THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 5, 1996 TAG: 9610040058
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, ENTERTAINMENT WRITER
LENGTH: 71 lines
BASQUIAT IS:
A. A basket game played in South America
B. ``The James Dean of the art world''
C. ``The Eddie Murphy of the art world''
D. ``The radiant child''
Choose B, C, and D, and you'll be on target.
Now, Jean Michel Basquiat is the subject of an intriguing, but puzzling, movie called ``Basquiat,'' currently at Lynnhaven Mall (lower level) in Virginia Beach and opening Friday at the Naro Expanded Cinema in Norfolk.
Basquiat was, in fact, an unknown graffiti writer who in 1981 catapulted to fame as one of the most successful, controversial and glamorous artists of the decade. He, of West Indian heritage, was the first black artist to score big in the white-dominated world of art galleries. Andy Warhol was his mentor.
In 1988, at age 27, he died from a heroin overdose.
Julian Schnabel, an artist famous for turning broken plates into art, directed the film, which pictures a rather passive Andy Warhol who seems to revel in the genius of the young Basquiat, while Basquiat himself is rather docile and fatalistic.
Schnabel, a big, burly man who is almost as famous for giving parties as he is for painting, appeared shocked by a rather tentative suggestion that the film belittles Warhol.
``Belittle Andy?'' he yelled. ``How could you get that idea? Andy is one of the geniuses of the 20th century. He was not this wild thing everyone seems to picture. He sat quietly at parties. He was almost stoic. I have failed, FAILED, if you got this idea. Who do you write for? Are you important?''
Once Schnabel is calmed down, he reveals a six-year struggle to make ``Basquiat,'' a film he claims is the first-ever feature film by an artist about another artist. The $3.3 million it took to make it was put up by art collectors and newsprint moguls Peter Brant and Joseph Allen.
Schnabel's pals took roles in the film including David Bowie as Warhol, Dennis Hopper as Swiss art broker Bruno Bischofberger, Gary Oldman as an artist (purportedly based on Schnabel himself), Courtney Love as a party girl named Big Pink, Christopher Walken as a pesky TV newsman and Tatum O'Neal as an ignorant collector who proclaims that Basquiat is ``the authentic voice of the gutter.''
Schnabel said he felt compelled to make it ``because Jean Michel's talent has been diminished through popularization. Like Van Gogh, people know more about his death than his work. He did not die of AIDS and, yes, I do think he was self-destructive. He really looked up to Andy. I consider the film a requiem for both Jean Michel and Andy. The art critics really criticized them when they started working together.''
He added quickly, ``people like Tom Wolfe, who wrote about him, didn't know a thing about painting. Painting is not something that can be explained in literary terms. I make a painting simply because I don't know what it looks like.''
Jeffrey Wright, who has the title role, won a Tony award for playing Roy Cohn's nurse in ``Angels in America.'' This is his film breakthrough, but he admits there was trouble on the set.
``Julian is not a director,'' the actor said. ``At least, not an actor's director. What he brought to it was a painter's eye but, yes, we did have difficulties. I had my own idea of what Jean Michel would have been like. Julian had his. To me, Jean Michel was sophisticated enough to get into the room, but not sophisticated enough to survive it.''
The actor says he is fascinated by Basquiat's fame. ``You have to remember that in the 1980s, the predominant force in pop culture was painting. Today, it is film.''
Actor and director differed, according to Wright on one basic issue. ``I feel,'' Wright said, ``that Jean Michel was made a bit more passive, more docile, than he actually was. He was somewhat of a victim, that is true, but he also grabbed the reins and drove the horses. He wasn't JUST a victim.'' by CNB