The controversial documentary combined American royalty with jaw-dropping real estate and unforgettable honesty
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(jpeg)/Big-And-Little-Edie-Grey-Gardens-010226-1-435c62ebf7b14de187847305f72672b3.jpg "'Little' Edith Bouvier Beale (1917 - 2002), a cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, at home with her mother, 'Big Edie'")
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NEED TO KNOW
- Grey Gardens was home to the Beale women from 1924 to 1979
- The 28-room East Hampton estate fell into disarray and disrepair as Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale (“Big Edie”) and her daughter, Edith Bouvier Beale (“Little Edie”) struggled throughout their lives
- David and Albert Maysles captured life in Grey Gardens in the mid-1970s and the women's fight to continue to call the estate home as the town and county objected to the state of the property
It's been 50 years since viewers were welcomed into the world of Grey Gardens.
Filmmakers David and Albert Maysles embarked on the documentary project after Lee Radziwill suggested visiting the dilapidated East Hampton estate as inspiration for a documentary on how that area of Long Island was transforming from a sleepy hideaway for creatives to the it vacation spot for the wealthy.
The Maysles were surprised by the state of the property, which was filled with cats, had no running water, and trash littered almost all of its 28 rooms and the surrounding grounds, but also found themselves captivated by the home's two remaining residents: Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale (“Big Edie”) and her daughter, Edith Bouvier Beale (“Little Edie”).
The story and lifestyle of the aunt and cousin of former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis quickly became the focus. When the film premiered, first at the New York Film Festival in Sept. 1975 and then nationwide on Feb. 19, 1976, some questioned its ethics and whether it should have been so indulgent in sharing Big Edie and Little Edie's living conditions without intervening in some larger capacity.
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Construction of the home almost didn't happen because of a different family's drama
The house was designed in 1897 by architect Joseph Greenleaf Thorpe, as a home for F. Stanhope Phillips and wife Margaret Bagg Phillips. A property dispute initially delayed construction of the home. In March 1901, F. Stanhope Phillips died, leaving his widow in a dispute with his brother over the property. The back and forth between the two was vicious and included accusations that Margaret had her husband's body dismembered prior to cremation to keep an autopsy from proving he was mentally incapacitated at the time he left his estate to his wife.
Ultimately, Margaret was legally victorious and completed the construction of the 6,652-square-foot home, which she enjoyed for about a decade before selling to Robert C. Hill and his wife Anna in 1913. The two would go on to develop the property's gardens into a lavish spread that remained intact throughout their decade on the property.
Big Edie and husband Phelan Beale first bought the home in 1923
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The Hills sold Grey Gardens to the Beales in 1923. The couple shared three children — Little Edie, born in 1917, Phelan Beale Jr., born in 1920, and Bouvier Beale, born in 1922. Grey Gardens offered the young family an opportunity to slow down and sprawl out, embracing relaxed weekends and summers spent at the home.
Beale and Big Edie split in the mid-1930s, at which point she started living in the residence full-time with a full staff at her disposal. Her children were in boarding school. The divorce wouldn't be finalized until 1946.
Bouvier patriarch helped continue to fund Big Edie until Major John Vernou Bouvier Jr. died in 1948. At that point, what Big Edie did inherit was rationed out to her by her sons, who were in control of the inheritance.
The house's decline was the subject of a 1972 article, two years before the documentary
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No longer fully staffed, the home and property began to decline. Big Edie was unfazed by the conditions she found herself in, and still had the help of Little Edie, who split her time between Manhattan and New York City. By the 1950s, Little Edie's dreams of Broadway and stardom were dashed by the lack of financial support she was getting at home.
When Phelan died in 1956, Little Edie had less support than ever and found herself faced with hunkering down in Grey Gardens with her mother. The pair did offer a local board to help maintain the grounds as best they could, but decline was evident by the start of the 1960s.
Throughout that decade, the women began selling off items from inside the mansion, including some of its luxe furniture. At that point, they took to living primarily on the house's upper level, leaving the lower level to disintegrate and fill with trash, cats, raccoons, and more.
These conditions led to the 1972 New York Magazine article about Grey Gardens, which details the arguments of both the town and the Beales over the home's condition.
The year before, the Edies were threatened with eviction over the state of the property
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Warning notices were sent to the women regarding the home's outdoor overgrowth and faulty furnace. The county would go on to allege that the two women were mentally incompetent and couldn't care for themselves or the property. The village and the county demanded extensive changes that the Edies had no intention of pursuing.
