueled Edie's paranoia, as well as caused physical problems, including brain damage. A former heroin user, Paul America was credited with Edie's former roommate with keeping her off of smack while they lived together. While they were together, America tried to keep Sedgwick from being exploited. Their relationship was an on-again/off-again affair, as America continually left New York for the country (his brother owned a farm in Indiana) as the city, according to those who knew him, drove him crazy. Eventually, friction over control issues forced them apart.America later appeared with Sedgwick in the long-gestated film "Ciao Manhattan," his second and last film role. This was supposed to be Edie's breakout role, but the film's execution by Warhol acolytes was amateurish. Shooting on "Ciao! Manhattan," which would prove to be Edie's final film, commenced on April 15, 1967. The idea for the movie was conceived by Edie's old promoter Chuck Wein and producer Robert Margouleff; it originally was supposed to be a porno film. Later, Wein suggested they cast Edie. Margouleff remembers that the shooting of the film was anarchic, with the filmmakers and the actors addicted to, and needing, speed, which was injected by a physician with whom the production company had set up a charge account. In one scene, Paul America was filmed chauffeuring Baby Jane Holzer to the Pan Am building, after which he was filmed driving off. The filmmakers waited for him to return so they could shoot backup footage of the scene, but America never returned. Eight months later, he was found in a Michigan jail, where the crew had to shoot pickup scenes to finish off his characterization. After the departure of Paul America, Edie wound up in Gracie Square Hospital. It wa there that she learned of her father's death, on October 24, 1967. He believed towards the end of his life that his own mental illness was the root of his children's problems.After her discharge, Edie shacked up in the Warwick Hotel with the screenwriter L.M. Kit Carson, Carson attracted the fragile Edie with the promise of a screenplay written for her, but ultimately he was unable to deal with the erratic behavior stemming from her drug abuse and left her, after which Edie wound up in Bellevue Hospital. After being discharged from Bellevue due to the intervention of her personal physician, she overdosed on drugs and was committed to Manhattan State Hospital. By late 1968, Edie was a physical and emotional wreck: By the time she returned to the family ranch for Christmas, she was barely able to walk and talk, the result of poor blood circulation in her brain. She recovered and moved into an apartment near U.C. Santa Barbara in 1969, but by August, she was institutionalized again after a drug bust. She met her future husband, Michael Post, during her stay in the psychiatric ward of Santa Barbara's Cottage Hospital, though upon her discharge, she became the moll of a motorcycle gang in order to obtain drugs. Known as "Princess" by the bikers, she was very promiscuous, sleeping with anyone who could supply her with heroin. She was institutionalized again in 1970.
Edie was furloughed from the hospital in the summer of 1970 to finish filming "Ciao! Manhattan," the last parts of which feature her with a bad boob job and clearly in the throes of drug dependency. Under the supervision of two nurses, she played out her scenes, including a shock treatment scene (electro-convulsive therapy) filmed in a real clinic. Edie had receive.. back East in the past, and her familiarity with the proper procedures helped the filmmakers create a sense of verisimilitude for the scene. Ironically, she was soon back at the clinic for real, suffering from delirium tremens, where she received shock treatment therapy for real. She underwent a minimum of 20 electro-convulsive treatments in the first six months of 1971, from January to June 4. The therapy was authorized as her personal physician thought she was suicidalEdie married Michael Post on July 24, 1971, managing to stay clean until October, even giving up the lush. However, that fall, she was prescribed a pain pill to treat a physical debility. In addition, her doctor prescribed barbiturates, possibly to help her sleep, and she manipulated the physician to get more pills. She frequently boosted the effects of the downers with alcohol. On the night of November 15, 1971, Edie went to fashion show at the Santa Barbara Museum and wound up being filmed for the last time in her life. The television documentary "An American Family" was being filmed at the museum that night, and Edie - attracted by the cameras as a moth is to flame - walked over and began talking to Lance Loud, one of the subjects of the documentary, whom she had already met.After the fashion show, Edie went to a party but was asked to leave after her presence caused another guest to rave at her for being a heroin addict. Edie, who had herself been imbibing strong waters, rang up her husband to come retrieve her from the soirée. The newlyweds went back to their apartment Edie took her prescribed pain medication and they both went to sleep. That morning, when Post awoke at 7:30 AM, he found Edie dead next to him in the bed. Her death was ascribed as "acute barbiturate intoxication" and she was ruled an "Accident/Suicide" by the coroner. (November 16, 1971-her death)Edie Sedgwick was buried in the Oak Hill Cemetery in Ballard, California, which - according to her sister Suky "used to be a dingy village so small that if you went through it at fifty miles per hour you'd miss it. It's in the Valley, but it's nothing. A few live-oak trees. No one would ever go there except to see the veterinarian." She was laid to eternal rest far from the glamor and crowds of New York, where she glistered like gold for a brief moment in the mid-60s.
IMDb mini-biography by Jon C. Hopwood
Photographs shown are from various photographers and screen caps from Ciao!Manhattan. Credit & Copyright Acknowledgments go out to David Weisman, Nat Finkelstein,Billy Name, Fred Eberstadt,Burt Glenn, David Bailey & various unknown photographers. If the owners of any photographs or illustrations that are included on this site are not credited please make efforts to contact me, so I may credit appropriately. Thank You!
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