ROSALYN DREXLER: WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS? (1975)
Directed by Patricia Lewis Jaffe & Gaby Rodgers
60 minutes
Rosalyn Drexler (1926-2025) was a category-defying creative force. Over the course of her multidecade career, she worked as a painter (creating some of the first examples of Pop art), a novelist, an Obie-award-winning playwright, a film critic, an occasional nightclub singer, and briefly, a professional wrestler. The documentary WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS? (1975) provides a window into Drexler's extraordinary creative universe. Set against the backdrop of the lost artistic demimonde of 20th-century New York, the film – directed by Patricia Lewis Jaffe and Gaby Rodgers – shows the artist rehearsing her madcap cabaret performances, cooking for her family in her art-strewn Manhattan apartment, and speaking candidly about her art, writing, and life. As Newsweek critic Jack Kroll remarks in the film, "[Drexler's] essential insight is that people and things are completely insane, and she speaks from inside the whale." The documentary will be accompanied by never-before-seen home movies shot by Drexler and her husband Sherman in the 1940-50s, as well as a panel discussion. The screening coincides with a major exhibition of her work from the 1960s at Garth Greenan Gallery at 25 Greene Street; for more info about the exhibition visit: https://www.garthgreenan.com/