400 Words from Albert Maysles
Of all the interesting things that have happened to me by chance in New York, one of my most valued is the evening I met Albert Maysles, by chance, at a cocktail party. I wasn’t expecting to know a single person there besides the person who’d taken me, and I didn’t, so I was pleased when an energetic octogenarian in heavy black spectacles crossed the room and began to make conversation. We were ten minutes into a nice chat when he mentioned his films. A movie I made, he said. ‘Grey Gardens’? ‘Grey Gardens’?! You? You mean… ‘Salesman’? ‘Gimme Shelter’? Albert Maysles, he said, extending his hand.
We sat in a corner of the room for the next hour or so, drinking white wine out of plastic cups, and talking about stories. Albert Maysles and his brother David are fathers of American documentary filmmaking. In person, Albert is extremely gracious. He’s still at work on a variety of projects (he described to me with infectious enthusiasm a series he’s developing, in which he makes conversation with random travelers on trains). He told me about the early part of his career, transitioning out of psychology and into filmmaking, and he talked with candor about his family. We had a memorable conversation about positivity: Albert thinks that the stories that are told in America lean overly towards the negative. We talked about how to tell positive stories in an interesting way; he gave me a few ideas that I’d still like to do something with. And he’s interested in other peoples’ projects. He listened to me talk for a while about 400 Words and not only said he wanted to contribute a piece, but actually followed through. I haven’t been as great about my end of the bargain. I wanted to wait until the 400 Words website was better-looking, until the next issue was about to come out, etc., etc.
Well, no more waiting. Here’s a 400-word autobiography by an American treasure. —KS
Albert (right) with David Maysles on the set of ‘Grey Gardens’
by Albert Maysles—Age 82—New York, NY
“It’s been a code in my family of origin to give notice and care to the outsider—the underprivileged, the scapegoat, the handicapped, the social outcast, or the downright eccentric. Examples are so many. My father couldn’t bring himself to collect the three dollars a month rent due from his tenant, too poor to afford it. At first my mother complained to him, but then came to me to praise him for being so thoughtful. My brother and I shared a love for all three of our uncle Sams—one an artist in his nineties, another a talented violinist, but a special love for our uncle Sam the egg salesman, a man whom no one (especially his wife) but us brothers cared for. He was coarse and uneducated—all the more he needed to be appreciated by us. In an exclusively white neighborhood my sister had no problem bringing black friends home for dinner. Once grown up my brother and I made two of our best films where it was the main character (in ‘Salesman’ it was Paul Brennan) who was constantly rejected and (in ‘Grey Gardens’) a mother and daughter who were reclusive non-conformists. In both films our subjects count on us telling the truth and with a loving care for them. Some 30 years ago as my mother lay dying she asked the following be put on her gravestone: “Count on me as one who loved her fellow man.”
And the tradition goes on in my immediate family. I like telling the story of how when I moved in with my wife-to-be’s apartment, I soon noticed a woman moving aimlessly about the apartment. When I questioned my wife she explained she was her housekeeper and totally blind. “You have a totally blind housekeeper?,” I asked. “Yes,” she replied. “If I let her go, who’s going to hire her?” My son is a very talented artist obsessed with the plight of the disadvantaged. In our living room hang, side-by-side, two of his portraits in oil: one of Frederick Douglass, the other of John Brown. My youngest daughter spent two years between high school and college in Nepal working with refugee children. And my oldest daughter, she is always coming to people’s rescue.
Filming real people with love, understanding, and a special care for outsiders—it’s my way of making a better world.”
(Image: Maysles brothers portrait from DV.com; ‘Grey Gardens’ image from lestercat)
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