Warhol's beach movie where everyone's horny, no one surfs, and urine makes you legit.
Viva and Taylor Mead are a married couple renting an extra beach-house to a group of surfers sent to them by a Mr. Morrissey of La Jolla Realty. Their daughter, Ingrid Superstar, is pregnant and on the hunt for a husband. Mr. Mead, who is gay, tries to pawn her off to one of the surfers. Meanwhile, Viva wants a divorce from her boy-crazy hubby, who wants a surfer of his own. Tom, a surfer, is inveigled by Mr. Mead to urinate on him. In a close-up, Mr. Mead receives Tom's offering ecstatically, after which he comments, "I'm a real surfer now."
Acting
Taylor Mead's unhinged, genuine delight in every absurd moment.
Direction
Warhol's static camera forces you to witness uncomfortable intimacy.
Production
The Factory's beach house becomes a surreal stage for desire.
Director
Andy Warhol
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Warhol supposedly filmed this in California to escape a Factory rent dispute, making it his only West Coast production. The surfing footage was largely unusable because no one actually knew how to surf.
This was Warhol's attempt to make a mainstream beach party movie—the genre's commercial peak—while systematically dismantling every convention: heterosexual romance, narrative closure, and the very concept of 'acting.'
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