Candy Darling: Dreamer, Icon, Superstar Cynthia Carr

Cynthia Carr’s new biography of the Warhol superstar and unintentional pioneer who became an icon puts Candy Darling in the spotlight. Candy personified glamor, performing in the early Off-Off-Broadway theater scene and in Warhol’s films Flesh and Women in Revolt, inspiring songs by Lou Reed and the Rolling Stones, and posing for Richard Avedon. Yet she lived on the edge, keeping a part of herself hidden, and died at 29 in 1974, just as conversations about gender and identity were entering the broader culture. Carr is a former Village Voice writer and an acclaimed author of books on American art and culture, who worked on Candy Darling as a fellow at the Leon Levy Center for Biography. She speaks with Lucy Sante, author of Low Life, The Other Paris, and most recently, I Heard Her Call My Name: A Memoir of Transition.

Presented with the Leon Levy Center for Biography.