- John Lurie
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John Lurie Born December 14, 1952
Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.Residence New York City Occupation Actor, musician, painter and television producer Years active 1978–present Television Fishing with John, Oz Website strangeandbeautiful.com John Lurie (born December 14, 1952) is an American actor, musician, painter and producer. He is co-founder of The Lounge Lizards, a jazz ensemble. Lurie has acted in 19 films including Stranger than Paradise and Down by Law, composed and performed music for 20 television and film works, and he produced and starred in Fishing with John, a 1991 television series. In 1996 his soundtrack for Get Shorty was nominated for a Grammy Award. For five years he appeared in the HBO television show Oz.
Suffering from chronic Lyme disease since 2000, Lurie refocused his attention on painting, his first major show in May 2004, in New York City. His primitivist art works have shown in galleries around the world. His painting Bear Surprise became an internet meme in Russia in 2006.
Contents
Early life
Lurie was born in Minneapolis.[1] Before marriage, his mother had been a painter and art teacher in Liverpool.[2] Lurie was raised alongside two siblings, his brother Evan and his sister Liz.[1] The family moved to New Orleans when John was six, later, they moved to Worcester, Massachusetts. In high school, Lurie played basketball and harmonica. He jammed on harmonica with Mississippi Fred McDowell, and with Canned Heat around 1968.[1] He played harmonica in a band from Boston, but it did not work out. He switched to guitar and then saxophone.[3]
After high school, Lurie hitchhiked across the U.S., seeing a lot of places including Berkeley, California. He moved to New York City around 1974, then briefly visited London where the punk music scene was beginning—it did not appeal to him. He was more interested in avant-garde jazz and no wave.[1]
Music, film and television
In 1978, he formed The Lounge Lizards with his brother Evan Lurie. The Lounge Lizards, initially a "fake jazz" combo, has included artists such as Arto Lindsay, Calvin Weston, Billy Martin, Oren Bloedow, Steve Bernstein, Marc Ribot, and Erik Sanko, among others. The band continued to make music for 20 years. During this time, Lurie recorded 22 albums and composed scores for over 20 movies, the most notable being Stranger than Paradise, Down by Law, Mystery Train, Clay Pigeons, Animal Factory, and Get Shorty, which earned him a Grammy Award nomination.[4]
During the 1980s he starred in three films directed by Jim Jarmusch, Stranger Than Paradise, Down by Law, and Permanent Vacation. He made a cameo appearance in Downtown 81,[5] and would have accepted a larger part but for writer Glenn O'Brien insulting his African-American girlfriend.[6] He went on to have roles in other notable films including Paris, Texas and The Last Temptation of Christ. Lurie also starred, during 2001-2003, on the HBO prison series Oz as inmate Greg Penders.
His 1991 TV series Fishing with John, which he wrote, directed and starred in, was a cult success.[7] The critically acclaimed series aired on IFC and Bravo. Episodes included guests Tom Waits, Willem Dafoe, Matt Dillon, Jim Jarmusch, and Dennis Hopper. It has since been released on DVD by Criterion.
In 1993 Lurie, with Howard Shore, composed the theme to Late Night with Conan O'Brien which was also used as the theme to The Tonight Show when O'Brien hosted. In 1998, Lurie formed his own record label: Strange & Beautiful Music. On it, he released Queen of All Ears, a Lounge Lizard CD, and he released a soundtrack album from Fishing with John.[8]
In 1999, Lurie released the album The Legendary Marvin Pontiac–Greatest Hits, which was purportedly a posthumous collection of the work of an insane African-Jewish musician named Marvin Pontiac. Pontiac, however, was a fictional character created by Lurie,[9] and the music was written by Lurie. Performers on the album include Lurie, John Medeski, Billy Martin, G. Calvin Weston, Marc Ribot, and Tony Scherr.[10] The album received praise from David Bowie, Angelique Kidjo, Iggy Pop, Leonard Cohen, and others, who were in on the joke, and a fictional "biography" was published by Allmusic.[11]
Painting
Since the 1970s and early '80s, Lurie has painted.[12] The majority of his early works are in watercolor and pencil, but in the late 2000s he began to work in oil.[13] Lurie has been exhibiting his paintings since July 2003, when two works were shown at the Nolan/Eckman Gallery in New York City.[14]
In May–June 2004, he had his first solo gallery exhibition at Anton Kern Gallery, New York. He subsequently exhibited at Galerie Daniel Blau in Munich, Galerie Lelong in Zürich and Galerie Gabriel Rolt in Amsterdam.[14] Lurie was represented at the Basel International Art Fair in June 2005 and 2006. In January 2005, Lurie exhibited his second show in New York at Roebling Hall's new Chelsea location. On April 30, 2006, Lurie opened his first solo museum show at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York.[2] In 2007, his work was showcased at Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.[12]
Lurie continued to exhibit in domestic and international venues in 2008. A collection of work was displayed at the NEXT Art Fair Chicago and Lurie's work was exhibited at the Mudam Luxembourg from October through December in 2008.[14] In addition, The Museum of Modern Art has acquired his work for their permanent collection.[15]
