The New Yorker:

The artist Samantha Nye tries to drum up models for a shoot of a female-only “pleasure party” at the Belvedere Guest House, the all-male gay compound.

By H. C. Wilentz

From the ferry to Cherry Grove, a historic queer enclave on Fire Island, the Belvedere Guest House looks like a plate of meringues. Closer up, pastel gates and an ornate fountain hint at the compound’s high-camp interior. As a rule, the guests are all men. But this year an artist and onetime Guggenheim-grant recipient named Samantha Nye persuaded the Belvedere’s owners to let her rent the grounds for a four-day film project—a lesbian takeover of the inner sanctum.

Several weeks before the shoot, in the waning days of the regular season, Nye walked two freshly thawed cakes to a community center situated a few blocks from the Belvedere, to serve at an afternoon casting call. She was looking for ten to fifteen lesbians over the age of sixty for a large group scene that she referred to as a “pleasure party.” She had secured soft commitments from a few out-of-towners, including a former nun, but, given the cost of accommodations in Cherry Grove, she needed to drum up interest among the locals.

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