The film depicts the life of a former child actor, who has become a male prostitute. He has an affair with a former starlet who tries to revive his acting career. Since she is a former actress herself, her assistance is useless to him.
Plot
Joey Davis is an unemployed former child star who supports himself as a hustler in Los Angeles. Joey uses sex to get his landlady to reduce his rent, then seduces Sally Todd, a former Hollywood starlet.
Sally tries to help Joey revive his career but her status as a mediocre ex-actress proves to be quite useless. Sally's psychotic daughter, Jessica, further complicates the relationship between Sally and the cynical, emotionally numb Joey.
The film was well received at Cannes and the New York Film Festival screening was standing-room only and was received by a generally enthusiastic crowd however three people walked out, with one lady claiming "It's the most disgusting thing I have ever seen" and referring to the films of the era "Make them, make them, just don't show them to anybody."[5][4]
At a panel discussion following the New York Film Festival screening, Otto Preminger called it "depressingly entertaining".[4] After previously ignoring most Warhol films, the New York Daily News reviewed the film, with Kathleen Carroll awarding it three stars.[7] The advert for the film was censored in the Daily News with a t-shirt painted on Dallesandro and a bra strap on Miles.[7]
Andrea Feldman, who had a much larger role than in previous Warhol films,[8] died shortly before the film was released, jumping from the fourteenth floor of her parents' apartment.[9] Her performance garnered positive reviews, with Judith Crist, writing in New York magazine, "The most striking performance, in large part non-performance, comes from the late Andrea Feldman, as the flat-voiced, freaked-out daughter, a mass of psychotic confusion, infantile and heart-breaking."[9]
