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Andrea Feldman (April 1, 1948 – August 8, 1972) was an American actress and a Warhol superstar. A native New Yorker, she starred in several of Warhol’s underground movies, such as Trash, before committing suicide in 1972.^[1]

Biography

Feldman was a regular in the backroom of Max's Kansas City where she was noted for her exhibitionist nature, pioneering a performance she called "Showtime" in which she performed a sexual act with a coke bottle, and for her heavy dependence on drugs, particularly amphetamines.^[2]

Feldman had a small but memorable role in Andy Warhol's "Trash" (1970), as a spaced-out rich girl with an LSD obsession. She was also featured in a 1970 documentary called "Groupies", where she referred to herself by a nickname given to her by the Warhol crowd: Andrea "Whips" Feldman. She also often referred to herself as "Andrea Warhol".

In August 1972, Feldman summoned several ex-boyfriends, including poet Jim Carroll, to the New York City apartment of her parents so that they would be witness to her "final starring role", her suicide. Feldman was holding a can of Coca-Cola in one hand and a rosary in the other when she jumped from the fourteenth floor of 51 Fifth Avenue and 12th Street.^[3]

Feldman’s suicide preceded the release of Andy Warhol's Heat, in which she had a significant role much larger than in the previous Warhol film, by only three weeks. ^[4] Feldman's performance garnered positive reviews. Judith Christ, a critic for New York magazine wrote:

"The most striking performance - in large part non-performance - comes from the late Andrea Feldman as the flat-voiced, freaked-out daughter, a mass of psychotic confusion, infantile and heart-breaking."^[3]

Filmography

• **** (Four Stars) aka 24 Hour Movie (1967)
• Groupies (1970) documentary
• Trash (1970)
• Heat (1972)

References

External links

• Andrea Feldman at the Internet Movie Database