Watch a few of his appearances on Late Night with David Letterman here.
In addition to his autobiographies, Crisp also wrote books like How to Have a Life Style (1975), Doing It with Style (1981), Manners from Heaven (1985) and Resident Alien: The New York Diaries (1997), a compilation of columns he wrote for the New York Native, a gay New York City newspaper.Ĭrisp was a frequent guest on talk shows throughout the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s. Watch Sting talk about the song and his friendship with Crisp in this interview. In 1987, the musician Sting was inspired by Crisp to write the song “An Englishman in New York.” Crisp starred in the music video, which you can see here. Crisp revisited the play 20 years later to rave reviews. The show opened at the Players Theatre in New York City on December 20, 1978. He reprised the role in a sequel over 30 years later.įollowing the film’s success, Crisp toured the UK and North America with a celebrated one-man show titled An Evening with Quentin Crisp. John Hurt starred as Crisp and earned a BAFTA award for his performance. In 1975, The Naked Civil Servant was adapted for the screen. Chalk portrait of a young Quentin Crisp, made by the British artist Dorothy Colles while she was studying art at the Slade School, London, 1930s. You can see some of the portraits he sat for (as well as some glamorous photos of young Crisp by Angus McBean) in the National Portrait Gallery’s collection. įor most of his adult life, Crisp earned a modest living by working as an artist’s model.
Mitchell interviewed Crisp in his famously grubby one-room apartment for the investigative current affairs program World in Action watch the segment her e. Ĭrisp’s first memoir, The Naked Civil Servant, brought him to the attention of documentarian Denis Mitchell. Also check out LGBTQ-related items from the London Metropolitan Archives and the Museum of London. To better understand Crisp’s world, read this short history of LGBTQ rights in the UK or take a deeper dive with Peter Ackroyd’s Queer City: Gay London from the Romans to the Present Day and Queer London : Perils and Pleasures in the Sexual Metropolis, 1918-1957 by Matt Houlbrook. Find out more in the three installments of Crisp’s autobiography: The Naked Civil Servant (1968), How to Become a Virgin (1981), and The Last Word (published posthumously in 2017 excerpt here ).
Hear the author, raconteur, and provocateur in a 1970 conversation with Studs Terkel before he found late-in-life fame.įor a brief overview of Quentin Crisp’s life, read this 1999 New York Times obituary. Episode Notesįrom a young age, Quentin Crisp was determined to be himself-makeup, painted nails, dramatically dyed hair, and all-even if it consigned him to a life of poverty and isolation. Credit: Simon Dack Archive/Alamy Stock Photo.