‘Grey Gardens’ at 50: Were Little Edie and Big Edie Exploited, or In On the Fun?

In the few short months leading up to its wide release, the filmmakers behind Grey Gardens were in a frantic state of damage control. Albert and David Maysles’s now iconic documentary, chronicling the eccentric lives of high-society dropouts “Big” and “Little” Edith Bouvier Beale—Jackie O’s aunt and first cousin—had been courting controversy even before its fall 1975 debut at the New York Film Festival. Critics at its first press screening called the film disgusting, accusing…