“Make Me Famous” (2021) is a documentary primarily about painter Edward Brezinski, legal name Edward James Brzezinski, and the New Wave art movement in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, retroactively described as the neo-expressionist movement. Eventually it segues into exploring his origins in Detroit before moving to San Francisco to study at the San Francisco Institute of Art then solving the mystery of what Brezinski did after he left New York City. Married couple filmmakers and producers, former actor turned director, cowriter and editor Brian Vincent and cowriter, additional cinematographer and film’s publicist Heather Spore, knock it out of the park in their feature film debut. Vincent and Spore bring the past to life and implicitly create a documentary about how the avant garde transforms as they age and the privilege of living long enough to become a resource while witnessing the next big thing.
“Make Me Famous” centers a starving, known but not financially successful artist with fame elusively swirling around him. Having home videos of Brezinski at the full flush of his youth and strength makes it feel as if he participated and would have been thrilled over all the attention even posthumously. The documentary features the best of both worlds: showing the common story about what happens to a man with big dreams who never obtains them contrasted with those who got what they aimed for. According to his vocal, former opponent, fellow painter Duncan Hannah, the most successful of them all is painter David McDermott, who used to date Brezinski and offers the most commentary about his former lover. Hannah sits in an Irish countryside mansion living his best life showing that his youthful exploits were just him on a budget. He styles himself like Tom Wolfe, a look shared with another painter who stayed stateside, Peter McGough, but McGough differentiates his look with a tiny lap dog who remains mum and unnamed throughout the confessional.
While most of the film is chronological, occasionally the filmmakers rewind to an earlier time, San Francisco, before moving forward then returning to his childhood. It may be the film’s only flaw, but it is not a dealbreaker. The Brzezinski family makes an appearance, including cousins Edward, Sally and Ted with some lifechanging news that never got to their elusive and unusual family member. Berlin neighbor Gerald Kuklinski talks about witnessing Brezinski at his lowest point. They tell the complete story of Brezinski’s life when he was not trying to become rich and famous. Robert Metzger, the director emeritus at the Detroit Institute of Arts, explains Brezinski’s early artist influences, which also sheds a light on the ripple effect in New York and on numerous people who never knew Brezinski, including the filmmakers.
In the interest of full disclosure, I do not know Vincent, and if he is related to me, I am unaware of it. If I was, the relationship could have been a thumb on the scale against receiving a glowing review, but “Make Me Famous” is so absorbing that I would have no choice but to surrender and praise this documentary. Vincent dives into a vast archive of home videos and archival coverage, montages of paintings, fliers, posters, photographs and newspapers to recreate the past before fast forwarding to the present like a cinematic then and now profile of the people whom he elicits exclusive interviews from. Though the participants may have different takes on what happened, everyone has receipts to prove that it did happen. It is like watching the past unfold with absolutely no one having a decorous or diplomatic bone in their body. Everyone is just as passionate as they were back then about what happened, how successful they were and who was right, even if it was not them. One man clutches a book because he was in it. A moviegoer loves a dishy interviewee, and Vincent got the cooperation of plenty of the people who were in the rooms where it happened.
Though the interviewees are unflinching in their assessment of their friend and acquaintance, the commentary never feels unkind. Besides the earlier aforementioned interviewees, others include model and writer Claudia Summers and her husband photographer Marcus Leatherdale, Limbo Lounge co-owner Tri Garraty, videographer Jim C, and art collector Lenny Kisko. Among the artists are Mark Kostabi, Kenny Scharf, Eric Bogosian, and Julie Jo Fehre. Gallerists Annina Nosei, Patti Astor and Patrick Fox drop in to share some riveting tales, especially Nosei, who may deserve her own documentary considering she was the taste maker who discovered Basquiat. It is no surprise that most of the interviewees are painters such as Robert Hawkins, Walter Robinson, Sur Rodney Sur, Frank Holliday, Richard Hambleton, William Rand, and Jim Radacovich.
From early in “Make Me Famous,” a tale about Brezinski eating art makes the rounds, and Radacovich is the artist who provided the snack. It is just one example of the filmmakers’ comprehensiveness. Art historian Joseph Masheck is not just a talking head who kept his nose in books. He lived during that era and was part of the scene on 3rd Street. Seeming more staid than their younger selves could ever imagine, all these people were just young, wild adventurers and now they are part of the art world establishment watching art evolve or rehash past movements. Considering that their nights out transformed into attending funerals when members of their community died from AIDS or overdose, aging and bearing witness become more coveted than success as only photographs allow Basquiat, Kooning and David Wojnarowicz, among many others, to appear as still images, not active participants.
“Make Me Famous” is not just about the art world in one of the grungiest areas in Manhattan or artists but is like watching a study of how people live, age and die. Musician Marguerite Van Cook and artist James Romberger, a married couple, turn out to be Brezinski’ eternal ride-or-die friends who make the pilgrimage across the pond with the filmmakers to uncover the mystery of what happened to him. Seeing how those two transform from a carefree couple to a mature partnership is one of the most beautiful works of art displayed in the film.
It is not disclosed in “Make Me Famous,” but Vincent is Hambleton’s executor. This documentary almost deserves a prequel to explain how Vincent got to know Hambleton then how Hambleton’s community basically trusted and embraced this younger man, an artist in a different form of media, so much that they supported his film. After recently seeing “The Chaplain and the Doctor” (2025), I’m going to stop taking it for granted when a filmmaker is upfront about their involvement in the process. Vincent and Spore are not obtrusive, but they allow some seams to show and reveal how they locate and interview people when there is not a connection and the way is not smoothed over. While the audience is watching a finished, polished product, the sheer logistical coordination, interpersonal skill and cooperation in collaboration required to complete a film that may primarily take place in New York City but includes the entire nation and parts of Europe should not be glossed over. So many different types of people had to trust him and not all of them yearn for the spotlight. It is not just a good film. It is a great model of how art, filmmaking and real relationships can make history and community without the conventional ties of blood.
