"The Marble Faun" speaks: Jerry Torre on the Life and Influence of Grey Gardens

The #MarbleFaun of #GreyGardens, the touching and at times haunting memoir about his teenage days as caretaker of , the now-celebrated mansion chronicled in the iconic documentary Grey Gardens and two feature-length films. Claudia Cragg, @KGNUClaudia, speaks here with about the book, co-written with film historian , is a behind-the-scenes look at "" and "" and their bizarre and reclusive life of squalor amidst the tremendous wealth of East Hampton, the family bond that developed between Jerry and them, and the day everything was turned upside down forever with the arrival of documentary filmmakers What began as a teenager coming upon what he assumed was an old, abandoned house takes on new dimensions when suddenly Edie appears on the porch draped in a shower curtain with an apron tied around her head. "You must be the Marble Faun," she tells the stunned Jerry. Rather than chasing him away as he at first feared, she invites Jerry to meet her mother upstairs. So begins a strange and unusually close friendship with the two women as Jerry takes on the task of volunteer gardener of their estate, often sleeping nights in their living room and staying out of the way of mother-daughter arguments. The Marble Faun of Grey Gardens is Jerry's look back on the filming of Grey Gardens but also how the notoriety the movie achieved changed his life along with the Beales's as their private world is shared with audiences everywhere.