Lurie has published two art books. In June 2006, Lurie released his first book, Learn To Draw, a compilation of black and white drawings published by Walther Konig. In May 2008, Lurie released A Fine Example of Art, a hard cover, full color book of over 80 reproductions of his work, published by powerHouse Books. John Lurie's show The Skeleton in my closet has moved back out to the garden, was on view at Fredericks & Freiser in late 2009.[16]
Lurie's watercolor painting Bear Surprise achieved enormous popularity on numerous Russian websites, in an Internet phenomenon known as Preved.[17]
John Lurie exhibited at Watari Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo beginning January 30, 2010, showing hundreds of his works. From late June to early August, he showed 45 prints at Gallery Brown in Los Angeles.[18] In January 2011, John Lurie participated in a group exhibition called "Angels Without Wings" at the University of the Arts, Philadelphia. Lurie said of his childlike style: "My paintings are a logical development from the ones that were taped to the refrigerator 50 years ago."[19]
Personal life
In New York City, he has lived with a girlfriend but has not married. The artist Jean-Michel Basquiat slept on Lurie's apartment floor for a few days at a time, on and off over a couple of years, leaving studies and artwork behind. In cleaning his apartment, Lurie says he may have thrown away "millions of dollars worth" of art.[13]
In interviews, Lurie says he has experienced debilitating ill health since 2000, with initially baffling neurological symptoms.[4][20] At one point, he was told he had a year to live.[3] The doctors he consulted in the first few years did not agree on a diagnosis, but by 2006 eight doctors each said it was late persistent Lyme disease, a chronic malady.[1][3][21] Lurie names 1994 as the time of his first exposure to Lyme disease.[4] The illness has kept him from acting or performing music, and Lurie spends his energy painting.[1][4][22]
In August 2010, Tad Friend wrote a piece in The New Yorker about Lurie disappearing from New York, hiding from an artist named John Perry, whom Friend said was stalking Lurie.[23] Friend's version of the rupture between the former friends was disputed by almost all those interviewed.[24] Lurie described the article as "wildly inaccurate", noting in February 2011 that its publication did not resolve anything, that "the situation continues".[4] In May 2011, Perry undertook a public hunger strike to protest The New Yorker characterizing him as a stalker. Editor David Remnick said the piece in his magazine was "thoroughly reported and fact-checked" and that Perry was accurately portrayed.[25] Lurie commented about the protest: "He's conducting a hunger strike a half block from my house to prove he's not a stalker".[25] Author Rick Moody wrote in the online literary magazine The Rumpus that Friend's profile in The New Yorker, nominally about Lurie and his art, was two-thirds to three-quarters about Perry, including a full page photo of Perry standing in front of one of his own paintings. The article did not have a single image of Lurie's art. Moody confirmed that Lurie was very ill with chronic Lyme disease, and he described Perry as a deceitful stalker, capable of violence.[21]
Filmography
- Rome '78 (1978)
- Men In Orbit (1979)
- Underground U.S.A. (1980)
- Permanent Vacation (1980)
- The Offenders (1980)
- Subway Riders (1981)
- Stranger Than Paradise (1983)
- Paris, Texas (1984)
- Desperately Seeking Susan (1985)
- Down by Law (1986)
- The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
- Il piccolo diavolo (1988)
- Wild at Heart (1990)
- John Lurie and the Lounge Lizards Live in Berlin 1991 (1992) (concert film)
- Smoke (1995) (uncredited)
- Blue in the Face (1995)
- Just Your Luck (1996)
- New Rose Hotel (1998)
- Sleepwalk (2000)
Discography
John Lurie
- Berlin 1991 Volume One and the Lounge Lizards (1991)
- Men With Sticks: John Lurie National Orchestra (1993)
- The Days with Jacques
- The Legendary Marvin Pontiac (1999)
Lounge Lizards
- Lounge Lizards (1981)
- No Pain for Cakes (1986)
- Voice of Chunk (1988)
- Big Heart: Live in Tokyo (1986)
- Live: 1979-1981 (1992)
- Live in Berlin, Volume One (1992)
- Live in Berlin, Volume Two (1993)
- Queen of All Ears (1998)
- Big Heart: Live in Tokyo (Import) (2004)
Soundtracks
- Stranger Than Paradise and The Resurrection of Albert Ayler (album released in 1986)
- Down by Law and Variety (album released in 1987)
- Mystery Train (1989)
- Get Shorty (1995)
- Excess Baggage (1997)
- Fishing with John (recorded in 1991, released in 1998)
- African Swim and Manny and Lo (1999)
References
- ^ a b c d e f Broun, Tim; John Lurie (December 2006). "John Lurie: Interview by Tim Broun". Perfect Sound Forever. http://www.furious.com/perfect/johnlurie.html. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ a b John Lurie at P.S. 1. ARTINFO. May 5, 2006. http://www.artinfo.com/news/story/15468/john-lurie-at-ps-1/. Retrieved 2008-05-20
- ^ a b c Ortiz, Alan (March 1, 2009). "Q&A: John Lurie (Unabridged)". Stop Smiling. Stop Smiling Media. http://www.stopsmilingonline.com/story_detail.php?id=1210. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ a b c d e Sutton, Larson (February 1, 2011). "John Lurie Sustains". jambands.com. Relix Media Group. http://www.jambands.com/features/2011/02/01/john-lurie-sustains/. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
- ^ "Full cast and crew for New York Beat Movie (1981)". Internet Movie Database. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0208993/fullcredits#cast. Retrieved March 8, 2011.
