SUSAN SEIDELMAN (1952)

80S PIONEER

The director of an iconic 1980s film that starred one of the era’s most recognisable and influential figures, Susan Seidelman brought punk attitude and feminist ideas into the mainstream.

Born in Philadelphia, Seidelman attended New York University Tisch School for the Arts, attracting critical acclaim for her short And You Act Like One Too (1976). By the time she graduated, New York had become a cultural hub for the nascent punk and no wave movements. Nan Goldin, Kathy Acker, Kathryn Bigelow and Sara Driver were already making inroads in their various disciplines, encouraging other women to find forms of expression for their stories and views. The cultural scene as a whole became the object of Seidelman’s fascination, which resulted in her ultra-low-budget feature debut Smithereens (1982). Shot on 16mm and with a roughly hewn aesthetic, it was inspired by Giulietta Masina’s character in Nights of Cabiria (1957) and was the first independent US film to screen in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.

Few films are as emblematic of a decade as Seidelman’s sophomore feature Desperately Seeking Susan (1985). It was inspired by French New Wave director Jacques Rivette’s Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974) and captured Madonna at the height of her newfound fame. Although the singer wasn’t the star of the film, her presence contributed significantly to its success. In a story of mistaken identity between Madonna’s eponymous rebel and Rosanna Arquette’s character, who desperately wants to be like her, Seidelman cleverly tapped into her singer-star’s growing appeal. And like Smithereens, Seidelman reinvented New York for Roberta, transforming it into the backdrop of a modern-day Alice in Wonderland tale. Madonna’s ‘Into the Groove’ played on the soundtrack, and the film’s tapping into the zeitgeist of its pop star and questions of identity pertinent to the 1980s, particularly in terms of gender, found a number of critics naming it one of the best US films of the year and, eventually, the decade.

Making Mr. Right (1987), featuring a goofy performance by John Malkovich, and She-Devil (1989), which saw Meryl Streep spar against feature film debutante Roseanne Barr, also found Seidelman imbuing social comedies with a feminist perspective. But neither possessed the edginess or ‘of the moment’ urgency of Desperately Seeking Susan. Seidelman directed the pilot episode of Sex and the City and has continued to make films while nurturing future filmmakers at Tisch.