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Remembering Peter Orlovsky

Directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman remember fondly their time spent with the late Peter Orlovsky while preparing to make Howl, their movie based on Allen Ginsberg's life, which opens in September. 


ALLEN GINSBERG PETER ORLOVSKY MAIN X390 (FAIR USE) | ADVOCATE.COM

We first met Peter Orlovsky six summers ago, as we were embarking on our film based on the 1955 poem “Howl” by Peter's longtime partner, Allen Ginsberg. Peter was the first person we set out to meet as part of our research. He was then living a quiet retired life in a the woods of New England, lovingly cared for by friends arranged by Allen before his death in 1997.

We showed up at Peter's small apartment on the first level of a Victorian house in a peaceful Vermont town. From all the pictures we had seen, Peter had been a knockout as a young man, and he was still a very good-looking older man, with piercing blue eyes, a strong jaw, and a shock of thick gray hair. Though debilitated with emphysema, he seemed big and robust, and he had a ready and happy smile.

He was warm and funny. His mind would wander in the course of our conversation, but he seemed eager to recall his times with Allen. At one point in the middle of the interview he stood up and slowly made his way to the living room to show us a photo of the two of them. There on the wall was a framed black-and-white photo of two bearded middle-aged men in matching white shirts and suspenders. “We both had beards back then ... ” He got a big chuckle pointing out the matching gaudy suspenders — he was wearing one of the pairs as we spoke.

Peter was pretty sure that the title for “Howl” came to Allen during one of their many moonlit walks through the streets of San Francisco in 1955. Walking through the Broadway tunnel that goes from North Beach to Union Square, Peter began singing the recent Hank Williams song “Howlin’ at the Moon.” Peter remembered seeing the manuscript in Allen’s typewriter a day or two later, with the title “Howl” at the top of the page. Allen never mentioned anything about it, but Peter seemed to take great pride in being Allen’s muse at the time. “I never asked him, and he never offered, but there were things he would pick up on and and use in his verse form some way or another. Poets do it all the time.”

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Reader Comments
  • Name: mitzi malcom
    Date posted: 6/28/2010 4:31:51 AM
    Hometown: san francisco

    Comment:

    saw howl this eve at castro theater saw brilliant playwright larry myers talking with james franco about nyc howl festival myers 'memo from allen ginsberg" headlining the fest dr myers knows car solomon s best friend he directs javck kerouac literary group authorized by kerouac executor and estate

  • Name: Rowan
    Date posted: 6/9/2010 4:41:22 PM
    Hometown: London

    Comment:

    @ steve elkind Ahhh... :-)

  • Name: steve elkind
    Date posted: 6/4/2010 5:16:19 AM
    Hometown: Paris

    Comment:

    Good-bye, Peter Orlovsky You don't have to look for your shoes anymore The cleaning woman is god Under the bed there's a pair of dirty socks Don't worry about washing them The basin has no more water in it anyway And eveyone now will go barefoot

  • Name: Will
    Date posted: 6/3/2010 12:06:47 AM
    Hometown: Flint, MI

    Comment:

    Beautiful.



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