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Fried Shoes, Cooked Diamonds

1978

Boulder

Documentary

A bearded man in round glasses, a blue jacket and a striped tie speaks in front of a brick wall, holding a briefcase.
Still from Fried Shoes, Cooked Diamonds (1978). © 1979 Carmina Cinematografica S.R.L. All Rights Reserved.
An older man in a gray jacket, a bearded man in glasses and a blond woman talk around a table covered with papers.
Still from Fried Shoes, Cooked Diamonds (1978). © 1979 Carmina Cinematografica S.R.L. All Rights Reserved.
Close-up of a bearded man with curly hair and round wire-rimmed glasses speaking in front of a brick wall.
Still from Fried Shoes, Cooked Diamonds (1978). © 1979 Carmina Cinematografica S.R.L. All Rights Reserved.

DIRECTED BY

Costanzo Allione

STARRING

Allen GinsbergGregory CorsoAnne WaldmanWilliam S. BurroughsTimothy Leary

PRODUCTION TYPE

Documentary

PRODUCTION COMPANY

Carmina Cinematografica

IMDb

See on IMDb (opens in new tab)

FILMED IN BOULDER

Boulder County’s part in this film is a school, not a landmark. In the summer of 1978 Costanzo Allione and an Italian crew filmed the summer faculty of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at the Naropa Institute in Boulder for Italian television, and the closing credits thank Naropa and its founder, Chögyam Trungpa. Scenes the Ginsberg estate places at Naropa include Gregory Corso’s workshops and a reading by Miguel Piñero and Miguel Algarín.

That year Naropa had offices at 1111 Pearl Street on the Pearl Street Mall and rented classrooms around downtown Boulder, but no account we found ties a scene to a building. Not all of the film is local. The protest was shot on the railroad tracks near the Rocky Flats plant, twelve miles from Boulder by Ginsberg’s narration, on a site mostly in Jefferson County. The director’s audio release lists recordings from outside the county, such as a Timothy Leary class in Greeley, without saying which reached the film.

ABOUT

In the summer of 1978 an Italian crew follows the poets teaching at Naropa’s Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, catching them in class, at readings and at home. Allen Ginsberg narrates, introducing old friends and younger colleagues, among them William S. Burroughs, Gregory Corso, Peter Orlovsky, Amiri Baraka, Diane di Prima, Anne Waldman and Timothy Leary, while Fernanda Pivano questions several of them about poetry, Buddhism and politics. Partway through, the group joins an anti-nuclear protest near the Rocky Flats weapons plant.

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