Desperately Seeking Something: A Memoir about Movies, Mothers, and Material Girls

After 40 years spent “on the less-glamorous side of the camera telling other people’s stories,” director Seidelman (Desperately Seeking Susan) takes a lively jaunt through her own. After a childhood spent in a Philadelphia suburb in the 1960s, Seidelman discovered a love for movies in college and later attended NYU’s graduate film school, finding inspiration in the 1970s feminist movement and the city’s buzzing, subversive punk subculture. Three years out of film school, she began work on Smithereens (1982), a movie that reflected her fascination with female characters who sought to “break out of the boxes they were stuck in,” and became the first low-budget independent American film to compete for the Palme d’Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival; her sophomore hit, Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), starred Madonna and catapulted her to mainstream success; she later directed the first four episodes of Sex and the City in 1997, among other projects. Interwoven with fascinating behind-the-scenes detail, Seidelman vividly traces the evolution of her artistic vision, combining the strong, feisty heroines of classic screwball comedies with the playful, postmodern spirit of New Wave film. It’s an enthralling look at a trailblazing filmmaker’s perseverance and vision. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House. (June)