Spalding Gray
Birthday: 1941-06-05 Place of Birth: Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.
Synopsis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Spalding Rockwell Gray (June 5, 1941 – ca. January 10, 2004) was an American actor, playwright, screenwriter, performance artist, and monologuist. He was primarily known for his "trenchant, personal narratives delivered on sparse, unadorned sets with a dry, WASP, quiet mania." Gray achieved celebrity for writing and acting in the play Swimming to Cambodia, adapted into a film in 1987. He began his career in regional theatre, moved to New York in 1967 and three years later joined Richard Schechner's experimental troupe, the Performance Group. He co-founded the Wooster Group ensemble in 1975. He died in New York City of an apparent suicide. A documentary film about his life, entitled And Everything is Going Fine, was released in 2010 and is directed by Steven Soderbergh. Description above from the Wikipedia article Spalding Gray, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Acting
And Everything Is Going Fine
From the first time he performed Swimming to Cambodia - the one-man account of his experience of making the 1984 film The Killing Fields - Spalding Gray made the art of the monologue his own. Drawing unstintingly on the most intimate aspects of his own life, his shows were vibrant, hilarious and moving. His death came tragically early, in 2004; this compilation of interview and performance footage nails his idiosyncratic and irreplaceable brilliance.
Kate & Leopold
When her scientist ex-boyfriend discovers a portal to travel through time -- and brings back a 19th-century nobleman named Leopold to prove it -- a skeptical Kate reluctantly takes responsibility for showing Leopold the 21st century. The more time Kate spends with Leopold, the harder she falls for him. But if he doesn't return to his own time, his absence will forever alter history.
Drunks
At the beginning of a nightly Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, Jim seems particularly troubled. His sponsor encourages him to talk that night, the first time in seven months, so he does - and leaves the meeting right after. As Jim wanders the night, searching for some solace in his old stomping grounds, bars and parks where he bought drugs, the meeting goes on, and we hear the stories of survivors and addicts - some, like Louis, who claim to have wandered in looking for choir practice, who don't call themselves alcoholic, and others, like Joseph, whose drinking almost caused the death of his child - as they talk about their lives at the meeting
Gray's Anatomy
The film documents, in an often dramatic and humorous fashion, Gray's investigations into alternative medicine for an eye condition (Macular pucker) he had developed.
Diabolique
The wife and mistress of a cruel school master collaborate in a carefully planned and executed scheme to murder him. The plan goes well until the body, which has been strategically dumped, disappears. The psychological strain starts to weigh on the two women when a retired police investigator begins looking into the man's disappearance on a whim.
Beyond Rangoon
Dr. Laura Bowman is a young widow who's unwittingly drawn into political turmoil while vacationing in Burma in the late 1980s. Bowman initially left San Francisco with her sister in an attempt to escape painful memories of her husband and son's violent deaths. But her fight to escape to Thailand could prove just as harrowing.
Bad Company
CIA operative Nelson Crowe is tasked with a deadly assignment: infiltrate a highly secret industrial espionage firm. Once inside, he teams with Margaret Wells, a master spy and seductive manipulator, in a plot to overthrow the organization's sinister president, which leads them into a darkly mysterious web of intrigue -- and shocking murder!
King of the Hill
Based on the Depression-era bildungsroman memoir of writer A. E. Hotchner, the film follows the story of a boy struggling to survive on his own in a hotel in St. Louis after his mother is committed to a sanatorium with tuberculosis. His father, a German immigrant and traveling salesman working for the Hamilton Watch Company, is off on long trips from which the boy cannot be certain he will return.
Straight Talk
Honest and straightforward small-town Shirlee Kenyon chucks her boyfriend and heads for Chicago. Accidentally having to host a radio problem phone-in show, it is clear she is a natural and is hired on the spot. But the station insists she call herself Doctor, and as her popularity grows a local reporter starts digging for the truth. Problem is, the more he is around her the more he fancies her.
Monster in a Box
This is the story of Spalding Gray and his attempt to write a novel. It is a first person account about writing and living, and dealing with success while trying to be successful.
The Image
When career-focused journalist's investigation indirectly causes a suicide, he questions his own methods and life in general.
Beaches
A privileged rich debutante and a cynical struggling entertainer share a turbulent, but strong childhood friendship over the years.
Stars & Bars
A British art expert leaves New York to buy a long-lost Renoir from a Georgia eccentric.
Swimming to Cambodia
Spalding Gray sits behind a desk throughout the entire film and recounts his exploits and chance encounters while playing a minor role in the film 'The Killing Fields'. At the same time, he gives a background to the events occurring in Cambodia at the time the film was set.
Seven Minutes in Heaven
Natalie allows her classmate Jeff, who ran away from home after a fight with his stepfather, to stay at her place while her father is away on a business trip. Natalie soon starts dating Jeff's friend James Casey, who isn't as faithful as she thinks, while her best friend Polly falls in love with baseball player Zoo Knudsen.
True Stories
A small but growing Texas town, filled with strange and musical characters, celebrates its sesquicentennial and converge on a local parade and talent show.
Variety
A repressed young woman becomes obsessed with pornography and the mysterious rich patron of the Times Square porn theater where she works selling tickets.
Hard Choices
A teenaged boy goes for a ride with his brother and the brother's friends, who proceed to rob a store and murder the clerk. They are caught and, despite the young boy's protestations, he is convicted of murder and sent to prison. A female social worker assigned to the boy's case not only believes him, but begins to fall in love with him, and determines to either help him prove his innocence or escape.
Almost You
Alex and Erica Boyer are a young couple in crisis. Alex, despite his loving wife, beautiful home and high-paying job, feels trapped. When Erica has an accident that leaves her temporarily confined to a wheelchair and requiring the services of a private nurse, the beautiful Lisa enters the Boyers' lives. A complicated situation develops as Alex sees Lisa as the cure for his own problems as well as his wife's.
The Killing Fields
New York Times reporter Sydney Schanberg is on assignment covering the Cambodian Civil War, with the help of local interpreter Dith Pran and American photojournalist Al Rockoff. When the U.S. Army pulls out amid escalating violence, Schanberg makes exit arrangements for Pran and his family. Pran, however, tells Schanberg he intends to stay in Cambodia to help cover the unfolding story — a decision he may regret as the Khmer Rouge rebels move in.
Spalding Gray's Map of L.A.
Spalding Gray comes to LA to perform a set of monologues.