- ^ Bowman, David (2002). This Must Be the Place: The Adventures of Talking Heads in the Twentieth Century. HarperCollins. p. 206. ISBN 0060507314. "Downtowner John Lurie was supposed to be in the movie, but Lurie turned down a part after O'Brien asked Lurie's black girlfriend to make them some pancakes."
- ^ "'Fishing with John' - The TV Show". US Television Programming. BBC. June 20, 2001. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A573969. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
- ^ Amorosi, A.D. (June 11, 1998). "20 Questions: John Lurie". Philadelphia City Paper. http://citypaper.net/articles/061198/20Q.shtml. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
- ^ Robins, Wayne (2008-04-21). Behind The Legend of the Legendary Marvin Pontiac: A Conversation with John Lurie. Emusic Magazine. http://www.emusic.com/features/spotlight/2008_04-qa-john-lurie.html
- ^ The Legendary Marvin Pontiac - Greatest Hits, Emusic.
- ^ Marvin Pontiac, Allmusic.
- ^ a b "John Lurie: The Erotic Poetry of Hoog"
- ^ a b Laden, Tanja M. (July 9, 2010). "Speaking With John". The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tanja-m-laden/speaking-with-john_b_640096.html. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ a b c Lurie, John. "News". Strange&Beautiful. http://www.strangeandbeautiful.com/news/index.html. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ MoMA permanent collection search
- ^ John Lurie in Chelsea, Basquiat Blog.
- ^ Sonkin, Victor (May 12, 2006). "Salon: The "preved" phenomenon gained enormous popularity on the Russian-language Internet with the speed of an avalanche.". The Moscow Times. Archived from the original on October 8, 2007. http://web.archive.org/web/20071008041947/http://context.themoscowtimes.com/story/167904/. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ "Gallery Brown shows John Lurie's "The Invention of Animals"". Art Knowledge News. http://www.artknowledgenews.com/2010-06-19-21-18-04-gallery-brown-shows-john-luries-the-invention-of-animals.html. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
- ^ Amorosi, A.D. (February 10, 2011). "Melancholy Mirth". The Inquirer Digital: Arts & Entertainment. Philly.com. http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20110210_MELANCHOLY_MIRTH.html. Retrieved March 4, 2011.
- ^ "John Lurie's Works on Paper". The Leonard Lopate Show. 2006-06-14..
- ^ a b Moody, Rick (June 24, 2011). "Swinging Modern Sounds #30: What Is and Is Not Masculine". In Stephen Elliott. The Rumpus. http://therumpus.net/2011/06/swinging-modern-sounds-30-what-is-and-is-not-masculine/. Retrieved June 26, 2011.
- ^ Forson, Kofi; Noah Becker, ed. (September 2009). "In Conversation with John Lurie". Whitehot Magazine. http://whitehotmagazine.com/articles/in-conversation-with-john-lurie/1948. Retrieved February 14, 2011.
- ^ Friend, Tad (August 16, 2010). "Sleeping With Weapons: Why did John Lurie disappear?" (abstract). The New Yorker (Condé Nast Digital): 51. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/16/100816fa_fact_friend. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
- ^ "Video: John Lurie and 'The Drawing Show'". News Desk. The New Yorker. August 9, 2010. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2010/08/video-john-lurie-the-drawing-show.html. Retrieved April 8, 2011.
- ^ a b Palmeri, Tara (May 26, 2011). "The squawk of the town: Hunger strike for New Yorker retraction". New York Post. NYP Holdings. http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/the_squawk_of_the_town_TfYrR65jsQqLEb0sfDU2LM. Retrieved June 5, 2011.
External links
Categories:- 1952 births
- Living people
- People from Minneapolis, Minnesota
- People from Worcester, Massachusetts
- American actors
- American television producers
- American jazz musicians
- American painters
- Artists from New York City
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