Sitting on a Million
AKA the Mame Faye History Project
2008 single channel video (collaboration with Penny Lane)
THE SOMETIMES TRUE STORY OF MAME FAYE, who ran a world famous house of prostitution in Troy, New York for almost forty years (c. 1906 to 1941). Despite being snubbed by official historians, everyone past the age of retirement has a story - funny, sordid, unbelievable - about Troy's most famous madam.
SITTIN' ON A MILLION (2008, 26 minutes) presents these stories in all their contradictory glory, alongside vintage erotica, reenactments, and street performances.asks us to consider the role of memory and imagination in creating history, and reminds us about all those ordinary, extraordinary people erased from the official record.
More info at: http://www.mamefaye.com