The initial footage was scrapped because they didn't have Lee Radziwill's blessing
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Lee Radziwill initially introduced the filmmaking brothers to her cousin and aunt, but didn't approve of some of the footage they took that summer. This was also amid the county's raids of the home, which led Lee to enlist Jackie and Aristotle Onassis' help in getting the home up to code.
As they began formulating it into a documentary that focused on the two, Radziwill objected. The back-and-forth between her and the brothers led to the project being shelved. The following year, without consulting Radziwill, the brothers sought out to make the documentary from scratch.
The estate was allegedly haunted
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Part of Big Edie's hesitation with restoring the house was because she believed it was haunted. While some of her thoughts on the matter were dismissed, she wasn't the only one who believed so. Jerry Torre, who stepped in as a caretaker for the estate and appeared in the documentary, also shared his beliefs that the house was haunted.
"There’s a spirit in the mansion. One summer morning, I was in the kitchen cleaning up, and I felt a person in the kitchen with me. I definitely felt someone in the kitchen standing near me," he told the Philly Voice in 2018.
"I went upstairs after that and I told Mrs. Beale that I had a really strange feeling in the kitchen. Mrs. Beale said that Tom Logan died in the kitchen and his anniversary was that very day. 'And he died on the army cot that you sleep on,' she said."
They were paid for the documentary, but not much
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Little Edie spoke about the documentary with The New York Times in 1978, explaining why the payout for the documentary wasn't what they'd initially hoped for. Both Big Edie and Little Edie were paid $5,000 each to participate in the documentary, with the promise of more coming to them from the proceeds down the line. Ultimately, the documentary never recouped its costs, which meant no further payment was distributed.
People questioned the line between mental illness and eccentric living
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The New York Times review of the film noted that while there was good documentary filmmaking, many viewers felt a sense of exploitation.
"I found the film sad, of course; who can fail to be saddened by the remnants of two lives expiring in a haze? But I felt angry, too. Would anyone have bothered with these people had they not been related to Jackie Onassis? The Maysleses were not out to ridicule the Beales, but the film presents them as a pair of grotesques."
In a 2014 interview, Albert Maysles addressed the criticism, noting, "The critic from The New York Times said we should be ashamed of ourselves for making the film. As someone with a background in psychology, I knew better than to claim they were mentally ill. Their behavior was just their way of asserting themselves."
"And what could be a better way to assert themselves than a film about them asserting themselves? Nothing more, nothing less. It’s just them. They were always in control," he continued.
Little Edie sold the house in 1979
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Big Edie died in 1977 at age 81 after falling ill with pneumonia. At that point, Little Edie was faced with the insurmountable. She came to terms with the fact that she would have to sell the home, but held out for another two years before she ultimately sold it to Sally Quinn and Ben Bradlee. The pair vowed to restore it and paid $220,000 for the property.
It took the pair just over a year to renovate the home, which would become a family vacation destination for their family through 2017, when Quinn sold it to designer Liz Lange. Lange spoke to Chairish about the home in April 2025.
"When Grey Gardens was owned by Sally Quinn and Ben Bradley, they would rent the house out for the summer, and one summer, my husband and I rented it. We fell in love with it and fantasized about owning it, but never imagined that dream would become a reality. But as luck would have it, a few years later, Sally decided to put it on the market, and we pounced," she shared of acquiring the infamous home.
"It is very personal to me, as I grew up around the corner. It’s so hard to pick just one thing in the house, but my favorite part of the house and grounds may be the sunroom, which is entirely made up of diamond-paneled glass doors and windows, which look out on our walled garden. It’s so peaceful and beautiful."
The Edies story was adapted as a musical and a TV movie
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Grey Gardens was adapted into a full-length musical, written by Doug Wright, with music by Scott Frankel and lyrics by Michael Korie, debuting on Broadway in 2006, making it the first musical on Broadway ever to be adapted from a documentary. It won a Tony Award for Best Costume Design, with Christine Ebersole and Mary Louise Wilson also taking home wins for their performances.
In 2009, Grey Gardens debuted on HBO. The film flashes back and forth between Little Edie's life as a young woman and the creation and release of the infamous documentary, starring Jessica Lange as Big Edie and Drew Barrymore as Little Edie. The film was nominated for 17 Primetime Emmys, winning six. It was also nominated for three Golden Globes, winning two.
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