Black White + Gray: A Portrait of Sam Wagstaff and Robert Mapplethorpe
- Director: James Crump
- Writer: James Crump
- Producer: Stanley F. Buchthal; James Crump
CGiii Comment
A look at the life and contribution of Sam Wagstaff (1921-1987), curator, trend-setter, collector of photographs, and lover and guide to Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989), told chronologically with archival footage, photographs, and contemporary interviews. Wagstaff is upper class, handsome, and gay, reinventing himself after World War II as a curator, with extraordinary success. By the 1970s, he's friends with Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith, his mother has left him a fortune, and he's collecting old photographs by the score. Many who comment discuss his largely forgotten contribution to art - the discovery of photography. The film sets the record straight.
Trailer...
Black White + Gray from Canadian Art on Vimeo.
Cast & Characters
Pierre Apraxine as Himself;
Dick Cavett as Himself;
Dominick Dunne as Himself;
Gordon Baldwin as Himself - Getty Museum;
Raymond Foye as Himself;
Jeffrey Fraenkel as Himself - Fraenkel Gallery;
Philippe Garner as Himself;
Ralph Gibson as Himself;
Timothy Greenfield-Sanders as Himself - photographer;
John Giorno; Tukey Koffend as Herself - childhood friend;
Robert Mapplethorpe as Himself;
Jean-Jacques Naudet as Himself;
Eugenia Parry as Herself;
Ingrid Sischy as Herself - Interview Magazine