DonBachardy Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Review: Chris & Don: A Love Story
Filed under: Theatrical Reviews », New in Theaters »
A real-life romance to put all those rom-com fairy tales to shame, Tina Mascara and Guido Santi's Chris & Don: A Love Story details the unlikely union between British author Christopher Isherwood - chiefly famous for writing The Berlin Stories, which was the basis for Cabaret - and Don Bachardy, a man thirty years his junior. From the outset, age was the monumental difference between the two, as Isherwood had already achieved professional recognition and befriended countless literary and filmic celebrities (including classmate W.H. Auden) when, in 1952, he met 18-year-old Bachardy on a Santa Monica beach. Having first had a fling with the young man's brother, Isherwood quickly fell for the bright-faced, energetic Bachardy, an L.A. suburbanite conditioned by his mother to adore all things Hollywood who saw in the writer a handsome, sophisticated father figure and role model. As friend John Boorman opines, Bachardy was a malleable individual eager to be shaped by Isherwood into a version (if not outright carbon copy) of himself, a dynamic that became so pronounced that the teenager, raised in California, soon began unconsciously speaking with a British accent.
Isherwood/Bachardy Doc Gets a Distributor
Filed under: Documentary », Independent », Romance », Deals », Distribution »
Last year, we got the previously-untold story of Danny Williams and his forays in love and Warhol. This year, we're getting a documentary about writer Christopher Isherwood and his long, 30-year love affair with artist Don Bachardy called Chris & Don: A Love Story, which comes from newbie directors Guido Santi and Tina Mascara. Variety reports that Zeitgeist Films has nabbed the domestic rights to the documentary, with plans for a festival run, a limited summer release, and an expanded run after that. The film details the partnership, which began when Isherwood was 49 on Valentine's Day, 1953. (How romantic, eh?) He met the young, 18-year-old Bachardy at a beach in Santa Monica, and the huge age difference did not deter him. Nor did the waves the unconventional union made. For the most part, the couple remained together for the rest of Isherwood's life -- an impressive 33 years.
Andy Herwitz, of Film Sales Co., negotiated the deal, and says: "The fact that the film is about the 30-year love relationship between two men made it a natural for a number of the gay distributors to pursue. What I think is telling is that, ultimately, the strongest and best offer came from Zeitgeist, an arthouse distributor which appeals to mainstream audiences. I think this augurs for the crossover potential of the film." Now if only someone could make a film about Gore Vidal and Jimmie Trimble.
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